Should We Protect the Strong or the Weak? Risk,Resilience, and the Selection of Marine Protected Areas |
| |
Authors: | EDWARD T GAME EVE McDONALD‐MADDEN MARJI L PUOTINEN HUGH P POSSINGHAM |
| |
Institution: | 1. The Ecology Centre and Centre for Applied Environmental Decision Analysis, University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Queensland 4072, Australia;2. Wealth from Oceans Flagship, CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, Cleveland, Queensland 4163, Australia;3. School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Woollongong, New South Wales 2522, Australia |
| |
Abstract: | Abstract: It is thought that recovery of marine habitats from uncontrollable disturbance may be faster in marine reserves than in unprotected habitats. But which marine habitats should be protected, those areas at greatest risk or those at least risk? We first defined this problem mathematically for 2 alternate conservation objectives. We then analytically solved this problem for both objectives and determined under which conditions each of the different protection strategies was optimal. If the conservation objective was to maximize the chance of having at least 1 healthy site, then the best strategy was protection of the site at lowest risk. On the other hand, if the goal was to maximize the expected number of healthy sites, the optimal strategy was more complex. If protected sites were likely to spend a significant amount of time in a degraded state, then it was best to protect low‐risk sites. Alternatively, if most areas were generally healthy then, counterintuitively, it was best to protect sites at higher risk. We applied these strategies to a situation of cyclone disturbance of coral reefs on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. With regard to the risk of cyclone disturbance, the optimal reef to protect differed dramatically, depending on the expected speed of reef recovery of both protected and unprotected reefs. An adequate consideration of risk is fundamental to all conservation actions and can indicate surprising routes to conservation success. |
| |
Keywords: | catastrophes coral reefs cyclones habitat disturbance marine reserves reserve selection arrecifes de coral catá strofes perturbació n de há bitat selecció n de reservas reservas marinas |
|
|