Science Priorities for Seamounts: Research Links to Conservation and Management

Seamounts shape the topography of all ocean basins and can be hotspots of biological activity in the deep sea. The Census of Marine Life on Seamounts (CenSeam) was a field program that examined seamounts as part of the global Census of Marine Life (CoML) initiative from 2005 to 2010. CenSeam progressed seamount science by collating historical data, collecting new data, undertaking regional and global analyses of seamount biodiversity, mapping species and habitat distributions, challenging established paradigms of seamount ecology, developing new hypotheses, and documenting the impacts of human activities on seamounts. However, because of the large number of seamounts globally, much about the structure, function and connectivity of seamount ecosystems remains unexplored and unknown. Continual, and potentially increasing, threats to seamount resources from fishing and seabed mining are creating a pressing demand for research to inform conservation and management strategies. To meet this need, intensive science effort in the following areas will be needed: 1) Improved physical and biological data; of particular importance is information on seamount location, physical characteristics (e.g. habitat heterogeneity and complexity), more complete and intensive biodiversity inventories, and increased understanding of seamount connectivity and faunal dispersal; 2) New human impact data; these shall encompass better studies on the effects of human activities on seamount ecosystems, as well as monitoring long-term changes in seamount assemblages following impacts (e.g. recovery); 3) Global data repositories; there is a pressing need for more comprehensive fisheries catch and effort data, especially on the high seas, and compilation or maintenance of geological and biodiversity databases that underpin regional and global analyses; 4) Application of support tools in a data-poor environment; conservation and management will have to increasingly rely on predictive modelling techniques, critical evaluation of environmental surrogates as faunal “proxies”, and ecological risk assessment

What is a land grab? Exploring green grabs, conservation, and private protected areas in southern Chile

Discussions of land grabs for various purposes, including environmental ends, have expanded in recent years, yet land grabbing remains inconsistently defined and poorly understood. Our ability to assess the extent to which land grabs are occurring, and to identify the mixture of factors driving land and resource acquisition, is limited. This paper assesses whether a land grab for conservation is happening in southern Chile, and identifies the various driving forces that combine to drive land acquisitions in the region, based on a detailed exploration of the recent massive growth in privately owned protected areas in the region. This paper finds that the various dominant definitions of land grabs each apply only partially to southern Chile, that land grabs for conservation need to be understood as the latest stage in a longer process by which the region's natural resources are incorporated into the Chilean and the global economy, and that green grabs interact in various ways with broader resource grabs, particularly for forestry and hydroelectricity. This case study demonstrates the limitations of some definitions of land grabs, particularly their focus on capitalist accumulation within land grabs, their international nature and their emphasis on legal processes

Markets, nature, neoliberalism and conservation through private protected areas in southern Chile.

A vibrant literature has emerged in recent years exploring moves towards neoliberal forms of conservation, with a reduced role for the state and an enhanced role for markets and private and civil society actors. Yet there is a need for studies which explore how and why this trend has emerged, and what impact this has on both people and nature. This paper is a detailed examination of private protected areas, which are often associated with neoliberal approaches to conservation, in Chile, a country which has had a long and deep engagement with neoliberalism. It finds that private protected areas demonstrate a broad range of attitudes towards the use of markets in conservation, from enthusiasm to hostility. Yet all have been made possible, indeed incentivised, by Chile’s liberalised property markets and individualistic political culture, products of earlier neoliberal reforms within Chile’s society and economy. As such, they provide only a limited challenge to the social and environmental consequence of the integration of southern Chile’s natural resources into global neoliberal economic chains. It emphasises the importance of considering how broader neoliberal economic, political and social reforms have allowed certain forms of conservation to emerge and thrive

Partial migration and early size of southern hake Merluccius australis : a journey between estuarine and oceanic habitats off Northwest Patagonia

Partial migration is a key adaptive strategy, increasingly observed across multiple taxa. To investigate partial migration and life-cycle diversity of Merluccius australis in northwestern Patagonia, we analysed isotopic (delta C-13, delta O-18) and elemental (B-11, Na-23, Mg-24, Mn-55, Sr-86, Ba-138) compositions of otoliths from juveniles, sub-adults, and adults to identify nursery origins, habitats used, and migratory behaviours of multiple cohorts (1990-2005). Influence of early size upon migration was assessed by comparing back-calculated sizes at demersal recruitment between resident and migratory adults. Although partial migration occurred at both estuarine and oceanic nursery habitats, migratory behaviour was more frequent in fish of estuarine origin (59%) than in fish of oceanic origin (17%). Adults of estuarine origin dominated both estuarine (92%) and oceanic (77%) sampling areas. Although we found no significant differences in size at demersal recruitment between oceanic-resident and oceanic-migratory fish, a strong relationship between size at demersal recruitment and migratory behaviour appeared in fish of estuarine origin, whose probability of migration increased from 5% to 95% as demersal recruitment size increased from 18.8 to 23.6cm. Further research on M. australis life cycle is required to incorporate sub-population processes into the stock assessment and management models being used for this overexploited species