scholarly journals Year-Round Movements of Sooty Terns (Onychoprion fuscatus) Nesting Within One of the Atlantic’s Largest Marine Protected Areas

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. James Reynolds ◽  
Colin P. Wearn ◽  
B. John Hughes ◽  
Roger C. Dickey ◽  
Lucy J. H. Garrett ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Marine Protected Area ◽  
Population Declines ◽  
Marine Habitats ◽  
Ascension Island ◽  
Range Overlap ◽  
Anthropogenic Threats ◽  
Onychoprion Fuscatus ◽  
Effective Conservation ◽  
Foraging Ranges

Seabirds are among the most threatened birds as a result of acute exposure to many anthropogenic threats. Their effective conservation requires a detailed understanding of how seabirds use marine habitats. Recently, one of the largest no-take marine reserves in the Atlantic was designated in tropical waters surrounding Ascension Island, on which the largest Atlantic population of sooty terns (Onychoprion fuscatus) breeds. Although they are the most abundant tropical seabird, they appear to have suffered marked population declines on Ascension Island as they have elsewhere. Here, we describe year-round movements and habitat use of male and female sooty terns between 2011 and 2015. On average, birds traveled 47,000 km during their 8 months of migration, during which they remained within 2,900 km of the island. They spent most of the day and night in flight, only touching down briefly on the ocean most likely to feed. Habitat suitability models successfully predicted foraging ranges of birds and their at-sea distributions varied considerably between seasons, years and sexes. Considerable variation in range overlap between birds and the new marine protected area (MPA) suggests that similar such studies of other marine taxa are urgently needed. The range of sooty terns mainly falls in the high seas outside of the new MPA, highlighting the very large areas that many oceanic seabirds forage across and the challenges their conservation present.

scholarly journals Guidelines for Marine Protected Areas

2000 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 352
Author(s):  
Mark Westera
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Site Selection ◽  
Protected Area ◽  
Marine Protected Area ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Economic Aspect ◽  
Financial Sustainability ◽  
Broad Application

Guidelines to marine protected areas is a collation of efforts from the IUCN, NOAA and Cardiff University, among others. It is aimed at managers and would be managers of marine parks, but will also be of use to anyone involved in the Marine Protected Area (MPA) process from conceptual planning to establishment, monitoring and management. Its broad application takes into account the hurdles that a manager is likely to encounter. There are nine sections, an introduction, an evaluation of the legal framework required to successfully establish MPAs, a discussion on dealing with all the relevant parties, involving communities and other stakeholders, site selection, planning and managing MPAs, zoning, evaluating economic aspect and financial sustainability, and finally a section on research, monitoring and review. Boxes are used throughout the text within each chapter to summarize important points and make for quick reference to the topic of that chapter.

Seabird foraging ranges as a preliminary tool for identifying candidate Marine Protected Areas

2012 ◽  
Vol 156 ◽  
pp. 53-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris B. Thaxter ◽  
Ben Lascelles ◽  
Kate Sugar ◽  
Aonghais S.C.P. Cook ◽  
Staffan Roos ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Foraging Ranges

scholarly journals Evaluating the potential for transboundary management of marine biodiversity in the Western Indian Ocean

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
NOam Levin
Keyword(s):  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Western Indian Ocean ◽  
Marine Biodiversity ◽  
Transboundary Conservation ◽  
External Powers ◽  
Conservation Investment ◽  
Effective Conservation ◽  
Regional Conservation

The economic and socio-political interactions between countries can have major impacts on transboundary conservation decisions and outcomes. Here, we examined for 14 Western Indian Ocean (WIO) continental and island nations the extent of their marine coral reef species, fisheries and marine protected areas (MPAs), in the context of their geopolitical and socio-economic connections. We also examined the role of external countries and organisations in collaboration within the region. We found large variation between the different countries in their protected area size, and management, which result from different interests in establishing the MPAs, ranging from fisheries management, biodiversity conservation to asserting sovereignty claims. Seventy-four per cent of the 154 MPAs in the region belong to island nations; however, the largest MPAs in the WIO were established by European powers, and include Mayotte and Glorioso Islands (France) and Chagos (UK). While the majority of MPAs are managed by individual countries, between-country collaboration within and outside the region is key if the aim is to achieve effective conservation of ecosystems and species across the island and mainland nations in the region. This may be advanced by creating transboundary MPAs and by regional conservation investment by external powers that benefit from the region’s resources.

scholarly journals Decline of unique Pontocaspian biodiversity in the Black Sea Basin: a review

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aleksandre Gogaladze ◽  
Mikhail Son ◽  
Matteo Lattuada ◽  
Vitaliy Anistratenko ◽  
Vitaly Syomin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Black Sea ◽  
Species Distribution ◽  
The Black Sea ◽  
Distribution Data ◽  
Past Century ◽  
Detailed Knowledge ◽  
The Past ◽  
Mollusc Species ◽  
Anthropogenic Threats ◽  
Effective Conservation

Aim The unique aquatic Pontocaspian (PC) biota of the Black Sea Basin (BSB) is in decline. Lack of detailed knowledge on the status and trends of species, populations and communities hampers a thorough risk assessment and precludes effective conservation. This paper aims to review PC biodiversity trends using endemic molluscs as a model group. We aim to assess changes in PC habitats, community structure and species distribution over the past century and to identify direct anthropogenic threats. Location Black Sea Basin (Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Ukraine and Russia). Methods Presence/absence data of target mollusc species was assembled from literature, reports and personal observations. PC biodiversity trends in the NW BSB coastal regions were established by comparing 20th and 21st century occurrences. Direct drivers of habitat and biodiversity change were identified and documented. Results A very strong decline of PC species and communities during the past century is driven by a) damming of rivers, b) habitat modifications negatively affecting salinity gradients, c) pollution and eutrophication, d) invasive alien species and e) climate change. Four out of 10 studied regions, namely, the Danube Delta – Razim Lake system, Dniester Liman, Dnieper-South Bug Estuary and Taganrog Bay-Don Delta contain the entire spectrum of ecological conditions to support PC communities and still host threatened endemic PC mollusc species. Distribution data is incomplete, but the scale of deterioration of PC species and communities is evident from the assembled data, as are major direct threats. Main conclusions PC biodiversity in the BSB is profoundly affected by human activities. Standardised observation and collection data as well as precise definition of PC biota and habitats are necessary for targeted conservation actions. This study will help to set the research and policy agenda required to improve data collection to accommodate effective conservation of the unique PC biota.

scholarly journals Spain and Marine Protected Areas: Recent Developments

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 847-855
Author(s):  
Mariano J. Aznar
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Protected Area ◽  
Biological Diversity ◽  
Marine Protected Area ◽  
Natura 2000 ◽  
Convention On Biological Diversity ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Barcelona Convention ◽  
Specially Protected Areas

Abstract Spain has just declared a new marine protected area in the Mediterranean. This follows a protective trend taken by Spanish authorities during the last decades and has permitted Spain to honour its international compromises under the Convention on Biological Diversity. It contributes to a framework of protected areas established under conventional regimes such as OSPAR, RAMSAR or EU Natura 2000. The new area protects a ‘cetacean corridor’ and will be inscribed in the list of Specially Protected Areas of Mediterranean Importance under the Barcelona Convention regional framework.

scholarly journals Detection of Stones in Marine Habitats Combining Simultaneous Hydroacoustic Surveys

Geosciences ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (8) ◽  
pp. 279 ◽  
Author(s):  
Svenja Papenmeier ◽  
H. Hass
Keyword(s):  
Marine Protected Area ◽  
Benthic Communities ◽  
Sediment Surface ◽  
Sidescan Sonar ◽  
Marine Biodiversity ◽  
Outer Reef ◽  
Single Beam ◽  
Marine Deposits ◽  
Marine Habitats ◽  
High Backscatter

Exposed stones in sandy sublittoral environments are hotspots for marine biodiversity, especially for benthic communities. The detection of single stones is principally possible using sidescan-sonar (SSS) backscatter data. The data resolution has to be high to visualize the acoustic shadows of the stones. Otherwise, stony substrates will not be differentiable from other high backscatter substrates (e.g., gravel). Acquiring adequate sonar data and identifying stones in backscatter images is time consuming because it usually requires visual-manual procedures. To develop a more efficient identification and demarcation procedure of stone fields, sidescan sonar and parametric echo sound data were recorded within the marine protected area of “Sylt Outer Reef” (German Bight, North Sea). The investigated area (~5.900 km2) is characterized by dispersed heterogeneous moraine and marine deposits. Data from parametric sediment echo sounder indicate hyperbolas at the sediment surface in stony areas, which can easily be exported. By combining simultaneous recorded low backscatter data and parametric single beam data, stony grounds were demarcated faster, less complex and reproducible from gravelly substrates indicating similar high backscatter in the SSS data.

scholarly journals A Synthesis of Opportunities for Applying the Telecoupling Framework to Marine Protected Areas

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (16) ◽  
pp. 4450
Author(s):  
Vanessa Hull ◽  
Christian J. Rivera ◽  
Chad Wong
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Environmental Sustainability ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Polluted Water ◽  
Marine Biodiversity ◽  
The World ◽  
The Face ◽  
Sustainability Challenges ◽  
Anthropogenic Threats

The world’s oceans face unprecedented anthropogenic threats in the globalized era that originate from all over the world, including climate change, global trade and transportation, and pollution. Marine protected areas (MPAs) serve important roles in conservation of marine biodiversity and ecosystem resilience, but their success is increasingly challenged in the face of such large-scale threats. Here, we illustrate the utility of adopting the interdisciplinary telecoupling framework to better understand effects that originate from distant places and cross MPA boundaries (e.g., polluted water circulation, anthropogenic noise transport, human and animal migration). We review evidence of distal processes affecting MPAs and the cutting-edge approaches currently used to investigate these processes. We then introduce the umbrella framework of telecoupling and explain how it can help address knowledge gaps that exist due to limitations of past approaches that are centered within individual disciplines. We then synthesize five examples from the recent telecoupling literature to explore how the telecoupling framework can be used for MPA research. These examples include the spatial subsidies approach, adapted social network analysis, telecoupled qualitative analysis, telecoupled supply chain analysis, and decision support tools for telecoupling. Our work highlights the potential for the telecoupling framework to better understand and address the mounting and interconnected socioeconomic and environmental sustainability challenges faced by the growing number of MPAs around the world.

Rock lobster movement patterns and population structure within a Tasmanian Marine Protected Area inform fishery and conservation management

2009 ◽  
Vol 60 (5) ◽  
pp. 417 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neville Barrett ◽  
Colin Buxton ◽  
Caleb Gardner
Keyword(s):  
Marine Protected Areas ◽  
Marine Protected Area ◽  
Conservation Management ◽  
Movement Patterns ◽  
Fold Increase ◽  
Reference Sites ◽  
Rock Lobster ◽  
Spatial Management ◽  
Ecosystem Interactions ◽  
Annual Time

As reference sites to better understand characteristics such as movement patterns, depletion of natural resources and ecosystem interactions, Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are crucial in fishery and conservation management. The southern rock lobster (Jasus edwardsii) is an important reef predator in temperate Australasia and subject to heavy exploitation. In a Tasmanian MPA, 90% of individuals were recaptured less than 200 m from the point of release over weekly to annual time scales, regardless of size or sex. This lack of movement resulted in a substantial build-up of biomass and of large mature individuals in the MPA relative to adjacent fished locations. Although there was little spillover of individuals to the fishery, a 4-fold increase in female fecundity potentially enhanced larval export. Comparison of fished and unfished biomass of legal-sized animals suggested that exploitation had reduced biomass in the adjacent fishery to <10% of natural values. Overall, the demographic and movement patterns illustrate the extent of depletion of stocks in the absence of historical baseline data and the potential need for spatial management resulting from limited movement. Our data indicate that within MPAs, this predator can potentially recover in abundance to natural levels despite adjacent fishing pressure.

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