Fish use of restored mangroves matches that in natural mangroves regardless of forest age

The loss and degradation of mangrove forests have triggered global restoration efforts to support biodiversity ecosystem services, including fish stock enhancement. As accelerates, it is important evaluate outcomes for species that play functional roles in ecosystems yet this remains a clear knowledge gap. There remarkably little information, example, about how use mangroves varies as restored vegetation matures, hampering include fisheries benefits natural capital assessments restoration. We used unbaited underwater cameras within two distinct zones forests—fringe interior—at five pairs restored-natural sites increasing age from southeast Queensland, Australia. deep learning automatically extract data the four most common species: yellowfin bream (Acanthopagrus australis), sea mullet (Mugil cephalus), toadfish (Tetractenos hamiltoni), silverbiddy (Gerres subfasciatus). abundance these varied among zones, but was equal or greater compared paired sites. Despite younger having dramatically lower structural complexity, abundances did not increase with site maturity. Furthermore, while were more abundant fringe zone, we observed similarities interior across all Our paired, space-for-time design provides powerful test fish, highlighting even newly immature are readily utilized by key species.