This chapter deals with benthic invertebrates inhabiting the extensive inter-reef soft bottom habitats
and those occurring on the reef, excluding corals. For the remainder of the chapter, the term ‘benthic
invertebrate’ refers to all invertebrates excluding corals. An assessment of the impacts of climate
change on non-coral benthic invertebrates poses particular challenges: i) benthic invertebrates
include an extraordinary diversity of marine organisms, including many microscopic, infaunal,
boring or ephemeral species that can be difficult to sample and are poorly known taxonomically; ii)
benthic invertebrates employ a diversity of reproductive strategies, broadly including planktotrophy
(development through feeding larvae), lecithotrophy (development through non-feeding larvae) and
direct development (release of post-metamorphic juveniles), as well as asexual reproduction, making
broad generalisations of dispersal capabilities difficult; iii) factors determining species distributions are
poorly known for most species; iv) benthic invertebrates exhibit a tremendous variety of lifestyles and
forms, including colonial, sedentary and errant species; v) many species include either a pelagic larval
or adult stage, so effects of climate change may vary during their lives (see McKinnon et al. chapter 6
for comments on planktonic forms); and, vi) research on the biogeography of benthic invertebrates
on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is strongly biased towards commercial or destructive species.This is Chapter 11 of Climate change and the Great Barrier Reef: a vulnerability assessment. The entire book can be found at http://hdl.handle.net/11017/13
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