scholarly journals Fishers' Ecological Knowledge and Stable Isotope Analysis Reveal Mangrove Estuaries as Key Developmental Habitats for Critically Endangered Sea Turtles

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn R. Wedemeyer-Strombel ◽  
Jeffrey A. Seminoff ◽  
Michael J. Liles ◽  
Ramón Neftali Sánchez ◽  
Sofía Chavarría ◽  
...  

Successful conservation of endangered, migratory species requires an understanding of habitat use throughout life stages. When dedicated scientific studies are difficult to conduct, local expert knowledge can provide crucial baseline data to guide study design and aid data interpretation. In 2008, fishers in El Salvador demonstrated that eastern Pacific hawksbill sea turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata)—a population conservation biologists considered virtually extirpated—use mangrove estuaries as nesting habitat rather than open-coast beaches used by hawksbills in other regions. We confirmed and amplified this observation by using fishers' ecological knowledge to guide biological sampling for stable isotope analysis to assess if eastern Pacific hawskbills use mangrove-dominated estuaries as developmental habitats. We found that immature hawksbills experience a pelagic stage and then recruit to estuaries at ~37 cm curved carapace length, where they increase reliance on estuarine resources until they approach adult sizes. This life history strategy makes them especially vulnerable to in-water nearshore threats, and necessitates targeted expansion of conservation efforts throughout the eastern Pacific. Our analysis also provides a model for integrating traditional scientific approaches with local knowledge—a model that could yield crucial advances in other understudied regions.

2016 ◽  
Vol 67 (10) ◽  
pp. 1434 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. M. Parsons ◽  
M. A. Morrison ◽  
B. M. Gillanders ◽  
K. D. Clements ◽  
S. J. Bury ◽  
...  

Defining appropriate management units to balance productivity and yield of exploited species is fundamental to effective resource management. Anecdotal and tag–recapture information related to morphology, movement behaviour and life-history strategy suggest that separate groups of snapper (Chrysophrys auratus) exist in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand. To address the existence of discrete groups, we examined morphology, meristics and otolith chemistry from snapper collected throughout the Hauraki Gulf. We also used tag–recapture information, stable isotope analysis and interpreted functional aspects of morphology and meristics data to understand potential life-history strategy differences. Snapper from rocky reef habitats did not display morphology and meristic features distinct from snapper from soft sediment habitats and differences in otolith chemistry and stable isotope ratios could respectively be explained by a locational influence and predominance of kelp in rocky reef food webs. Conversely, snapper collected from a known spawning area had distinct morphological and meristic features consistent with semi–pelagic sparids and stable isotope analysis also indicated a potentially more pelagic and higher trophic-level diet. Maintenance of population complexity such as this is generally beneficial to fish populations, and can be achieved by revisiting the spatial units used for fishery management.


2019 ◽  
Vol 166 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Luciana Medeiros ◽  
Danielle S. Monteiro ◽  
Silvina Botta ◽  
Maíra C. Proietti ◽  
Eduardo R. Secchi

2003 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. T. Short ◽  
Gottfried P. Kibelka ◽  
Robert H. Byrne ◽  
David Hollander

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Mortensen ◽  
◽  
Nathan D. Stansell ◽  
Byron A. Steinman ◽  
Gilles Y. Brocard ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Andreas Hilkert ◽  
John K. Böhlke ◽  
Stanley J. Mroczkowski ◽  
Kyle L. Fort ◽  
Konstantin Aizikov ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
Petra Vaiglova ◽  
John Coleman ◽  
Charlotte Diffey ◽  
Vasiliki Tzevelekidi ◽  
Melanie Fillios ◽  
...  

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