Survey
* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
Marine Reserves The New Zealand Experience Compiled by Bill Ballantine Leigh Marine Laboratory, University of Auckland The world centred on NZ The South West Pacific The New Zealand Region Usual Map Land Habitats Marine Habitats ! Little Barrier Island – 1st land reserve 1888 Leigh – 1st marine reserve 1975 The rules in Marine Reserve 1. No fishing - by big boats or little boats No fishing by anyone 2. No constructions 3. No dumping or filling 4. No disturbances • Marine reserves are pieces of the sea that are left undisturbed so that • They continue in their natural state • Or recover towards the natural state The problem is we do not know much about life in the sea – it is out of sight Most countries try 1. To protect the large special things 2. To sustain fisheries 3. And some oddments • But these things are only a tiny part of life in the sea Marine life is abundant, varied, complex and different from life on land It is even difficult to tell the plants from the animals If we have places in the sea where there are no disturbances – would these marine reserves have any use? We could them to find out what is natural, and what we have changed. Counting fish – a place to start But even well-meant disturbances matter – like people feeding fish So in the reserve fish mob the divers while outside they flee Do we believe the fish counts that show more fish in the reserve than outside? Check by fishing ! (with barbless hooks) Results of 4 surveys for snapper Inside the reserve • Outside reserve The tagging system – inject coloured latex Into a fin ray – this one yellow in a tail fin ray Third method of counting fish. Video camera over a bait box No divers, no hooks, just sit in the boat and watch on video Cheaper Easier No harm to fish So taken to many other places including the Poor Knights Islands Some fishing at Poor Knights till November 1998 No increase at places still fished Movement matters Fish can be tracked with acoustic tags And their position fixed with sound receivers One snapper’s range in a week • With the first two marine reserves we learnt important new things about snapper – although snapper were the best studied fish Also new things about rock lobster Complex movements New behaviour Changes with time lobsters 500 m-2 (+/- SE) reserve 50 Leigh non reserve 40 30 20 10 0 1970 1980 1990 2000 year - Rapid increase when reserve established - Decline across all sites between 1995 and 2001 - Densities remain ~10 times higher in reserve Data: Ayling 1978, McDiarmid & Breen 1992, Kelly and Haggitt 1996, 2000, 2002 Heavily fished species increase inside marine reserves but this is only the start of the story - The big changes are to habitats In 1976 the commonest sub-tidal reef habitat was grazed by sea-urchins But with protection predators not only become commoner, they also grow larger Large lobsters can open large sea urchins Inside the reserve, 30% of tethered sea urchins are eaten within 24 hours – outside almost none. Urchin “barrens” like this in 1976 Are now kelp forest • Marine Reserves give everyone more opportunity to see and appreciate the full range of marine life. In displays on land In visits to the shore Or directly in the sea Whole classes of children go snorkelling And can see bottom living fish – such as skates Fish in the water column, such as sweep Fish in the kelp forest, such as snapper A natural abundance of fish A glass-bottomed boat will do Or just watch it on film Is this education, recreation or tourism? What is the target audience or market? Is it just people? • Compressing a 30 year story into 30 minutes means a lot of simplification. • Most of the things that happened in the reserve were complete surprises. • We are still learning. • Recently we learnt more about fish feeding Many people, especially children enjoyed feeding the fish This produced feeding frenzies Angela Parsons, a young part-time ranger said this was wrong in a marine reserve She wrote and put up this sign – and the feeding stopped An illustration from a pamphlet about fish and other animals in the reserve A female ‘spotty’ , a small common labrid fish A male ‘spotty’ All are female first, but change sex at 3 years The only stakeholders I recognize are our grandchildren – the rest of us are users. What are we going to leave them? End of Part 1 Thanks to all the research workers and photographers who supplied material for this presentation – especially Kim Westerskov Tony Ayling Roger Grace Allie MacDiarmid Shane Kelly Russ Babcock Nick Shears Tim Haggitt John Walsby Geoff Jones Howard Choat Chris Battershill Mike Kingsford Trevor Willis Darren Parsons Tim Langlois Part 2 Principles for SYSTEMS of marine reserves Bill Ballantine, Leigh Marine Laboratory New Zealand Written for a workshop at the UBC Fisheries Center, Vancouver in 1997 I was specially invited, so I tried to upgrade:- (a) from single reserves to systems (b) from particular aims to principles Basic Principles 1. Representation 2. Replication 3. Network Design 4. Sustainable Amount Need a real example to explain these principles North-east New Zealand 1. Representation • All regions require marine reserves. • In each region, all major habitats must be represented in reserves. Test with just 4 major habitats - • Harbours and Estuaries sheltered shallow enclosed Sheltered waters less than 50 m not open to ocean storms and swell Open coast and inner shelf Outer shelf and open sea Existing reserves represent all four major habitats 2. Replication At least three separate (in space) examples of each major habitat. Many reasons including: scientific, conservation, and social Adding 8 more reserves would replicate each major habitat 3. A Network Design A network spread over the region to encourage connections by larval dispersal. A further 8 reserves would provide such a network Existing reserves provide few connections • But 24 reserves provide many connections 4. A Sustainable Amount The system must be large enough to maintain itself. This amount is not known precisely. It is unlikely to be less than 10% (or more than 50%). So establishing at least 10% immediately is a sensible programme. This is 10% of the whole region and 10% of each habitat That completes the scientific principles. But science only indicates the constraints. Many possibilities exist within these and which of these are chosen is subject to the full democratic process. The blue squares show one of the alternatives. • The example given was for 10% • This would be the minimum for science, education and recreation. • At least 20% would be needed for adequate conservation. • At least 30% would be needed to maximise benefits to fisheries There is much to be done, and time is not on our side.