Download Farewell Spit Ramsar Site

Farewell Spit Ramsar Site
• David Melville
Ornithological Society of New Zealand/Birds New
Zealand
• Mike Ogle
• Simon Walls
Department of Conservation
• Lawson Davey
Department of Conservation/Manawhenua ki
Mohua
Nelson/Marlborough Fish & Game Council
• Declared a Ramsar Site 13 August 1976
The Ramsar Site boundary is the same as the Nature Reserve – mean low spring
tide level
Criteria for designation*
1. Representative of a natural wetland type
2. Supports threatened species
3. Populations important for maintaining
biological diversity
4. Critical stage of the life cycle
5. Supports >20,000 waterbirds
6. Supports 1% of species/subspecies
7 & 8 relate to fish – not applicable
9 relates to 1% of non-avian taxa
* Criteria as adopted in 1999 and 2005
Representative wetland types
Mobile dunes, dune
slacks, Zostera flats
Rare and threatened species
Notoacmea helmsi
scapha [?]
Pimelea villosa
[Nationally
Endangered]
Eleocharis
neozelandica [At Risk]
Latrodectus katipo
[At Risk]
Critical stage of the life cycle
↓
Pre-migratory
fattening
Moult
Migration
>20,000 waterbirds
Internationally important waterbird
populations
What does Ramsar mean for
Farewell Spit?
• International recognition
BUT
– No current management plan
– No monitoring plan
– NO CMS
Ramsar Management Plans
• STRONGLY URGES Contracting Parties to apply the
New Guidelines to establish and implement
management planning processes, particularly for
those Ramsar Sites within their territory that do not
yet have such processes and plans in place.
Ecological character
• INVITES Contracting Parties and those responsible for
the management of Ramsar Sites to apply these
guidelines in the preparation of ecological character
descriptions of Ramsar Sites, and as part of their
management planning processes, so that these
descriptions constitute a complementary basis to
the Information Sheets on Ramsar Wetlands (RIS) for
detecting and notifying changes in ecological
character, as established through Article 3.2 of the
Convention text
[Farewell Spit RIS October 1992]
Ramsar Monitoring
• CALLS ON Contracting Parties to support the
development, by the relevant authorities within
their territories, of Early Warning Systems for
detecting, and initiating action in response to,
change in ecological character
Ramsar monitoring
• URGES Contracting Parties, as a matter of high
priority, to put in place mechanisms in order to be
informed at the earliest possible time, including
through reports by national authorities and local and
indigenous communities and NGOs, if the ecological
character of any wetland in its territory included in
the Ramsar List has changed, is changing or is likely
to change
Inter-relationship between monitoring
and management
Description of the site
at time of designation
Description using RIS
Detailed map
Ecological character
Development of
Management Plan for
the site
Maintenance of ecological
character provides basis of
management actions and
monitoring regime
Update description
Management actions
Regular monitoring to
provide feedback to
regular reviews of
Management Plan
Ongoing monitoring and impact
assessments
Monitoring regime forms part of
Management Plan
Management challenges
• Dune vegetation
– Threatened dune slack plants - exotics
– Marram – control or leave? – wind blown sand
contributes to tidal flats
[Ballance et al. 2006 NZ J Geol Geophys 49: 91-99]
Management challenges
• Fire
– Puponga Farm Park
acquired as ‘fire break’
for Farewell Spit
• Grazing
– Hare [deer, possum]
• Predation
– Pig, mustelids
>300 pigs removed in past 2 years
Cetacean strandings
• Farwell Spit has more cetacean strandings
than anywhere else in NZ
• Iwi involvement in rescue and carcass disposal
Cetacean standings
• Sperm Whales 134 tonnes (3 animals –
November 2014)
• Pilot Whales 114 tonnes (120 animals – February
2015)
Monitoring – bird census
• OSNZ counts since 1960s
– February (summer), June (winter), November (spring)
[Schuckard & Melville 2014. Shorebirds of Farewell Spit, Golden Bay and
Tasman Bay]
Changing shorebird populations
Monitoring – bird census
• Population of Red Knot declined c.75% 19612001 at Farewell Spit – but numbers increased
at Manukau Harbour, Auckland.
• What caused decline?
.
Manukau Harbour X Farewell Spit
• At Farewell Spit, they feed mostly on molluscs
- principally on small pipis, cockles and
nutshells.
• Also feed on crustaceans, not recorded
anywhere else.
Baseline data – benthos survey 2003
To provide baseline information
on the distribution and abundance
of intertidal macrobenthic
organisms, with particular
reference to prey species for
shorebirds.
12,839 specimens of 91 taxa
Monitoring - Black Swans
• Farewell Spit major moulting site
• Annual census by Fish & Game
The future – increase in marine
farming?
• Potential adverse impacts on benthos at Farewell
Spit – zooplankton ‘harvesting’ by mussels
Circulation
Chlorophyll
Tuckey et al. 2006. NZ J Mar
Freshw Res 40: 305-324
NIWA Tasman and Golden Bays
oceanography report
Marine farming
sites
Min Fisheries 2010
Phytoplankton
depletion
MPI 2013. Overview of ecological
effects of aquaculture
Future – mineral extraction?
‘Oil and coal permits threaten national parks’
‘The oil exploration permit application area includes the
shoreline of Abel Tasman and Kahurangi national
parks, Farewell Spit Nature Reserve, and the
Westhaven and Tonga Island marine reserves.’
‘Iwi against oil, gas and coal proposal in Golden Bay’
‘Mineral bid seen as goldmine for region’
‘Plug pulled on Golden Bay mining’
The future – climate change – Zostera
• Increased temperature
strong negative effect of warming and a positive effect of genotypic
diversity on shoot densities [Ehler et al. 2009. MEPS 355: 1-7]
• Increased storm frequency
• Sea level rise
The future – climate change - benthos
• Warmer water
– Less reproductive output
– Slower growth rate
[Philippart et al. 2003. Limnol.
Oceanogr. 48: 2171-2185]
[Beukema et al. 2009. MEPS 384:
135-145]
• Ocean acidification
– larvae the most sensitive life-history
stage , with a large majority of studies
on this critical stage of development
revealing negative effects
[Gazeau et al. 2013. Marine Biology
160: 2207-2245]
The future
• Exotic organisms
– Asian Date Mussel
– Canada Goose
• Disease
– Avian influenza cetaceans ↔ birds ??
– Ross River Fever/Southern Saltmarsh
Mosquito
Aedes camptorhynchus
Partnerships
• Waterbird monitoring – Birds New Zealand,
Fish & Game
• Cetacean strandings – iwi,
Dawn breaks on a new Ramsar day……..