An international team has developed the first comprehensive framework for designing networks of marine protected areas that can help vulnerable species survive as climate change drives habitat loss.
In a paper published Oct. 26 in One Earth, the researchers outlined guidelines for governments to provide long-distance larval drifters, like urchins and lobsters, as well as migratory species, like turtles and sharks, with protected stopovers along coastal corridors. Led by Stanford marine conservation scientist Nur Arafeh-Dalmau, the team included 50 scientists and practitioners from academia, conservation organizations, and management agencies from the U.S., Mexico, and Australia.
The guidelines come at a critical time as nearly every country in the world has committed to protect 30% of land and sea by 2030. Marine protected areas and similar conservation measures on land connect habitats fractured by generations of human development or erratically carved up by wildfires and heat waves.
Read more at: Stanford University
Stanford marine conservation scientist Nur Arafeh-Dalmau swims in a giant kelp forest in Baja California in August. An avid diver, he documented Mexico’s worst marine heat wave from 2014 to 2016. (Photo credit: Jennifer Adler/MasKelp)