nursery habitats
Recently Published Documents


TOTAL DOCUMENTS

151
(FIVE YEARS 39)

H-INDEX

32
(FIVE YEARS 3)

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jorge Assis ◽  
Pierre Failler ◽  
Eliza Fragkopoulou ◽  
David Abecasis ◽  
Gregoire Touron-Gardic ◽  
...  

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) must function as networks with sufficient stepping-stone continuity between suitable habitats to ensure the conservation of naturally connected regional pools of biodiversity in the long-term. For most marine biodiversity, population connectivity is mediated by passively dispersed planktonic stages with contrasting dispersal periods, ranging from a few hours to hundreds of days. These processes exert a major influence on whether threatened populations should be conserved as either isolated units or linked metapopulations. However, the distance scales at which individual MPAs are connected are insufficiently understood. Here, we use a biophysical model integrating high-resolution ocean currents and contrasting dispersal periods to predict connectivity across the Network of MPAs in Western Africa. Our results revealed that connectivity differs sharply among distinct ecological groups, from highly connected (e.g., fish and crustacea) to predominantly isolated ecosystem structuring species (e.g., corals, macroalgae and seagrass) that might potentially undermine conservation efforts because they are the feeding or nursery habitats required by many other species. Regardless of their dispersal duration, all ecological groups showed a common connectivity gap in the Bijagós region of Guinea-Bissau, highlighting the important role of MPAs there and the need to further support and increase MPA coverage to ensure connectivity along the whole network. Our findings provide key insights for the future management of the Network of MPAs in Western Africa, highlighting the need to protect and ensure continuity of isolated ecosystem structuring species and identifying key regions that function as stepping-stone connectivity corridors.


2021 ◽  
pp. 000-000
Author(s):  
Maria Byrne ◽  
Dan Minchin ◽  
Matthew Clements ◽  
Dione J. Deaker

2021 ◽  
Vol 213 ◽  
pp. 105825
Author(s):  
Juliana López-Angarita ◽  
Melany Villate-Moreno ◽  
Juan M. Díaz ◽  
Juan Camilo Cubillos-M ◽  
Alexander Tilley

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (17) ◽  
pp. 9485
Author(s):  
Chiara D’Alpaos ◽  
Andrea D’Alpaos

Coastal ecosystems are among the most economically valuable and highly threatened on Earth; they provide valuable ecosystem services (ESs) but are severely exposed to climate changes and human pressure. Although the preservation of coastal ecosystems is of the utmost importance, it is often sub-optimally pursued by Governments and Societies because of the high costs involved. We consider salt-marsh ecosystems in the Venice Lagoon as an example of a threatened landscape, calling for innovative, integrated management strategies, and propose an application-driven methodological framework to support policymakers in the identification of cost-effective incentive policies to ecosystem preservation. By combining group decision-making and Value-Focused-Thinking approaches, we provide a multiple-criteria decision model, based on pairwise comparisons, to identify which ESs are top-priority policy targets according to a cost-effective perspective. We implemented an online Delphi survey process and interviewed a pool of experts who identified “recreation and tourism”, “coastal protection from flooding”, “carbon storage”, “biodiversity and landscape”, and “nursery habitats for fisheries” as the five most relevant ESs for the Venice Lagoon taking into consideration the Environmental, Economic, and Social perspectives. Our results suggest that the Environmental perspective is the most important criteria, whereas “biodiversity and landscape” is acknowledged as the most important ES.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily R. Anderson ◽  
Jack Butler ◽  
Mark J. Butler

Underwater sound is used by many marine larvae to orient to coastal habitats including backreef, sponge-dominated hardbottom habitat in the Florida Keys (FL, United States)—a particularly “noisy” coastal habitat. However, the distance over which acoustic cues are attractive to settlement-stage larvae is generally unknown. We examined this phenomenon in a region of the Florida Keys where mass sponge die-offs have diminished both underwater soundscapes and larval settlement. The absence of pronounced hardbottom-associated sound over such a large area allowed us to experimentally test in situ the response of fish and invertebrate larvae to broadcasted sounds at different distances from their source. We first measured the signal-to-noise ratio of healthy hardbottom habitat soundscapes broadcast from an underwater speaker at seven distances to determine the maximum range of the signal. Based on those results, larval collectors were then deployed at 10, 100, 500, and 1,000 m from speakers broadcasting sounds recorded at either degraded or healthy hardbottom sites for five consecutive nights during each of three new and full moon periods in summer/fall 2019. Larval settlement onto those collectors was affected by lunar phase and soundscape type, but varied among species. In most cases, the effect was small and not likely to be ecologically significant. The absence of a strong larval settlement response to a sound cue lies in contrast to results from other studies. We suspect that the small (<500 m) radius of the broadcasted soundscapes may have limited the magnitude of the larval response to locally available larvae whose abundance may have been low because the experiment was conducted within a large, relatively quiet seascape. If true, it is possible that planktonic larvae may require a series of acoustic “sign-posts,” perhaps in combination with other cues (e.g., chemical), to successfully orient to distant nursery habitats. Although habitat restoration efforts may be able to restore healthy soundscapes, the typically small size and number of restoration sites may limit the range of the acoustic cue and thus larval attraction to restored habitats.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanja Matić-Skoko ◽  
Dario Vrdoljak ◽  
Melita Peharda ◽  
Hana Uvanović ◽  
Krešimir Markulin ◽  
...  

Abstract This study aims to determine if otolith chemistry can differentiate between coastal lagoons and shallow coves and if it can effectively re-assign Sparus aurata specimens to the nearest nurseries. Young-of-the-year (Y-O-Y) and young adults were collected at fifteen sites within three nurseries along the eastern Adriatic. LA-ICP-MS was used to quantify the concentrations of 12 chemical elements in the otolith region corresponding to the juvenile nursery stage. The multivariate element concentration differed significantly among nurseries. Based on CAP analyses, using a suite of five trace elements (Sr, Mg, Zn, Ba and Pb), 41% S. aurata specimens were correctly re-allocated to the nurseries and a higher rate of success (46%) was achieved for shallow cove than for coastal lagoons. A separate CAP analysis explained 94% of element variance, with 100% discrimination for Sr:Ca, Mg:Ca and Pb:Ca, enabling re-allocation to shallow cove nurseries. The lowest success of Ba as a discriminant reduced re-allocation to shallow coves. The results suggested that number of shallow coves with continuous, submarine, freshwater springs along the coast, making them similar to coastal lagoons, could significantly contribute to the S. aurata recruitment, expanding attention from the protection of individual nursery towards a wider part of the coast.


Author(s):  
Philine S. E. zu Ermgassen ◽  
Bryan DeAngelis ◽  
Jonathan R. Gair ◽  
Sophus zu Ermgassen ◽  
Ronald Baker ◽  
...  

AbstractSeagrasses, oyster reefs, and salt marshes are critical coastal habitats that support high densities of juvenile fish and invertebrates. Yet which species are enhanced through these nursery habitats, and to what degree, remains largely unquantified. Densities of young-of-year fish and invertebrates in seagrasses, oyster reefs, and salt marsh edges as well as in paired adjacent unstructured habitats of the northern Gulf of Mexico were compiled. Species consistently found at higher densities in the structured habitats were identified, and species-specific growth and mortality models were applied to derive production enhancement estimates arising from this enhanced density. Enhancement levels for fish and invertebrate production were similar for seagrass (1370 [SD 317] g m–2 y–1for 25 enhanced species) and salt marsh edge habitats (1222 [SD 190] g m–2 y–1, 25 spp.), whereas oyster reefs produced ~650 [SD 114] g m–2 y–1(20 spp). This difference was partly due to lower densities of juvenile blue crab (Callinectes sapidus) on oyster reefs, although only oyster reefs enhanced commercially valuable stone crabs (Menippe spp.). The production estimates were applied to Galveston Bay, Texas, and Pensacola Bay, Florida, for species known to recruit consistently in those embayments. These case studies illustrated variability in production enhancement by coastal habitats within the northern Gulf of Mexico. Quantitative estimates of production enhancement within specific embayments can be used to quantify the role of essential fish habitat, inform management decisions, and communicate the value of habitat protection and restoration.


Author(s):  
Edmund Maser ◽  
Jennifer S. Strehse

AbstractSince World War I, considerable amounts of warfare materials have been dumped at seas worldwide. After more than 70 years of resting on the seabed, reports suggest that the metal shells of these munitions are corroding, such that explosive chemicals leak out and distribute in the marine environment. Explosives such as TNT (2,4,6-trinitrotoluene) and its derivatives are known for their toxicity and carcinogenicity, thereby posing a threat to the marine environment. Toxicity studies suggest that chemical components of munitions are unlikely to cause acute toxicity to marine organisms. However, there is increasing evidence that they can have sublethal and chronic effects in aquatic biota, especially in organisms that live directly on the sea floor or in subsurface substrates. Moreover, munition-dumping sites could serve as nursery habitats for young biota species, demanding special emphasis on all kinds of developing juvenile marine animals. Unfortunately, these chemicals may also enter the marine food chain and directly affect human health upon consuming contaminated seafood. While uptake and accumulation of toxic munition compounds in marine seafood species such as mussels and fish have already been shown, a reliable risk assessment for the human seafood consumer and the marine ecosphere is lacking and has not been performed until now. In this review, we compile the first data and landmarks for a reliable risk assessment for humans who consume seafood contaminated with munition compounds. We hereby follow the general guidelines for a toxicological risk assessment of food as suggested by authorities.


2021 ◽  
Vol 662 ◽  
pp. 209-214
Author(s):  
A Whitfield

The key criticism by Baker & Sheaves (2021; Mar Ecol Prog Ser 662:205-208) of the Whitfield (2020; Mar Ecol Prog Ser 649:219-234) estuarine littoral predation paradigm review is that shallow water fish nursery habitats contain abundant predator assemblages which may create high predation pressure on the juvenile fish cohorts that occupy these areas. The primary arguments supporting Baker & Sheaves’ criticism arise from a series of papers published by them on piscivorous fish predation in certain tropical Australian estuaries. The counter-argument that shallow littoral areas in estuaries do indeed provide small juvenile fishes with refuge from small and large piscivorous fishes is provided by published papers from 4 different estuary types in South Africa, covering both subtropical and warm-temperate systems. Based on the overall published information, the argument for shallow (<1 m depth) estuarine waters providing major protection for newly settled juveniles appears to be weak in northern Australia but strong in South Africa. The global situation, as outlined in this response, is more supportive of low piscivorous predation in shallow nursery habitats, but further targeted research is needed before we can confirm that littoral estuarine waters are indeed a universal keystone attribute in this regard.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document