By 2004, Belize was exhibiting classic fishing down of the food web. Groupers (Serranidae) and snappers (Lutjanidae) were scarce and fisheries turned to parrotfishes (Scarinae), leading to a 41% decline in their biomass. Several policies were enacted in 2009–2010, including a moratorium on fishing parrotfish and a new marine park with no-take areas. Using a 20-year time series on reef fish and benthos, we evaluated the impact of these policies approximately 10 years after their implementation. Establishment of the Southwater Caye Marine Reserve led to a recovery of snapper at 2 out of 3 sites, but there was no evidence of recovery outside the reserve. Snapper populations in an older reserve continued to increase, implying that at least 9 years is required for their recovery. Despite concerns over the feasibility of banning parrotfish harvest once it has become a dominant fin fishery, parrotfishes returned and exceeded biomass levels prior to the fishery. The majority of these changes involved an increase in parrotfish density; species composition and adult body size generally exhibited little change. Recovery occurred equally well in reserves and areas open to other forms of fishing, implying strong compliance. Temporal trends in parrotfish grazing intensity were strongly negatively associated with the cover of macroalgae, which by 2018 had fallen to the lowest levels observed since measurements began in 1998. Coral populations remained resilient and continued to exhibit periods of net recovery after disturbance. We found that a moratorium on parrotfish harvesting is feasible and appears to help constrain macroalgae, which can otherwise impede coral resilience.

中文翻译：

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海洋保护区、渔业禁令和珊瑚礁生态系统 20 年的积极变化

到 2004 年，伯利兹展示了对食物网的经典捕捞。石斑鱼 (Serranidae) 和鲷鱼 (Lutjanidae) 稀少，渔业转向鹦鹉鱼 (Scarinae)，导致其生物量下降 41%。2009 年至 2010 年颁布了多项政策，包括暂停捕捞鹦嘴鱼和新建一个设有禁捕区的海洋公园。使用珊瑚鱼和底栖生物的 20 年时间序列，我们评估了这些政策在实施大约 10 年后的影响。Southwater Caye 海洋保护区的建立导致 3 个地点中的 2 个地点恢复了鲷鱼，但在保护区外没有恢复的证据。较旧保护区的鲷鱼种群继续增加，这意味着它们的恢复至少需要 9 年的时间。尽管人们担心在鹦鹉鱼成为主要的鳍渔业后禁止捕捞鹦鹉鱼的可行性，但鹦鹉鱼在渔业之前返回并超过了生物量水平。这些变化中的大部分涉及鹦鹉鱼密度的增加。物种组成和成虫体型一般变化不大。在保护区和对其他形式的捕捞开放的地区恢复得同样好，这意味着严格遵守。鹦鹉鱼放牧强度的时间趋势与大型藻类的覆盖率呈强烈负相关，到 2018 年已降至自 1998 年开始测量以来观察到的最低水平。珊瑚种群保持弹性，并在受到干扰后继续表现出净恢复期。我们发现暂停鹦鹉鱼捕捞是可行的，似乎有助于抑制大型藻类，