The Roles of Bryozoans in Modern Coral Reefs

Cuffey, Roger

Contrary to impressions gained from the literature, collecting in the living reefs of Bermuda, Eniwetok, and Eleuthera implies that bryozoans are common and diversified in at least some modern coral reefs. In all the reefs examined, encrusting cheilostomes are the most abundant and diversified bryozoans. Tuft-like cheilostomes, and lichenoporid and idmoneid cyclostomes, frequently are moderately important. Reteporid and aeteid cheilostomes, and crisiid cyclostomes, are also occasionally encountered. Never the principal frame-builders, the bryozoans do reinforce the reef mass by encrusting the undersides of coral heads, rock ledges, and rock fragments, and by locally partially filling cavities deep within the reef. These animals do not form significant amounts of loose carbonate sediment, nor do they trap or bind such sediment. A few bryozoans drift epiplanktonically through the surface waters around some reefs. Some cyclostome bryozoans may participate in the cryptic sclerosponge-brachiopod community of modem reefs. Correlation of bryozoan morphologic variations with environmental- factor fluctuations may eventually be possible. Of interest to students of living reefs and bryozoans, clarification of the roles played by bryozoans in modern reefs will also be valuable for paleontologists studying both fossil reefs and bryozoan evolutionary history.

The Roles of Bryozoans in Modern Coral Reefs

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