Seascape Ecology

Simon J. Pittman

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781119084433
• eBook ISBN: 9781119084440
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Ecology
• Index: Biological Sciences

Seascape Ecology provides a comprehensive look at the state-of-the-science in the application of landscape ecology to the seas and provides guidance for future research priorities. The first book devoted exclusively to this rapidly emerging and increasingly important discipline, it is comprised of contributions from researchers at the forefront of seascape ecology working around the world. It presents the principles, concepts, methodology, and techniques informing seascape ecology and reports on the latest developments in the application of the approach to marine ecology and management.

A growing number of marine scientists, geographers, and marine managers are asking questions about the marine environment that are best addressed with a landscape ecology perspective. Seascape Ecology represents the first serious effort to fill the gap in the literature on the subject. Key topics and features of interest include:

• The origins and history of seascape ecology and various approaches to spatial patterning in the sea
• The links between seascape patterns and ecological processes, with special attention paid to the roles played by seagrasses and salt marshes and animal movements through seascapes
• Human influences on seascape ecology—includes models for assessing human-seascape interactions
• A special epilogue in which three eminent scientists who have been instrumental in shaping the course of landscape ecology offer their insights and perspectives

Seascape Ecology is a must-read for researchers and professionals in an array of disciplines, including marine biology, environmental science, geosciences, marine and coastal management, and environmental protection. It is also an excellent supplementary text for university courses in those fields.

PART I
Spatial Patterning in the Sea

Chapter 1
Introducing Seascape Ecology

Simon J. Pittman

Here, on the edge of what we know, in contact with the ocean of the unknown, shines the mystery and beauty of the world. And it's breathtaking.

Carlo Rovelli, Sette brevi lezioni di fisica (2014)

1.1 Introduction

A conceptual shift is under way in the way we perceive, understand and interact with the marine environment. The once widespread view of the sea as a vast featureless expanse of water providing unlimited resources is now giving way to a deeper more ecologically meaningful perspective. In recent years we have started to recognise and study the sea as a highly interconnected system exhibiting complex spatiotemporal patterning and previously unanticipated vulnerability to human activities. A primary catalyst for this change in worldview has been the technological advancement and proliferation of space-, air- and water-based ocean-sensing systems, together with increased sophistication in geospatial tools and mathematical simulation models. These technologies have allowed us to collect, integrate, analyse and visualise vast quantities of marine data that have revealed unimaginable structural complexity and interconnectedness across the seafloor, sea surface and throughout the water column. Whilst these patterns are visually captivating, it is their ecological implications that are scientifically intriguing and most relevant to society. However, significant knowledge gaps still exist in our understanding of how structural patterning in the sea, across multiple spatial and temporal scales, influences marine species distributions, biodiversity patterns, ecosystem services and human wellbeing. The breadth and depth of our existing knowledge has been constrained not only by technological limitations and data availability but also by the dominant philosophical and methodological scientific frameworks in marine science that have resulted in a preponderance of nonspatial, single scale and reductionist approaches in marine ecology. This has limited the ability of marine science to support holistic management strategies such as ecosystem-based management, where the human dimensions are integral to understanding the functioning of the system. In a rapidly changing world, where environmental patterns are being modified by human activity and the ocean economy is expanding and diversifying, society urgently requires a deeper and more holistic understanding of the linkages between seascape patterns and ecological processes to inform effective marine stewardship.

The scientific discipline of landscape ecology offers an appropriately holistic and interdisciplinary spatially explicit framework to address complex ecological questions. Although landscape ecology was once considered esoteric in science, its conceptual and analytical frameworks now permeate many areas of ecological research offering important new ecological insights (Turner 2005). In contrast, spatially explicit studies of seascape patterning are still relatively rare and although seascape ecology, the marine equivalent of landscape ecology, is on the verge of entering mainstream marine ecology, the level of familiarity among marine scientists is still comparable to that reported by terrestrial landscape ecologists in the 1980s, whereby ‘ideas were new and were received with a mixture of scepticism and excitement’ (Turner 2005).

Regardless, this new direction of scientific enquiry, with a focus on interpretation of spatial patterning, is not isolated to ecology but is part of a broader technological shift often referred to as the geospatial revolution. Our global society is undergoing a spatial information revolution fuelled by rapid innovations emerging from spatial computing, such as online maps, geoportals, location-based public services and a proliferation of augmented reality applications for all ages (Downs 2014; Shekhar et al. 2015). The geospatial revolution is also influencing the curriculum in schools and universities (Coulter 2014). This new wave of technological innovation and open access to geospatial data, which allows us to construct detailed and dynamic multidimensional digital representations of the global system, is the inspiration for the vision of Digital Earth as highlighted by Al Gore (Gore 1998) and others (Craglia et al. 2012). Consequently, a transformative shift is also underway in marine ecology. A new generation of marine ecologists, known as seascape ecologists, are bringing enhanced spatial awareness to ecological thinking, together with the tools to work with ‘big data’, a holistic perspective and a desire to ask new types of applied research questions. Yet, despite our best efforts to acquire and make accessible vast datasets that capture in detail the multidimensional patterning of the oceans, we still know surprisingly little about the ecological consequences of spatial patterning, including the implications for people and society.

In this introduction to the first book on seascape ecology, I introduce this emerging discipline and its relationship to landscape ecology and then touch on several key topics central to the conceptual and operational framework of seascape ecology.

1.2 Landscape Ecology and the Emergence of Seascape Ecology

Seascape ecology, the application of landscape ecology concepts to the marine environment, has been slowly emerging since the 1970s (Box 1.1) (Sousa 1979; Paine & Levin 1981; Walsh 1985; Steele 1989; Jones & Andrew 1992), yielding new ecological insights and showing growing potential to support the development of ecologically meaningful science-based management practices (Boström et al. 2011; Pittman et al. 2011). Seascape ecology, which draws heavily from conceptual and analytical frameworks developed in landscape ecology, focuses on understanding the causes and ecological consequences of the complex and dynamic spatial patterning that exists in marine environments (Robbins & Bell 1994; Pittman et al. 2011; see also Chapter 16 in this book). Landscape ecology shares some common ground with the broader subject of spatial ecology, which is also interested in spatial heterogeneity, but landscape ecology is defined by a set of concepts and techniques that are widely recognised as a specialisation in ecology (see foundation papers in Wiens et al. 1987) warranting an identity as a distinct discipline within ecology.

Influenced by a fusion of geography and ecology, the European roots of landscape ecology can be traced back to the early twentieth century and perhaps even to the Prussian geographer and explorer Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) through his contributions in Essai sur la géographie des plantes (von Humboldt & Bonpland 1807) and his holistic perspective of the universe outlined in Kosmos (published between 1845 and 1862). In 1939, Carl Troll, a German biogeographer, first introduced the term ‘landschaftsökologie’ (landscape ecology) to describe the study of landscape patterns mapped from aerial photography and then in 1971 defined it ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Table of Contents
• Contributors
• Foreword
• Preface
• Part I: Spatial Patterning in the Sea
• Part II: Linking Seascape Patterns and Ecological Processes
• Part III: Seascape Connectivity
• Part IV: People and Seascapes
• Part V: Epilogue
• Index
• End User License Agreement