MAP News Issue 428, October 28, 2017

Mangroves under Threat

There once was a beautiful tropical island afloat in the pale blue waters of the Caribbean called Bimini, immortalized by Ernest Hemingway in his well-known novel “Islands in the Stream.” Luxuriant coral reefs and mangroves provided safe refuge for bountiful marine life including a myriad of fish, sharks, sea turtles and sea birds. Its quiet beaches and laid-back residents lent Bimini a special flavour of a place where sports fishermen such as Hemingway went to catch marlin and bonefish. Then everything changed as industrial-style tourism had come to Bimini. The island is now replete with five-star hotels, condos, restaurants, golf courses and marinas, all meant to attract the wealthy tourists. Large swaths of mangroves were cleared, shorelines extended by using land fill, threatening corals and sea grasses, marine life and a way of life for the local people. For more than 20 years the Bahamas government has pledged to turn large parts of Bimini into a Marine Protected Area. To its shame, it has failed to act on its promises. READ MORE

AFRICA

Off the African coast, a new tool in the fight against climate change: drones

TANZANIA – The Zanzibar Mapping Initiative is the world's most ambitious mapping project deploying small-scale drones. The project was born out of a partnership with the World Bank and the Zanzibar Commission for Lands and the State University of Zanzibar, modeled after a drone mapping and digitization project called Dar Ramani Huria, a Swahili phrase that translates to "The Open Map of Dar es Salaam." Mapping and land management remains a frustrating and expensive problem across the African continent. A mere 2.9 percent of Africa is mapped at a local scale, compared to 87 percent of Europe, according to a 2007 report from the United Nations. As the population swells — Tanzania's national average population growth rate is one of the fastest in the world — a lack of up-to-date maps makes for messy land disputes and hamfisted attempts at urban planning. As the lush urban-island of 1.3 million people confronts the creeping threat of climate change and an uptick in natural disasters, high resolution aerial photography and a modern spatial data infrastructure can not only facilitate urban planning but assist government officials in climate-proofing the island. READ MORE

ASIA

Mangrove cover shows no significant increase ‘despite plantation efforts’

INDIA – Once rated the fifth largest mangrove forest in the world with a cover as high as 250,000 hectares a few decades ago, mangroves of the Indus delta now rank lower than 15th on the (global) list and have decreased to 98,014 hectares, indicating two to three per cent annual loss. No significant success has been achieved to increase its size despite attempts for mass mangrove plantation in the delta. These observations are part of a paper published in an international journal. Titled The Effect of Global Warming (Climate Change) on Mangroves of Indus Delta with Relevance to other Prevailing Anthropogenic Stresses, A critical review, the paper has been published in July this year in the European Academic Research journal. READ MORE

Let's mend our ways and save mangroves

INDIA – If there’s an ecosystem that can be termed as a cornucopia of life, it’s mangroves. These tiny coastal forests by the coastlines host the evening roosts of spoonbills, kingfishers, egrets, herons and hundreds of such wetland bird species in its arching canopy. A breeding ground for fish, it also serves as a natural habitat for a variety of flora and fauna. Perhaps for the same reason, Wetlands International, a global non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation and restoration of wetlands, has categorized mangroves as one of the most important ecosystems. Kerala once had extensive patches of mangroves along its west coast. A majority of them were lost following deforestation, human encroachments, soil drifts and natural calamities. Recently, College of Forestry, which is affiliated with Kerala Agricultural University, carried out a bird survey along the central Kerala's mangroves, in collaboration with the state forest department, Centre for Wildlife Studies and some non-governmental organizations of Thrissur district. The survey was a real watershed moment in the way we look at mangrove conservation efforts. READ MORE

Dept aims for dugong preservation

THAILAND – The Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation plans to strengthen measures for preserving and conserving the dugong population with the local community's participation, saying the plan also includes increasing seagrass habitat which is the main food source for the seacow-like mammal. Thanya Nethithammakul, chief of the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation, said dugong populations are being threatened by a loss of fertility in the seagrass habitat, and disturbance due to fishing gear and man-made hunting. The department needs to develop more effective measures to limit the losses and increase their population, he said.  Many seagrass habitats were now being destroyed as some locals collect tiny and colourful fish found near seagrass sites. READ MORE

Maharashtra to involve coastal villages protect state’s mangrove forests

INDIA – To protect the state’s mangrove forests, the government is mulling to take help from the residents of 60 coastal villages. Maharashtra has 15,088 hectares of mangroves.Last month, the government announced a new policy to protect mangroves on public and private land by creating ‘mangrove co-management committees’, which will include residents from villages located near the mangrove forests along the 720-km long coastline. These committees will be responsible for protecting the forests and using resources to generate jobs locally.“The committees will prepare a long-term plan for conserving mangroves in their areas and take necessary action to protect and grow them,” read the government resolution (GR).In Raigad, which has the largest stretch of mangrove forests in the state, 25 villages have been shortlisted for the project. Sindhudurg has 12 villages, Ratnagiri 10, Palghar nine and four from Thane. The government has set aside Rs15 crore for the project. READ MORE

AMERICAS

New analysis suggests that preserving rare species is vital to tropical forests

USA – The world's tropical forests are in "a critical state" in which the extinction of rare tree species could be a tipping point, say scientists who have developed an analytical method to map their biodiversity. "We are in the midst of an extinction crisis," said Jayanth R. Banavar, provost and senior vice president at the University of Oregon and previously at the University of Maryland in College Park. "We are losing species perhaps more rapidly than ever before. It is the biodiversity of the species that keeps our planet the way it is. These species have evolved over many, many millennia. A species once lost is gone forever." In a paper published Oct. 18, 2017 in the journal Science Advances, Banavar, a physicist, and co-authors from three other universities unveiled their findings, which are based on a mathematical framework relying on a mechanistic birth-death-immigration model of an ecosystem. The researchers suggest that the numerous extremely rare species may be vitally important to maintaining biodiversity and survival as forests undergo worldwide climate change and human activities. READ MORE

The Peruvian Amazon Is In Danger

PERU – The Peruvian Amazon is home to millions of animal, insect, and plant species making it one of the most biodiverse places on the planet. The Amazon Rainforest is often referred to as the “lungs of the earth” because its responsible for soaking up the carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere. As the detrimental impacts of climate change increase, specifically mining and deforestation in the Amazon, it is evident that all ecosystems in the world are connected and at risk. The tropical forests of Peru and all of South America play critical roles in global carbon cycling and produce weather and climate around them. Nine Wake Forest students eagerly adventured to see the Peruvian Amazon’s natural beauty and wonder for themselves as a part of a duel study-abroad course in tropical ecology and science writing led by biology Professor Miles Silman and journalism Professor Justin Catanoso. The students quickly learned from first-hand accounts that all ecosystems are in trouble if we don’t change. READ MORE

Biologist starting over after Hurricane Irma

US VIRGIN ISLANDS – For Caroline Rogers, an internationally known expert on coral reefs and the only USGS employee stationed in the Virgin Islands, Hurricane Irma swiftly wiped away normalcy at home, at work, and in the field. On September 6 Hurricane Irma was at the peak of its strength—with top sustained winds of 185 miles per hour and 225-mile-per-hour gusts, according to the National Hurricane Center—when it struck the island of St. John, where Rogers has lived and worked as a marine biologist since 1984. Rogers rode out the hurricane with friends in a concrete home. At the height of the storm, she felt the solid walls trembling. By day’s end, Rogers’ wooden house still had its roof, although two windows were smashed, and nearby homes had become piles of broken wood. Her office in a National Park Service building at Virgin Islands National Park was roofless. Its walls had exploded, and her books, papers and most of her equipment were ruined. Sediment can smother corals, but Hurricane Hole has no sediment-bearing freshwater streams. Its clear waters are habitat for an entire community of marine life, including Montastrea corals and squirrelfish. And the hurricane had profoundly altered the unique ecosystem Rogers discovered in 2009 and has been monitoring since then – a group of mangrove-lined bays sheltering 30 hard coral species that are normally found on deeper reefs. READ MORE

Here's why your sustainable tuna is also unsustainable

USA – Tuna is one of the most ubiquitous seafoods. It can be eaten from a can or as high-end sashimi and in many forms in between. But some species are over-fished and some fishing methods are unsustainable. How do you know which type of tuna you're eating? Some tuna is certified as sustainably caught by groups such as the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) that set standards for sustainable fishing. But these certifications are only good if they are credible. The Western and Central Pacific skipjack tuna fishery is one of the world's biggest. Some of the tuna caught here carries the MSC's blue label, identifying it as the best environmental choice for consumers. But the same boats making that sustainable catch may also use unsustainable methods to catch unsustainable fish on the same day. The On the Hook coalition sees this as at odds with the MSC certification,. Yes, sustainable and unsustainable fish can be separated; there are people on board whose sole job is to do this. But rewarding fishermen for their sustainable catch, while allowing them to fish unsustainably, dupes consumers into supporting companies that take part in bad behaviour. READ MORE

EUROPE

Warning of 'ecological Armageddon' after dramatic plunge in insect numbers

GERMANY – The abundance of flying insects has plunged by three-quarters over the past 25 years, according to a new study that has shocked scientists. Insects are an integral part of life on Earth as both pollinators and prey for other wildlife and it was known that some species such as butterflies were declining. But the newly revealed scale of the losses to all insects has prompted warnings that the world is “on course for ecological Armageddon”, with profound impacts on human society. The new data was gathered in nature reserves across Germany but has implications for all landscapes dominated by agriculture, the researchers said. READ MORE

 

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