Search results for "Marine Conservation"
showing 10 items of 34 documents
Marine reserves : fish life history and ecological traits matter
2010
Copyright by the Ecological Society of America
Climate driven life histories: the case of the Mediterranean Storm petrel
2014
Seabirds are affected by changes in the marine ecosystem. The influence of climatic factors on marine food webs can be reflected in long-term seabird population changes. We modelled the survival and recruitment of the Mediterranean storm petrel (Hydrobates pelagicus melitensis) using a 21-year mark-recapture dataset involving almost 5000 birds. We demonstrated a strong influence of prebreeding climatic conditions on recruitment age and of rainfall and breeding period conditions on juvenile survival. The results suggest that the juvenile survival rate of the Mediterranean subspecies may not be negatively affected by the predicted features of climate change, i.e., warmer summers and lower rai…
Economic transitions in finis terra
2009
A gradualist approach has been taken in describing the evolution of the last foragers in the Iberian Mediterranean Region (IMR) up to their rapid collapse, brought about by the appearance of the first prehistoric farmers. This point of view assumes that the post-Last Glaical Maximum (LGM) climatic change brought about a certain restructuring of the mammal fauna and exerted a direct influence by flooding the changing coastal plain and submerging coastal sites related to marine resource use. This paper proposes that small prey was a constant and structural resource in the IMR that did not signal intensification, since human consumption of rabbits goes back to the Middle Palaeolithic. At the s…
Identifying small pelagic Mediterranean fish schools from acoustic and environmental data using optimized artificial neural networks
2019
Abstract The Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union aims to exploit fish stocks at a level of Maximum Sustainable Yield by 2020 at the latest. At the Mediterranean level, the General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) has highlighted the importance of reversing the observed declining trend of fish stocks. In this complex context, it is important to obtain reliable biomass estimates to support scientifically sound advice for sustainable management of marine resources. This paper presents a machine learning methodology for the classification of pelagic species schools from acoustic and environmental data. In particular, the methodology was tuned for the recognition of an…
Sometimes Sperm Whales (Physeter macrocephalus) Cannot Find Their Way Back to the High Seas: A Multidisciplinary Study on a Mass Stranding
2011
BackgroundMass strandings of sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) remain peculiar and rather unexplained events, which rarely occur in the Mediterranean Sea. Solar cycles and related changes in the geomagnetic field, variations in water temperature and weather conditions, coast geographical features and human activities have been proposed as possible causes. In December 2009, a pod of seven male sperm whales stranded along the Adriatic coast of Southern Italy. This is the sixth instance from 1555 in this basin.Methodology/principal findingsComplete necropsies were performed on three whales whose bodies were in good condition, carrying out on sampled tissues histopathology, virology, bacter…
Moving Toward a Strategy for Addressing Climate Displacement of Marine Resources: A Proof-of-Concept
2020
Realistic predictions of climate change effects on natural resources are central to adaptation policies that try to reduce these impacts. However, most current forecasting approaches do not incorporate species-specific, process-based biological information, which limits their ability to inform actionable strategies. Mechanistic approaches, incorporating quantitative information on functional traits, can potentially predict species- and population-specific responses that result from the cumulative impacts of small-scale processes acting at the organismal level, and can be used to infer population-level dynamics and inform natural resources management. Here we present a proof-of-concept study…
Predicting marine species distributions: complementarity of food-web and Bayesian hierarchical modelling approaches
2019
16 pages, 9 figures, 3 tables, 1 appendix
The essentials of marine biotechnology
2021
Coastal countries have traditionally relied on the existing marine resources (e.g., fishing, food, transport, recreation, and tourism) as well as tried to support new economic endeavors (ocean energy, desalination for water supply, and seabed mining). Modern societies and lifestyle resulted in an increased demand for dietary diversity, better health and well-being, new biomedicines, natural cosmeceuticals, environmental conservation, and sustainable energy sources. These societal needs stimulated the interest of researchers on the diverse and underexplored marine environments as promising and sustainable sources of biomolecules and biomass, and they are addressed by the emerging field of ma…
Seasonal dynamics of atlantic herring (Clupea harengus L.) populations spawning in the vicinity of marginal habitats
2014
Published version of an article from the journal PLoS One. Also available from the publisher: http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0111985 Gillnet sampling and analyses of otolith shape, vertebral count and growth indicated the presence of three putative Atlantic herring (Clupea harengus L.) populations mixing together over the spawning season February–June inside and outside an inland brackish water lake (Landvikvannet) in southern Norway. Peak spawning of oceanic Norwegian spring spawners and coastal Skagerrak spring spawners occurred in March–April with small proportions of spawners entering the lake. In comparison, spawning of Landvik herring peaked in May–June with high proportions f…
Multi-zone marine protected areas: Assessment of ecosystem and fisheries benefits using multiple ecosystem models
2020
12 pages, 8 figures, 3 tables, 1 appendix supplementary data https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2020.105232