Chapter 13 Sustaining Aquatic Biodiversity

1
Chapter 13Sustaining Aquatic Biodiversity
2
What we get from aquatic ecosystems

• Ecosystem services list?
• Economic benefits list?

3
Percent of various groups of organisms that are
threatened with premature extinction due to human
activities
34 (51 of freshwater species)
Fish
24
Mammals
20
Reptiles
14
Plants
12
Birds
4
Freshwater threats

• Overfishing
• Pollution
• Loss of wetlands
• Dams
• Invasive species
• Overuse of water reduction in flow or supply

5
Freshwater Conservation

• Need to protect wetlands from development
  federal permit required to fill or destroy
  wetlands of at least 3 acres
• Mitigation banking destruction of existing
  wetlands is allowed as long as an equal area of
  the same type of wetland is created or restored,
  used as a last resort

6
Artificial wetlands How well do you think this
works compared to leaving the wetlands intact?
7
Freshwater Conservation

• Salmon fisheries
• Fish hatcheries cultivate and release young
  salmon
• Undoing the dam-age
• removing some dams, providing fish ladders

8
(No Transcript)
9
Freshwater Conservation
Sipsey Fork of the Black Warrior River

• Government intervention
• Clean Water Act (Chapter 22)
• Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, 1968
• In AL, Sipsey Fork of the Black Warrior River

10
Freshwater Conservation

• Private intervention example
• Freshwater Land Trust nonprofit organization
• Their mission is the acquisition and stewardship
  of lands that enhance water quality and preserve
  open space
• http//www.freshwaterlandtrust.org/

11
Freshwater Conservation A Case Study

• Florida Everglades threatened due to
  development that diverted and polluted water that
  maintained the wetlands
• Large urban areas developed on the Atlantic coast
  (Miami)
• Kissimmee River was converted into a straight
  channel in 1960s by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers,
  canals built from Lake Okeechobee to get water to
  cities
• Sugar cane and other crops are grown where
  wetlands used to be, runoff of phosphorus a
  problem

12
Canals have diverted flow of freshwater from its
natural course to the cities
13
Freshwater Conservation A Case Study

• Solutions?
• Established the Florida Everglades as a National
  Park but the plumbing upstream was already
  compromised
• Huge restoration project has been negotiated to
  restore portions of the Kissimmee River, remove
  levees and canals, return farmlands to wetlands,
  reduce diversion of water for urban areas,
  capture water that would go out to sea and return
  it to the Everglades by huge pumping systems
• Too little, too late?

14
Marine Ecosystems Threats

• Overharvesting of fish, shellfish, oysters,
  whales
• Incidental loss of species due to industrialized
  fishing techniques
• Pollution sediment, chemicals, nutrients,
  garbage (Chapter 22)
• Urban development on coasts threatens estuaries,
  coral reefs

15
Using marine resources Jurisdiction?

• International law
• Countrys sovereignty extends 12 miles off coast
• Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) out to 200 miles
• Nations of the world have jurisdiction over 36
  of oceans surface and 90 of its fish stocks
• Many countries have not used these laws to
  protect their resources and many have declined
• Outside of these areas, anyone can fish (remember
  tragedy of the commons?)

16
U.S. EEZ
17
Loss of ocean fisheries

• We are placing unprecedented pressure on marine
  resources
• Half the worlds marine fish populations are
  fully exploited
• 25 of fish population are overexploited and
  heading to extinction
• Total fisheries catch leveled off after 1998,
  despite increased fishing effort
• It is predicted that populations of all ocean
  species we fish for today will collapse by the
  year 2048

18
Quote from William Herrington Transactions of the
American Fisheries Society

• "It is only in the last few years when the
  fishing fleet has suffered from a marked scarcity
  of haddock that the folly of (the) belief in the
  inexhaustibility of nature has become potent".
• Date 1932
• People have been overharvesting for a long time!
• We shift from one species to another as one is
  depleted.

19
The total global fisheries catch has increased
20
(No Transcript)
21
Several factors mask declines

• Industrialized fishing has depleted stocks,
  global catch has remained stable for the past 20
  years
• Fishing fleets travel longer distances to reach
  less-fished portions of the ocean
• Fleets spend more time fishing and have been
  setting out more nets and lines, increasing
  effort to catch the same number of fish
• Improved technologies faster ships, sonar
  mapping, satellite navigation, thermal sensing,
  aerial spotting
• Data supplied to international monitoring
  agencies may be false

22
Fishing has industrialized

• Factory fishing highly industrialized, huge
  vessels use powerful technologies to capture fish
  in huge volumes
• Even process and freeze their catches while at
  sea
• Driftnets for schools of herring, sardines,
  mackerel, sharks
• Longline fishing for tuna and swordfish
• Trawling for pelagic fish and groundfish

23
Decline of ocean fisheries cod

• No fish has had more impact on human civilization
  than the Atlantic cod
• Eastern Canadians and U.S. fishermen have fished
  for cod for centuries
• Large ships and technology have destroyed the cod
  fishery
• Even protected stocks are not recovering
• Prey may now be competing with, and eating, young
  cod

24
Modern fishing fleets deplete marine life rapidly

• Grand Banks cod have been fished for centuries
• Catches more than doubled with immense industrial
  trawlers
• Record-high catches lasted only 10 years

25
Industrialized fishing changes fish communities

• Catch rates drop precipitously with
  industrialized fishing
• 90 of large-bodied fish and sharks are
  eliminated within 10 years
• Populations stabilize at 10 of their former
  levels
• Marine communities may have been very different
  before industrial fishing
• Removing animals at higher trophic levels allows
  prey to proliferate and change communities

26

• Oceans today contain only one-tenth of the
  large-bodied animals they once did

27
Fishing down the food chain

• As fishing increases, the size and age of fish
  caught decline
• 10-year-old cod, once common, are now rare
• As species become too rare to fish, fleets target
  other species
• Shifting from large, desirable species to
  smaller, less desirable ones
• Example cod ? haddock ? pollock (fish sticks)
• Entails catching species at lower trophic levels

28
Global marine
3.5
3.4
3.3
3.2
3.1
Mean trophic level
3.0
2.9
2.8
2.7
2.6
2.5
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Year
29
Global freshwater
3.5
3.4
3.3
3.2
3.1
Back to freshwater fish for one slide Drop in
mean trophic level even more pronounced in
populations of freshwater fish
3.0
Mean trophic level
2.9
2.8
2.7
2.6
2.5
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Year
30
Fishing practices kill nontarget animals

• By-catch the accidental capture of animals
• Driftnetting drowns dolphins, turtles, and seals
• Fish die from air exposure on deck
• Banned or restricted by many nations
• Longline fishing kills turtles, sharks, and
  albatrosses
• 300,000 seabirds die each year
• Bottom-trawling destroys communities
• Likened to clear-cutting and strip mining

31
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• Shift away from species and toward the larger
  ecosystem
• Consider the impacts of fishing on habitat and
  species interactions
• Set aside areas of oceans free from human
  interference

32
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• IUCN establishes Marine Protected Areas (MPA)
• There are 1300 worldwide
• Areas are protected but fishing and other
  resource extraction may still be allowed
• Levels of protection
• Uniform Multiple-Use
• Zoned Multiple-Use
• Zoned Multiple-Use With No-Take Area(s)
• No-Take
• No Impact
• No Access

33
(No Transcript)
34
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• Marine reserves areas where fishing is
  prohibited
• Leave ecosystems intact, without human
  interference
• Improve fisheries, because young fish will
  disperse into surrounding areas
• Many commercial, recreation fishers, and
  businesses do not support reserves

35
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• Found that reserves do work as
• win-win solutions
• Overall benefits included
• Boosting fish biomass
• Boosting total catch
• Increasing fish size
• Benefits inside reserve boundaries included
• Rapid and long-term increases in marine organisms
• Decrease mortality and habitat destruction
• Lessen the likelihood of extirpation of species

36
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• Benefits outside the marine reserve included
• A spillover effect when individuals of
  protected species spread outside reserves
• Larvae of species protected within reserves seed
  the seas outside reserves
• Improved fishing and ecotourism

37
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• Integrated coastal management
• Definition process for the management of the
  coast using an integrated approach, regarding all
  aspects of the coastal zone, including
  geographical and political boundaries, in an
  attempt to achieve sustainability (Wikipedia)

38
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• Integrated coastal management what needs to be
  integrated?
• Different levels of government
• Land and water zones
• Economic sectors that operate there (fisheries,
  tourism, port companies)
• Nations
• Disciplines (scientific, cultural, political,
  etc.)

39
Conservation efforts ecosystem approach

• US Marine Mammal Protection Act, 1972
• first legislation to call for an ecosystem
  approach to species protection

40
Conservation Species approach

• Laws/Treaties
• CITES
• Endangered Species Act

41
Conservation Species approach

• Case Study Whaling
• People have used whales for food and oil since
  3000 BC
• Whales large size, slow reproduction have made
  them vulnerable to extinction

42

• 1946 International Whaling Commission was started
  to regulate whaling worldwide, membership is
  voluntary
• 1986 IWC banned commercial whaling allows it
  for scientific research and native people
• Some countries continue to carry out whaling
  Japan, Norway, Iceland

43
(No Transcript)
44
Conservation Species approach

• Sea turtles all species are endangered or
  threatened
• TED
• www.youtube.com/watch?vj9olIycYg0c
• Protection of nesting areas on the beach
• On AL coasts, top to bottom pictures Loggerhead,
  Green, and Kemps Ridley

45
Conservation Marketplace Approach

• Summer flounder quotas were set for commercial
  and recreational fishing has been successful in
  increasing population of adult fish

46
Conservation Marketplace Approach

• Individual transfer quotas fishermen are
  allowed a total allowable catch (TAC) which may
  be traded usually species-specific has been
  done in New Zealand, Canada and the Netherlands
  one study shows it has been helpful in promoting
  sustainability

47
Conservation Marketplace Approach

• Use optimum sustainable yield instead of
• maximum sustainable yield
• MSY was used in the past to determine how much
  fish to catch
• Definition maximum number of fish that could be
  harvested annually without causing a population
  drop
• Has not worked However, MSY has been widely
  criticized as ignoring several key factors
  involved in fisheries management and has led to
  the devastating collapse of many fisheries. As a
  simple calculation, it ignores the size and age
  of the animal being taken, its reproductive
  status, and it focuses solely on the species in
  question, ignoring the damage to the ecosystem
  caused by the designated level of exploitation
  and the issue of bycatch. Among conservation
  biologists it is widely regarded as dangerous and
  misused.
• Better to use optimum sustainable yield lower
  amount harvested than with MSY

48
Conservation marketplace approach

• Educate the consumer
• Buy ecolabeled seafood
• Dolphin-safe tuna
• Consumers dont know how their seafood was caught
• Nonprofit organizations have devised guides for
  consumers
• Best choices farmed catfish and caviar,
  sardines, Canadian snow crab
• Avoid Atlantic cod, wild-caught caviar, sharks,
  farmed salmon