Live Poster Session: Zoom Link
Thursday, July 30th 1:15-2:30pm EDT
Abstract: Our understanding of marine ecosystems and our ability to conserve marine species lags behind that of terrestrial systems. This is despite the fact that 10% of the world’s population depends on fish and fish products (FAO) and despite the unique threats to ocean life. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List systematically categorizes species by their threat level in order to inform international conservation policy. However, species that lack sufficient data on population dynamics, abundance and/or geographic distribution are categorized as Data Deficient (DD). This means that a species may be seriously threatened but won’t be categorized and protected until the requisite data is available. Twice as many marine species are Data Deficient than non-marine species (Luiz et al. 2016). I sought to answer what proportion of these marine species are actually threatened and whether the threat to marine species has increased in the last thirteen years. My data set consisted of 227 marine species that changed status from Data Deficient to any other Red List category (Least Concern, Vulnerable, Endangered, Critically Endangered or Extinct) during the years 2007, 2009-2019. I compared the categorical proportions of this set to those representing the set of all non-Data Deficient marine species. I found a significant increase in the number of Near Threatened and Endangered marine species, coupled with a significant decrease in the number of Least Concern marine species. These results demonstrate the profound impacts of habitat degradation, overharvesting, pollution and climate change on marine species as well as the urgency of collecting sufficient data to categorize DD marine species.
SkerrettDDFinalPoster-Fiona-SkerrettLive Poster Session: Zoom Link
Thursday, July 30th 1:15-2:30pm EDT