Resumen del producto

Strong relationships exist between reef fishes and their habitat, anthropogenic habitat alterations maylead variations in the associated fish. Knowledge of fish species distribution over coastal areas heavilyimpacted by tourism over the Mexican Central Pacific is scarce. This work aims to identify the reef fishspecies on different coastal habitats (sand, rock, mud) present in Puerto Marques Bay. The fish communitywas characterized in terms of species richness, abundance, feeding behavior and was further assessedusing similarity analysis. The number of species and the relative abundance of fish species recorded variedsignificantly among the habitats (ANOSIM test: R = 0.676, P < 0.01, 999 permutations). In rocky areas, thehighest value of richness, exclusive species and the number of organisms were recorded. In comparisonwith soft bottoms, the complexity of hard substrates plays a significant role in reducing prey abundancesand providing nesting sites and different food resources such as invertebrates and macroalgae. Mugilcephalus was the only species recorded with muddy habitat affinity, where it feeds on detritus. Predatoryspecies like Caranx caballus, Lutjanus jordani and Lutjanus peru, generally associated with complex rockysubstrates were recorded exclusively in sandy areas near to the tourist marina. Although our data do notallow to conclude the anthropogenic outcomes in the reef fish community structure, they suggest thatfish assemblage from sandy bottoms could be affected by the presence of artificial structures.

Palabras clave: Acapulco City; reef fish; Anthropogenic disturbances; Central Mexican Pacific; trophic groups

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