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Why Marine Conservation Biology?
Elliott A. Norse and Larry B. Crowder
Nature provides a free lunch, but only if we control our appetites.
WILLIAM D. RUCKELSHAUS,
member of the US Commission on Ocean Policy
For many people old enough to remember, 1962 was the year of the Cuban Missile Crisis, when the world came very close to nuclear self-immolation. The missiles and bombers were ready to launch, butâjust barelyâpeople in positions of power made difficult choices, and sanity prevailed. That same year, marine biologist Rachel Carson alerted the world to another crisis that we humans had made for ourselves. Before then, humankind had largely overlooked our impact on our environment. But Carsonâs (1962) best-selling Silent Spring demonstrated that âprogressâ (in this case, from new synthetic chemical pesticides) is threatening the integrity of our natural world. In 1969, widely televised footage of dying seabirds from an oil well blowout in Californiaâs Santa Barbara Channel quickly catalyzed a broad-based environmental movement that led to passage of a flood of new and strengthened environmental laws in the United States and beyond. A decade later, Lovejoy (1980), Myers (1979), and Norse and McManus (1980) showed that our planet is losing its biological diversity, and SoulĂ© and Wilcox (1980) called upon the worldâs scientists to join forces to work to stop the accelerating erosion of life on Earth. These were wake-up calls that society could no longer afford to ignore. Yet, ironically, the visionary and courageous Rachel Carson, who had written three best-selling books about the wonders of the sea as well as Silent Spring, said almost nothing in these books about human impacts on the sea. And despite the Santa Barbara oil spillâs role in mobilizing the public, decision makers, and scientists, environmental consciousness focused mainly on land and freshwaters. Having been jolted into awareness by a marine biologist and mobilized by an offshore oil spill, the environmental movement nonetheless shifted its attention away from the sea.
Of course, our species evolved on land, and we tend to focus on what we can readily see. Although our Paleozoic ancestors were marine animals, they left the sea hundreds of millions of years ago, and humansâ physiological mechanisms and senses are ill-suited for acquiring knowledge beneath the seaâs wavy, mirrored surface. This profoundly affects marine conservation because, on land, people can see at least some of the consequences of our activities on ecosystems and species. Such understanding forms a basis for social, economic, and legal processes that can protect biodiversity. But judging the integrity of marine ecosystems and their species is far more difficult because most people never go below the sea surface and cannot gauge the health of a marine ecosystem. Rather, the general public and key decision makers (including legislators, agency officials, industrialists, funders, and environmental advocates) depend on those with information about what occurs beneath the surface, especially fishermen, offshore oil drillers, and marine scientists. And because people who extract commodities from the sea have strong economic incentive to minimize public concerns about marine biodiversity loss, marine scientists are by far the most credible providers of information.
It is difficult even for scientists to appreciate how the sea has changed. On that Pleistocene day when our ancestors first stood on an African shore and looked seaward, they must have been stunned by the wealth of marine life they saw. Were the mudflats paved with mollusks? Did the sea surface boil with fishes? Could dugongs and green sea turtles have filled the shallows like wildebeests and zebras on the plains? We cannot know for certain, but scientific information increasingly coming to light from around the world suggests that the sea was home to an astounding diversity and abundance of life as recently as hundreds, even tens of years ago (Crowder, Chapter 2). It was only in the 1990s (Butman and Carlton 1995; Norse 1993; Thorne-Miller and Catena 1991) that scientists assembled compelling information showing that biological diversity in the sea is imperiled worldwide. And not until the International Year of the Ocean did 1,605 the worldâs scientists join forces to publicly voice their concern about marine biodiversity loss in a statement called Troubled Waters: A Call for Action (MCBI 1998) (Box 1.1).
The land and freshwaters are anything but safe, and no knowledgeable person would suggest that we can afford to reduce our commitment to them, but it is also time to focus much more attention on the sea. The seaâs vital signs are disquieting: most everywhere scientists lookâin tropical and polar waters, urban estuaries and remote oceans, the sunlit epipelagic zone and seamounts in the black depthsâwe are seeing once-abundant species disappearing, noxious species proliferating, ecosystem functions changing, and fisheries collapsing. And although nature is always changing, these changes are without precedent in 65 million years, since a giant meteorite smashed into Earth, causing the extinction of dinosaurs, mosasaurs, ammonites, and countless other species (Ward 1994). Moreover, this time it is not a mindless mass of rock that threatens the seaâs biodiversity. It is our species.
Marine conservation biologists do not need to plumb the scholarly literature to frame the challenge we face; two quotations accessible to a broad audience suffice. In the 2002 movie Spider-Man, Uncle Ben teaches Peter Parker, âWith great power comes great responsibility.â Armed with the power either to destroy or to protect, recover, and sustainably use marine biodiversity, people can choose, just as people in 1962 chose not to make nuclear war. The other quotation is from a 1968 speech by American black radical Eldridge Cleaver: âYouâre either part of the solution or youâre part of the problem.â Marine scientistsâ unique combination of knowledge and credibility creates for us a unique niche in a world desperately in need of answers. Some of us might have been part of the problem in the past. But now the question is, Are we up to the challenge of being part of the solution? Are we ready to tackle the biggest question of all; namely, How can humankind live on Earth without ruining its living systems, including the largest component of the biosphere, the sea?
The marine conservation challenge shares most aspects of the terrestrial conservation challenge but also has some distinctive features. There are many important physicochemical and biological differences, but these pale in comparison to the human dimensions, how people treat estuaries, coastal waters, and the open oceans. Even more than poverty, affluence, technology, and greed, it is ignorance and indifference that are the enemies of marine biodiversity. Our not knowing the sea, not living in it, and not having a sense of responsibility for it have led to a âfrontier mentalityâ that has governed our social contract with the sea. Signs that the end of the frontier is rapidly approaching indicate the need for a new system based on the idea that marine ecosystems are heterogeneous and have many legitimate human interests. The last chapter in this book (Norse, Chapter 25) offers ocean zoning as an alternative to what Hardin (1968) called the âtragedy of the commons.â But to do this successfully, we must know more than we do now. And if unfamiliarity with the sea and its rapidly increasing conservation needs is the problem, then appropriately swift development of a vibrant interdisciplinary science of marine conservation biology must be an integral part of the solution.
BOX 1.1. Troubled Waters: A Call for Action
We, the undersigned marine scientists and conservation biologists, call upon the worldâs citizens and governments to recognize that the living sea is in trouble and to take decisive action. We must act quickly to stop further severe, irreversible damage to the seaâs biological diversity and integrity.
Marine ecosystems are home to many phyla that live nowhere else. As vital components of our planetâs life support systems, they protect shorelines from flooding, break down wastes, moderate climate and maintain a breathable atmosphere. Marine species provide a livelihood for millions of people, food, medicines, raw materials and recreation for billions, and are intrinsically important.
Life in the worldâs estuaries, coastal waters, enclosed seas and oceans is increasingly threatened by: (1) overexploitation of species, (2) physical alteration of ecosystems, (3) pollution, (4) introduction of alien species, and (5) global atmospheric change. Scientists have documented the extinction of marine species, disappearance of ecosystems and loss of resources worth billions of dollars. Overfishing has eliminated all but a handful of Californiaâs white abalones. Swordfish fisheries have collapsed as more boats armed with better technology chase ever fewer fish. Northern right whales have not recovered six decades after their exploitation supposedly ceased. Steller sea lion populations have dwindled as fishing for their food has intensified. Cyanide and dynamite fishing are destroying the worldâs richest coral reefs. Bottom trawling is scouring continental shelf seabeds from the poles to the tropics. Mangrove forests are vanishing. Logging and farming on hillsides are exposing soils to rains that wash silt into the sea, killing kelps and reef corals. Nutrients from sewage and toxic chemicals from industry are overnourishing and poisoning estuaries, coastal waters and enclosed seas. Millions of seabirds have been oiled, drowned by longlines, and deprived of nesting beaches by development and nest-robbing cats and rats. Alien species introduced intentionally or as stowaways in shipsâ ballast tanks have become dominant species in marine ecosystems around the world. Reef corals are succumbing to diseases or undergoing mass bleaching in many places. There is no doubt that the seaâs biological diversity and integrity are in trouble.
To reverse this trend and avert even more widespread harm to marine species and ecosystems, we urge citizens and governments worldwide to take the following five steps:
- Identify and provide effective protection to all populations of marine species that are significantly depleted or declining, take all measures necessary to allow their recovery, minimize bycatch, end all subsidies that encourage overfishing and ensure that use of marine species is sustainable in perpetuity.
- Increase the number and effectiveness of marine protected areas so that 20% of Exclusive Economic Zones and the High Seas are protected from threats by the Year 2020.
- Ameliorate or stop fishing methods that undermine sustainability by harming the habitats of economically valuable marine species and the species they use for food and shelter.
- Stop physical alteration of terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecosystems that harms the sea, minimize pollution discharged at sea or entering the sea from the land, curtail introduction of alien marine species and prevent further atmospheric changes that threaten marine species and ecosystems.
- Provide sufficient resources to encourage natural and social scientists to undertake marine conservation biology research needed to protect, restore and sustainably use life in the sea.
Nothing happening on Earth threatens our security more than the destruction of our living systems. The situation is so serious that leaders and citizens cannot afford to wait even a decade to make major progress toward these goals. To maintain, restore and sustainably use the seaâs biological diversity and the essential products and services that it provides, we must act now.
A Long-standing Problem
Marine scientists have come a long way since the Challenger expedition (1872 â 76) and the founding of the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn (Italy) in 1872 and the Marine Biological Association (UK) in 1883. We have reason to be proud of what we have learned and for the increasing use of scientific information as a basis for conservation decision making. But large knowledge gaps are still numerous, and scarcity of fact and theory bedevils marine conservation decision making. A telling sign is that, for some six decades, marine scientists failed to notice the extinction of a once-abundant nearshore limpet, Lottia alveus (Carlton et al. 1991) along a coastline studded with as many marine labs as any comparable stretch in the world. Similarly, nobody seemed to notice for five decades while once-abundant populations of oceanic whitetip sharks (Carcharhinus longimanus) in the Gulf of Mexico were being reduced more than 99 percent (Baum and Myers 2004). When marine scientists do see worrisome phenomena, such as the toxic phytoplankton bloom or viral disease that devastated Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus) populations in Mauritania in 1997 or jellyfish population explosions in the Bering Sea and Gulf of Mexico in the late 1990s, we are often unable to ascertain definitively why they are occurring. Scientists have not convincingly determined why Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) and North Atlantic right whales (Eubalaena glacialis) have not rebounded after their exploitation in the Northwest ...
