Conservation

2007

National Wildlife Refuge Program Underfunded

A ten percent cutback in the NWR program will result in some refuges having no personnel, maintenance, improvements or  programs. As it now exists the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service will have to deal with declining budgets through 2011 unless Congress decides otherwise.  Nationwide, the NWR system covers 96 million acres; 545 refuges and 37 wetland management areas.  Aside from habitat provision, they host forty million visitors a year.  Seventeen new refuges have been added since 2001. The southeast region,with 128 refuges will lose 80 employees and 43 refuges will have no staff at all.  These severe personnel cuts will mean FWS will have no way to deal with vandalism,  poaching or the use of ATV ’s in sensitive areas.  In the Archie Carr Refuge,  which is a major U.S.loggerhead turtle nesting site,  the cuts will eliminate sea turtle nesting surveys and their educational programs. The budget cuts were set by the House Appropriations Committee.The proposed budget in the Senate is only $3 million higher.  Estimates are that an additional $17 million is needed just to retain the status quo.  To help the refuge system get more needed funds write or call your Senators and Con- gressmen.See www.sealitsoc.org to .nd out how to get in touch.

2006
 

Coral Reef Quandary

We know a great deal about how a coral reef degrades but not enough on how, if the insults are discontinued, it recovers.  Caribbean reefs are especially fragile but once protected have been exceedingly slow to recover. 

Part of the problem was recently investigated and previous assumptions found wanting.  Reef fish, as adults, stick close to home, but their larvae drift off into the open sea.  Researchers thought this was a major means of dispersion and recruitment to other reefs that might be suffering shortages of those particular species.  A recent study by R.K. Cowan et al showed that populations of fish species are confined to relatively small areas and more local than previously thought.   Reefs tend to be “self-recruiting”.  Thus removing a species by over fishing does not mean recruitment from somewhere else will make up for those losses.  The removal of long-lived species is worse than the loss of shorter-lived species. 

The implications for fishery management present serious problems in how to go about stock recovery.

Coral Reef Complexity

Half of the world’s coral reefs have disappeared in the last fifty years.  Coral reefs face a plethora of threats; over fishing, poor water quality, and climate change are major ones.  So far, the most successful method of managing reefs, damaged or otherwise, is the creation of totally protected areas.  Last year, for example, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park rezoned no-take areas of 5 percent to 33 percent of the whole system.  Similarly, plans are underway to do much the same for the  northwestern Hawaiian Island Coral Reef Ecosystem Reserve.

Convincing reef users of the value of these moves is something else again.  However, past protected areas act as models and several have shown the value of  this management move. In the Bahamas archipelago, the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park encompasses a 456 square kilometer park that was established 46 years ago.  Fishing was completely banned in 1956.  Of particular importance has been the preservation of large parrotfish that graze on algae.  With the demise of the long-spined black sea urchin in 1983,  the parrotfish is now the only feeder keeping algae from overrunning the reef and killing off the underlying coral. 

Compared to fish in adjacent reefs, the parrotfish are larger and more numerous. Larger size has the advantage that they grow too big to fall prey to their major enemy, the Nassau Grouper.   As for human exploitation, large parrotfish are easily caught in fish traps, which tend to disproportionately select for them.

2005

The Gulf Restoration Network is a non-profit group based in New Orleans LA.  They publish a quarterly newsletter  and action alerts when legislation or issues , either state or federal, arise that affect Gulf fisheries or essential habitat.

Mangroves - October 2005
If you want to learn about restoring mangroves, an important source for information and know-how has been written by Robin Lewis, a conservationist who runs a well respected ecological company that serves both Florida and abroad.  Published in Ecological Engineering in July 2005, it is titled “Ecological Engineering for the Successful Management and Restoration of Mangrove Forests”.  He points out that the effort should be placed on site preparation and not planting.  If propagules are in the water in the area to be restored , nature will do the rest.  To download the article (16 pages) go to www.royrlewis.com , click on documents and then on the article.

2004

Several areas have been closed to commercial fishing - Longlines

Fishing derbies - a dangerous way to limit catches?

Shoreline erosion - somebody may be out a half billion dollars.

The article on Getting Serious about Conservation was written by Dave Bulloch as a "get out and vote" plea, but contains information of ongoing interest and importance.

An article entitled Nature Under Siege discusses appropriate metaphors, and consequences, for loss of diversity.

Some Louisiana wetlands have suffered degradation  because of the past containment of the Mississippi River which  has made brackish marshland too salty.

04/27/09 19:30