ConservationResilience: Difference between revisions
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Directly, protected areas conserve coral reefs by barring off unwanted disturbances. With legislation and enforcement, setting up effective conservation zones can help protect reefs from threats such as littering, certain types of pollution, and other human activities. | Directly, protected areas conserve coral reefs by barring off unwanted disturbances. With legislation and enforcement, setting up effective conservation zones can help protect reefs from threats such as littering, certain types of pollution, and other human activities. | ||
However, arguably more importantly, protected areas conserve reefs indirectly by enhancing reef resilience. Resilience is the ability of an ecosystem to | However, arguably more importantly, protected areas conserve reefs indirectly by enhancing reef resilience. Resilience is the ability of an ecosystem to bounce back from a disturbance without drastically changing.<ref name="holling">[Holling, C S. “Resilience and Stability of Ecological Systems.” Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, vol. 4, no. 1, 1973, pp. 1–23., doi:10.1146/annurev.es.04.110173.000245.]</ref> In the long term, protected areas enhance reef resilience by preserving ecosystem complexity and maintaining the populations of important functional groups, such as herbivorous fish, <ref name="salm">[Salm, Rodney V., et al. “Marine Protected Area Planning in a Changing Climate.” Coral Reefs and Climate Change: Science and Management Coastal and Estuarine Studies, 2006, pp. 207–221., doi:10.1029/61ce12.]</ref><ref name="bellwood">[Bellwood, D. R., et al. “Confronting the Coral Reef Crisis.” Nature, vol. 429, no. 6994, 2004, pp. 827–833., doi:10.1038/nature02691.]</ref><ref name="cumming">[Cumming, Graeme S., et al. “New and Emerging Directions in Coral Reef Conservation.” Biological Conservation, vol. 241, 2020, p. 108372., doi:10.1016/j.biocon.2019.108372.]</ref>, which protects reefs from bleaching.<ref name="mellin">[Mellin, Camille, et al. “Marine Protected Areas Increase Resilience among Coral Reef Communities.” Ecology Letters, vol. 19, no. 6, Mar. 2016, pp. 629–637., doi:10.1111/ele.12598.]</ref> | ||
Revision as of 15:34, 1 April 2020
Conservation and Reef Resilience
Coral reef conservation is a major part of reef management. Other than being one of the major goals of reef management, adequate conservation efforts are becoming increasingly important as coral reefs are met with more and worse threats. There are many different methods of conservation. The conventional understanding of the concept is setting up conservation zones or protected areas, which is to zone off certain valuable areas so as to protect them from, for example, overfishing. Examples of conservation zones are Marine Protected Areas and Marine Reserves.
How do protected areas conserve reefs?
Directly, protected areas conserve coral reefs by barring off unwanted disturbances. With legislation and enforcement, setting up effective conservation zones can help protect reefs from threats such as littering, certain types of pollution, and other human activities.
However, arguably more importantly, protected areas conserve reefs indirectly by enhancing reef resilience. Resilience is the ability of an ecosystem to bounce back from a disturbance without drastically changing.[1] In the long term, protected areas enhance reef resilience by preserving ecosystem complexity and maintaining the populations of important functional groups, such as herbivorous fish, [2][3][4], which protects reefs from bleaching.[5]
- ↑ [Holling, C S. “Resilience and Stability of Ecological Systems.” Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, vol. 4, no. 1, 1973, pp. 1–23., doi:10.1146/annurev.es.04.110173.000245.]
- ↑ [Salm, Rodney V., et al. “Marine Protected Area Planning in a Changing Climate.” Coral Reefs and Climate Change: Science and Management Coastal and Estuarine Studies, 2006, pp. 207–221., doi:10.1029/61ce12.]
- ↑ [Bellwood, D. R., et al. “Confronting the Coral Reef Crisis.” Nature, vol. 429, no. 6994, 2004, pp. 827–833., doi:10.1038/nature02691.]
- ↑ [Cumming, Graeme S., et al. “New and Emerging Directions in Coral Reef Conservation.” Biological Conservation, vol. 241, 2020, p. 108372., doi:10.1016/j.biocon.2019.108372.]
- ↑ [Mellin, Camille, et al. “Marine Protected Areas Increase Resilience among Coral Reef Communities.” Ecology Letters, vol. 19, no. 6, Mar. 2016, pp. 629–637., doi:10.1111/ele.12598.]