11th ICRS Abstract book - Nova Southeastern University

21.819
Lessons From Resilience Thinking For Ecosystem-Based Management in Coral Reef
Systems
Karen MCLEOD* 1 , Heather LESLIE 2
1 Department of Zoology, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, 2 Center for
Environmental Studies, Brown University, Providence, RI
As the frequency, magnitude, and scale of threats facing coral reefs and other marine
ecosystems escalates, how can management keep pace? Ensuring the continued delivery
of key services from coral reefs is particularly challenging in the face of increasingly
global drivers of change – namely, economic globalization and climate change.
Ecosystem-based management (EBM) emphasizes management of human activities
across sectors for whole systems (both social and natural), consideration of the
cumulative impacts of all activities affecting the system, and long-term maintenance of
the capacity of the system to deliver the range of services that humans want and need.
Through a resilience lens, EBM also recognizes an uncertain future, embraces change,
and considers the implications of the linkages between reef ecosystems and human
communities. We will present a synthesis of lessons learned from EBM efforts in both
tropical and temperate systems and provide guidance for applying these lessons to coral
reefs. First, we will discuss the design and implementation of EBM approaches and ways
to tailor EBM for coral reef systems. Second, we will evaluate the efficacy of local
management actions, adaptation, and mitigation strategies, especially in light of climate
change. In particular, we will evaluate tradeoffs between managing to bolster resilience to
a particular set of perturbations versus resilience to a broader range of perturbations,
including novel or surprising ones. Throughout, we will highlight the roles of science and
the consequences of ignoring linkages between social and ecological systems. The
integration of resilience concepts into marine EBM efforts holds promise for conserving
these fragile systems and the human communities that depend upon them.
21.820
The Ecology Of The World's Largest Fish, Rhincodon Typus
Mark MEEKAN* 1 , Corey BRADSHAW 2 , Steven WILSON 3 , John STEVENS 4 , Jeffrey
POLOVINA 5 , Brent STEWART 3
1 Darwin Office, Australian Institute of Marine Science, Brinkin, Australia, 2 Charles
Darwin University, Darwin, Australia, 3 Hubbs Seaworld, San Diego, CA, 4 CSIRO,
Hobart, Australia, 5 NOAA, Honolulu, HI
The past 15 years has seen rapid development of our understanding of the ecology and
biology of whale sharks that aggregate seasonally at Ningaloo Reef, Australia.
Monitoring fine-scale (metres to km) movement patterns suggests that whale sharks
migrate to the reef to feed on seasonal aggregations of baitfishes and euphausiids.
Satellite tagging has shown that sharks departing Ningaloo make frequent dives in excess
of 980 m and migrate generally toward the northeast, often into Indonesian waters.
Photo-identification (based on spot and stripe patterns) has confirmed that many sharks
return to the reef, with some individuals resighted at intervals of more than a decade and
a large number of individuals making frequent inter-annual visits. Photo-identification
resightings have generated mark-recapture databases for estimation of population size
and demographic parameters. Photograph matching has now been automated using openaccess
software (I3S) and match parsimony ranking, permitting faster and more reliable
matching success than manual comparisons. Most sharks (74 %) individually identified in
the Ningaloo aggregation from 1992-2006 have been male. Jolly-Seber open-population
models suggest that sharks sighted at the reef are drawn from a super-population of 300-
500 animals and Cormack-Jolly-Seber survival models demonstrate size-influenced
apparent survival probability ranging from 0.59 (5-m shark) to 0.81 (9-m sharks) per
year. Declines in relative abundance of up to 40 % were also evident in a 10-year
sightings-per-unit-effort dataset collected by tour operators. There was also a continuous
decrease in the average size of whale sharks from 7 m in 1994 to 5 m in 2004. Current
and future studies of this aggregation include quantification of mortality sources and the
development of microsatellite genetic tags for individual identification, validation of
photo-identification and an assessment of ocean-scale gene flow.
Poster Mini-Symposium 21: Social-Ecological Systems
469