Lost opportunities: coral recruitment does not translate to reef recovery in the Florida Keys.

We tested the hypothesis that the poor recovery of the coral populations on reefs in the Florida Keys is related to low coral recruitment. In the summer of 2011, we deployed 240 terracotta tiles at eight study sites in a balanced design: (i) among three depths; and (ii) between fished and unfished reefs. Corals recruited to ∼ 40% of the deployed tiles, with more corals settling on tiles on unfished reefs than on fished reefs. The apparent effect of protection was not a consequence of different densities of herbivorous fishes, but was more likely related to local hydrography and the tendency of the no-take reserves to act as larval sinks, particularly in the lower Florida Keys. There was a mismatch between the coral taxa that recruited and the adult coral assemblages, suggesting that recruits were arriving but not surviving to contribute to coral recovery.