Restoration Objective:
This study aimed to determine how long the seaweed species composition and coverage on the artificial reef takes to reach the climax as the natural reef? To address the above research question, the objective of this study is to monitor and compare the brown seaweed, especially the Sargassaceae distribution and coverage multi-temporally at five points, as well as to investigate their succession over the observation times (second and fourth years) on the artificial reef constructed in Wakasa Bay, Japan.
Site Selection Criteria:
The artificial reefs were constructed in Wakasa Bay (Fig. 1). This bay is located in the Japan Sea at Honshu Island between the Cape Echizen at the east and the Cape Kyoga at the west. Fukui Prefecture installed the artificial reef near a natural reef in Hiruga offing in the east part of the bay. The water depth on the east side (Stns. 1–4) is approximately 8–10 m and that on the west side is approximately 6–8 m, and the bottom sediment is sand. On the other hand, the water depth on the natural reef (Stn. 5) is approximately 5–6 m, and the bottom sediment is greenstone (Nakae et al., 2002). A natural reef extends from the artificial reef toward the land side.
