DOCSLIB.ORG

Underreported Stories on Climate Change and Coral Reefs in These

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Underreported Stories on Climate Change and Coral Reefs in These Underreported Stories on Climate Change and Coral Reefs in These Times of Diminishing International Reporting: Mining the Scholarly Literature Through Regular Annotated Bibliographies by Lucy A. Higgins B.A., Brown University 2011 A thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Colorado at Boulder in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Arts in Mass Communication and Research School of Journalism and Mass Communication 2013 This thesis entitled: UNDERREPORTED STORIES ON CLIMATE CHANGE AND CORAL REEFS IN THESE TIMES OF DIMINISHING INTERNATIONAL REPORTING: MINING THE SCHOLARLY LITERATURE THROUGH REGULAR ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHIES By Lucy A. Higgins Has been approved for Journalism and Mass Communication ____________________________ (Bella Mody) ____________________________ (Michael McDevitt) _____________________________ (Sandra Fish) Date ______________ The final copy of this thesis has been examined by the signatories, and we find that both the content and the form meet the acceptable presentation standards of scholarly work in the above mentioned discipline. ii Lucy A. Higgins (M.A., Mass Communication and Research with a certificate in the Environment, Policy, and Society, School of Journalism and Mass Communication) Underreported Stories on Climate Change and Coral Reefs in These Times of Diminishing International Reporting: Mining the Scholarly Literature Through Regular Annotated Bibliographies Thesis direction by Bella Mody ABSTRACT The goal of this project is to explore solutions to the increasingly difficult challenge of covering international environmental topics, such as coral reefs and climate change, during times of constrained budgets, shrinking environmental reporting, and disappearing foreign news bureaus. In this context of limited resources, this study explores whether the periodic bibliographic review of scholarly literature may offer a low-expense avenue for news organizations to sustain or even increase the breadth and depth of coverage of these important topics. This study compares coverage of coral reefs and climate change in scholarly journal articles (2007-2011) to those in the popular press (2007-2012) using the New York Times (NYTimes) as an exemplar of the latter. The extra year in the latter was to allow for a possible time lag in information moving from the scholarly literature to the popular press. Articles on coral reefs and climate change identified in the scholarly literature (239) revealed numerous possibilities for stories that were not covered in the 22 annotated articles on this topic that appeared in the NYTimes. Whereas the most frequently discussed topics in the scholarly literature were the iii relationship between herbivorous fish and coral health, sea surface temperatures (SST), coral bleaching, and the resilience, recovery, and acclimation processes of coral reef ecosystems, the NYTimes’s articles focused on conservation, tourism, SST, and broad discussion of climate change and how it might affect coral reef ecosystems. Additionally, of the 22 NYTimes articles on coral reefs and climate change, only three (14%) included hyperlinks to scholarly articles and 12 (55%) included at least one scientific reference. Overall, this study demonstrates that during these times of declining resources for on-the-spot reporting, scholarly literature represents an affordable but currently underutilized means for news organizations to continue providing wide ranging and detailed coverage of international environmental issues. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would first like to extend many thanks to my thesis advisor, Dr. Bella Mody, for her support, guidance, and revisions through out this project and for mentoring me during my time at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Thank you for the classes, office discussions, and delicious dinners at your home (and for letting me take home the leftovers). I would also like to thank Sandra Fish and Michael McDevitt for their time and consideration in serving on my committee, and for teaching such interesting, well- developed classes over the course of my program. I would like to extend thanks to my family, especially my father, Stephen Higgins, for providing a source of positivity, revisions, and humor. I would be remiss not to include a heartfelt thank you to my boyfriend, Jake O’Connor, who has supported me over the course of this project, and to Mary Cornell, who served as my partner-in-thesis over the past year. Without you all, I would still be glumly annotating sources. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract …………………………………………………………………………..……..iii Table of Contents ......……………….……………………………………………..........vi Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION ...………………………………………………………..1 Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ………………………………...……………….6 2.1 Context: A Reconfiguration of the Media and a Decline in Media Coverage of Climate Change ………...……………………………………………….………...6 2.2 The Decrease in Foreign Correspondents …………………………..……...…9 2.3 Overview on Coral Reefs and the Impact of Climate Change ………………12 Chapter 3: METHODS ………………………………………………………..……….15 3.1 Time Period…………………………………………………………………..15 3.2 Scholarly Database…………………………………………………………...16 3.3 The Popular Press: The New York Times as an Exemplar……………...........17 Chapter 4: RESULTS ………………………………………………………………… 20 4.1 Topics Covered in the Scholarly Literature …………………………………20 4.1.1 Herbivorous Fish and Coral Reefs …………………………….......22 4.1.2 Sea Surface Temperature, Thermal Sress. Sea-Level Rise ………..24 4.1.3 Coral Bleaching …………………………………………………...26 4.1.4 Coral Reef Resilience and Recovery ……………………………...28 vi 4.1.5 Other Topics in the Scholarly Literature: Ocean Acidification and Marine Reserves and Conservation …………………………………..…29 4.1.6 Research Methods Used in Scholarly Studies …………………….31 4.2 Topics Covered in the New York Times ……………………………….…….32 4.2.1 Conservation ………………………………………………………34 4.2.2 Tourism ……………………………………………………………36 4.2.3 Sea Surface Temperature ………………………………………….37 4.2.4 Climate Change in General ………………………………………..38 4.2.5 NYTimes Sources and Hyperlinks ……………………………...…39 4.3 Comparing the Scholarly and NYTimes Literatures …………………………41 4.3.1 Possible Explanations for Differences …………………………….45 Chapter 5: CONCLUSION ……………………………………………………………49 Chapter 6: FUTURE RESEARCH …………………………………………………...52 REFERENCES ………………………………………………………………….…….. 53 APPENDIX A: Table for Scholarly Literature ………………..………………….….58 APPENDIX B: Table for NYTimes Articles ………………………………………....60 APPENDIX C: NYTimes Annotated Bibliography ………………………………….61 APPENDIX D: Scholarly Journal Articles Annotated Bibliography ………………82 vii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Coral reef ecosystems are increasingly threatened worldwide by rising sea temperatures and ocean acidification, coupled with other human factors such as sedimentation and pollution, overfishing and destructive fishing, coastal development, and marine pollution and damage (Burke, 2011). At the same time, many US news organizations that could increase awareness and understanding of these threats are downsizing their global operations. For example, Bill Keller (Keller, 2012), the former editor of the New York Times (NYTimes), wrote, News organizations began their retreat from the world a long time ago, driven by economics and a wrongheaded belief that Americans don’t care that much about foreign news…two years ago 18 American newspapers and two entire newspaper chains had closed every one of their overseas bureaus. Other news outlets, including most TV networks, have downsized or abandoned full-time bureaus in favor of reporters or anchors who parachute in when there’s a crisis. They give spurts of coverage…but much less of the ongoing attention that would equip us to see crises coming and understand them when they erupt…Tweets are no substitute for being there… it’s possible we miss a layer of an immensely complicated story when we are not (there)… the price we pay for not being where news happens can be reckoned not only in less good journalism, but in less good policy. Because, make no mistake, some portion of the information governments call ‘intelligence’ is nothing more than an attentive reading of the news. In January of 2013, the NYTimes, Keller’s organization, announced that it was dismantling its nine-person environment desk further reducing availability of resources for adequately reporting on these important environmental developments. Colleges and universities often offer online resources, such as JSTOR, that consolidate scholarly journals, primary sources, and books. Google Scholar also offers readily available scholarly journal articles, many of which can be accessed without a journal subscription. Open databases are becoming more prevalent with the growing 1 debate about whether online journal articles should be free; PLoS (Public Library of Science) is a nonprofit that publishes open-access articles to the public (PLoS, 2013). Rather than continue to bemoan global environmental threats and shrinking foreign and environmental correspondence, I investigate unreported stories journalists might gain from freely available scholarly literature. Consistent with Thomas E. Patterson’s advocacy of knowledge-based journalism, this thesis presents a comparative study of popular press coverage of coral reefs and climate change against coverage in scholarly journal articles over a six-year period, from 2007-201 to benefits that could potentially arise from greater utilization of the scholarly literature in times of declining foreign and environmental correspondence. The purpose
Load more

Recommended publications
  • OGC-98-5 U.S. Insular Areas: Application of the U.S. Constitution
    United States General Accounting Office Report to the Chairman, Committee on GAO Resources, House of Representatives November 1997 U.S. INSULAR AREAS Application of the U.S. Constitution GAO/OGC-98-5 United States General Accounting Office GAO Washington, D.C. 20548 Office of the General Counsel B-271897 November 7, 1997 The Honorable Don Young Chairman Committee on Resources House of Representatives Dear Mr. Chairman: More than 4 million U.S. citizens and nationals live in insular areas1 under the jurisdiction of the United States. The Territorial Clause of the Constitution authorizes the Congress to “make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property” of the United States.2 Relying on the Territorial Clause, the Congress has enacted legislation making some provisions of the Constitution explicitly applicable in the insular areas. In addition to this congressional action, courts from time to time have ruled on the application of constitutional provisions to one or more of the insular areas. You asked us to update our 1991 report to you on the applicability of provisions of the Constitution to five insular areas: Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (the CNMI), American Samoa, and Guam. You asked specifically about significant judicial and legislative developments concerning the political or tax status of these areas, as well as court decisions since our earlier report involving the applicability of constitutional provisions to these areas. We have included this information in appendix I. 1As we did in our 1991 report on this issue, Applicability of Relevant Provisions of the U.S.
    [Show full text]
  • Juvenile Trapezia Spp. Crabs Can Increase Juvenile Host Coral Survival by Protection from Predation
    Vol. 515: 151–159, 2014 MARINE ECOLOGY PROGRESS SERIES Published November 18 doi: 10.3354/meps10970 Mar Ecol Prog Ser Juvenile Trapezia spp. crabs can increase juvenile host coral survival by protection from predation H. Rouzé1,2,*, G. Lecellier1,2,3, S. C. Mills2,4, S. Planes1,2, V. Berteaux-Lecellier1,2, H. Stewart1,5 1CRIOBE USR 3278 CNRS-EPHE-UPVD, BP 1013, Moorea, 98729 French Polynesia 2Laboratoire d’Excellence ‘CORAIL’, 58 avenue Paul Alduy, 66860 Perpignan, France 3Université de Versailles-Saint Quentin, 55 Avenue de Paris, Versailles Cedex, France 4CRIOBE USR 3278 CNRS-EPHE-UPVD, 58 Avenue Paul Alduy, 66860 Perpignan Cedex, France 5Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, 4160 Marine Drive, West Vancouver, British Columbia V7V 1N6, Canada ABSTRACT:Adult crabs are known to play critical roles in the survival of their adult coral hosts, but little is known of the mutualism between juvenile crabs (≤0.5 cm) and their juvenile hosts. Field and laboratory experiments both demonstrated that the presence of juvenile crabs of the genus Trapezia in young host Pocillopora corals (2 to 3 cm diameter) increased coral survival by 32% and reduced consumption by the corallivorous seastar Acanthaster planci. These experi- ments also showed that juvenile Trapezia were not effective at deterring predation by another common predatory seastar, Culcita novaeguineae. Finally, our work highlights that the defensive ability of symbiotic crabs may be genus-specific, as juvenile Tetralia spp. crabs, obligate sym- bionts of Acropora spp., displayed no protection against either A. planci or C. novaeguineae. KEY WORDS: Juvenile · Trapeziid · Corals · Acanthaster planci · Culcita novaeguineae · Mutualism · Predation · Defence Resale or republication not permitted without written consent of the publisher INTRODUCTION fered the highest predation around Moorea (Leray et al.
    [Show full text]
  • B: Other U.S. Island Possessions in the Tropical Pacific
    Appendix B Other U.S. Island Possessions in the Tropical Pacific1 Introduction Howland, Jarvis, and Baker Islands There are eight isolated and unincorporated is- Howland, Jarvis and Baker are arid coral islands lands and reefs under U.S. control and sovereignty in the southern Line Island group (figure B-l). Aside in the tropical Pacific Basin. Included in this cate- from American Samoa, Jarvis Island is the only gory are: Kingman Reef, Palmyra and Johnston other U.S.-affiliated island in the Southern Hemi- Atolls in the northern Line Island group; Howland, sphere. These islands lie within one-half degree Baker and Jarvis Islands in the southern Line Is- from the equator, in the equatorial climatic zone. land group; Midway Atoll at the northwest end of During the 19th century the United States and the Hawaiian archipelago; and Wake Island north Britain actively exploited the significant guano de- of the Marshall Islands. Evidence indicates that posits found on these three islands. Jarvis Island some of these islands were not inhabited prior to was claimed by the United States in 1857, and sub- “Western” discovery; and today some remain unin- sequently annexed by Britain in 1889. Jarvis, Howland, habited. and Baker Islands were made territories of the These islands range from less than 1 degree south United States in 1936, and placed under the juris- latitude to nearly 29 degrees north latitude and from diction of the Department of the Interior. The is- 162 degrees west to 167 east longitude. The climate lands currently are uninhabited. regimes range from arid to wet and equatorial to These atolls were used as weather stations and subtropical.
    [Show full text]
  • The Sea Stars (Echinodermata: Asteroidea): Their Biology, Ecology, Evolution and Utilization OPEN ACCESS
    See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/328063815 The Sea Stars (Echinodermata: Asteroidea): Their Biology, Ecology, Evolution and Utilization OPEN ACCESS Article · January 2018 CITATIONS READS 0 6 5 authors, including: Ferdinard Olisa Megwalu World Fisheries University @Pukyong National University (wfu.pknu.ackr) 3 PUBLICATIONS 0 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects: Population Dynamics. View project All content following this page was uploaded by Ferdinard Olisa Megwalu on 04 October 2018. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file. Review Article Published: 17 Sep, 2018 SF Journal of Biotechnology and Biomedical Engineering The Sea Stars (Echinodermata: Asteroidea): Their Biology, Ecology, Evolution and Utilization Rahman MA1*, Molla MHR1, Megwalu FO1, Asare OE1, Tchoundi A1, Shaikh MM1 and Jahan B2 1World Fisheries University Pilot Programme, Pukyong National University (PKNU), Nam-gu, Busan, Korea 2Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering Discipline, Khulna University, Khulna, Bangladesh Abstract The Sea stars (Asteroidea: Echinodermata) are comprising of a large and diverse groups of sessile marine invertebrates having seven extant orders such as Brisingida, Forcipulatida, Notomyotida, Paxillosida, Spinulosida, Valvatida and Velatida and two extinct one such as Calliasterellidae and Trichasteropsida. Around 1,500 living species of starfish occur on the seabed in all the world's oceans, from the tropics to subzero polar waters. They are found from the intertidal zone down to abyssal depths, 6,000m below the surface. Starfish typically have a central disc and five arms, though some species have a larger number of arms. The aboral or upper surface may be smooth, granular or spiny, and is covered with overlapping plates.
    [Show full text]
  • Coral Reef Biological Criteria: Using the Clean Water Act to Protect a National Treasure
    EPA/600/R-10/054 | July 2010 | www.epa.gov/ord Coral Reef Biological Criteria: Using the Clean Water Act to Protect a National Treasure Offi ce of Research and Development | National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory EPA/600/R-10/054 July 2010 www.epa.gov/ord Coral Reef Biological Criteria Using the Clean Water Act to Protect a National Treasure by Patricia Bradley Leska S. Fore Atlantic Ecology Division Statistical Design NHEERL, ORD 136 NW 40th St. 33 East Quay Road Seattle, WA 98107 Key West, FL 33040 William Fisher Wayne Davis Gulf Ecology Division Environmental Analysis Division NHEERL, ORD Offi ce of Environmental Information 1 Sabine Island Drive 701 Mapes Road Gulf Breeze, FL 32561 Fort Meade, MD 20755 Contract No. EP-C-06-033 Work Assignment 3-11 Great Lakes Environmental Center, Inc Project Officer: Work Assignment Manager: Susan K. Jackson Wayne Davis Offi ce of Water Offi ce of Environmental Information Washington, DC 20460 Fort Meade, MD 20755 National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory Offi ce of Research and Development Washington, DC 20460 Printed on chlorine free 100% recycled paper with 100% post-consumer fiber using vegetable-based ink. Notice and Disclaimer The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency through its Offi ce of Research and Development, Offi ce of Environmental Information, and Offi ce of Water funded and collaborated in the research described here under Contract EP-C-06-033, Work Assignment 3-11, to Great Lakes Environmental Center, Inc. It has been subject to the Agency’s peer and administrative review and has been approved for publication as an EPA document.
    [Show full text]
  • Monitoring Supports Establishment of Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument
    Proceedings of the 12 th International Coral Reef Symposium, Cairns, Australia, 9-13 July 2012 18F Does monitoring lead to improved coral reef management? Monitoring supports establishment of Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument Jean Kenyon 1, James Maragos 1, Peter Vroom 2 1U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Honolulu, HI U.S.A. 2Ocean Associates, San Diego, CA, contracted to NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Coral Reef Ecosystem Division, Honolulu, HI, U.S.A. Corresponding author: [email protected] Abstract. The U.S. Pacific Remote Islands consist of Howland, Baker, and Jarvis Islands, Johnston, Wake, and Palmyra Atolls, and Kingman Reef. Except for Wake, these islands and nearshore reefs have been administered as National Wildlife Refuges by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) as early as 1926. Before regular marine assessment and monitoring efforts began in 2000, scientists had visited these locations to collect fishes, corals, and other reef life, but few systematic reef surveys were accomplished. Since 2000, systematic inventory and monitoring surveys for fishes, corals, and benthic algae have been conducted by NOAA and USFWS during biennial cruises. Knowledge of the biodiversity, community structure, and condition of these reefs has increased dramatically because of these cooperative monitoring efforts, exemplified by the increase in number of stony corals reported at Howland from 25 to 109, at Baker from 28 to 104, at Jarvis from 0 to 70, at Palmyra from 72 to 177, at Kingman from 0 to 182, at Johnston from 38 to 49, and at Wake from 52 to 97. Informed through these survey efforts of the diversity and abundance of marine biota supported on these central Pacific reefs, President George W.
    [Show full text]
  • Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument
    U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument The Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument falls within the Central Pacific Ocean, ranging from Wake Atoll in the northwest to Jarvis Island in the southeast. The seven atolls and islands included within the monument are farther from human population centers than any other U.S. area. They represent one of the last frontiers and havens for wildlife in the world, and comprise the most widespread collection of coral reef, seabird, and shorebird protected areas on the planet under a single nation’s jurisdiction. At Howland Island, Baker Island, Jarvis Island, Palmyra Atoll, and Kingman Reef, the terrestrial areas, reefs, and waters out to 12 nautical miles (nmi) are part of the National Wildlife Refuge System. The land areas at Wake Atoll and Johnston Atoll remain under the jurisdiction of The giant clam, Tridacna gigas, is a clam that is the largest living bivalve mollusk. the U.S. Air Force, but the waters from Photo: © Kydd Pollock 0 to 12 nmi are protected as units of the National Wildlife Refuge System. For all of the areas, fishery-related Marine National Monument, and orders long time periods throughout their entire activities seaward from the 12-nmi refuge of magnitude greater than the reefs near cultural and geological history. These boundaries out to the 50-nmi monument heavily populated islands. Expansive refuges are unique in that they were and boundary are managed by the National shallow coral reefs and deep coral forests, are still largely pristine, though many Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
    [Show full text]
  • Annotated Checklist of the Fishes of Lord Howe Island
    AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATIONS Allen, Gerald R., Douglass F. Hoese, John R. Paxton, J. E. Randall, C. Russell, W. A. Starck, F. H. Talbot, and G. P. Whitley, 1977. Annotated checklist of the fishes of Lord Howe Island. Records of the Australian Museum 30(15): 365–454. [21 December 1976]. doi:10.3853/j.0067-1975.30.1977.287 ISSN 0067-1975 Published by the Australian Museum, Sydney naturenature cultureculture discover discover AustralianAustralian Museum Museum science science is is freely freely accessible accessible online online at at www.australianmuseum.net.au/publications/www.australianmuseum.net.au/publications/ 66 CollegeCollege Street,Street, SydneySydney NSWNSW 2010,2010, AustraliaAustralia ANNOTATED CHECKLIST OF THE FISHES OF LORD HOWE ISLAND G. R. ALLEN, 1,2 D. F. HOESE,1 J. R. PAXTON,1 J. E. RANDALL, 3 B. C. RUSSELL},4 W. A. STARCK 11,1 F. H. TALBOT,1,4 AND G. P. WHITlEy5 SUMMARY lord Howe Island, some 630 kilometres off the northern coast of New South Wales, Australia at 31.5° South latitude, is the world's southern most locality with a well developed coral reef community and associated lagoon. An extensive collection of fishes from lord Howelsland was made during a month's expedition in February 1973. A total of 208 species are newly recorded from lord Howe Island and 23 species newly recorded from the Australian mainland. The fish fauna of lord Howe is increased to 447 species in 107 families. Of the 390 species of inshore fishes, the majority (60%) are wide-ranging tropical forms; some 10% are found only at lord Howe Island, southern Australia and/or New Zealand.
    [Show full text]
  • How to Prepare the Final Version of Your Manuscript for The
    Proceedings of the 12th International Coral Reef Symposium, Cairns, Australia, 9-13 July 2012 17A Science in support of the Coral Triangle Initiative Genetic structure of Culcita sp. pincushion seastar in the Coral Triangle Nina Yasuda1, Coralie Taquet2, Satoshi Nagai3, Miguel Fortes4, Suharsono5, Handoko Adi Susanto6, Niphon Phongsuwan7 and Kazuo Nadaoka2 1University of Miyazaki, Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Marine Biology and Environmental Sciences, 2Tokyo Institute of Technology 3National Research Institute of Fisheries and Environment of Inland Sea (FEIS) Fisheries Research Agency 4Marine Science Institute CS University of the Philippines 5Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) 6Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) 7 Marine and Coastal Biology and Ecology Unit Phuket Marine Biological Center Corresponding author: [email protected] Abstract. From the Coral Triangle, which is the global centre of marine biodiversity, species richness tends to decrease eastward across the Pacific Ocean and westward across the Indian Ocean. However, this region is severely threatened by both human and natural disturbances, calling for urgent conservation efforts. Conservation and management decisions inevitably require definition of the limits of population structure of each species as well as mechanisms that produce high biodiversity in the Coral Triangle. In this study we sequenced the mitochondrial COI region of the pincushion seastar, Culcita sp., a common coral reef seastar whose life history resembles other well-studied coral reef seastars. We found a large genetic difference between Indian (Culcita schmideliana) and Pacific Ocean (Culcita novaeguineae) lineages. All the populations (except from Thailand) had Pacific mtDNA haplotypes, while central and western Indonesian populations had both Indian and Pacific haplotypes, showing a sign of sympatric distribution of these two genetic lineages around these areas.
    [Show full text]
  • Ocean Acidification Summary for Policymakers – Third
    O A Summary for Policymakers Third Symposium on the Ocean in a High-CO2 World Scientific sponsors: The International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) was launched in 1987 to coordinate international research on global-scale and regional-scale interactions between Earth’s biological, chemical and physical processes and their interactions with human systems. IGBP’s international core projects Integrated Marine Biogeochemistry and Ecosystem Research (IMBER), Surface Ocean–Lower Atmosphere Study (SOLAS), Past Global Changes (PAGES) and Land–Ocean Interactions in the Coastal Zone (LOICZ) study ocean acidification. The Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC-UNESCO) was established by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1960 to provide Member States of the United Nations with an essential mechanism for global cooperation in the study of the ocean. The Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (SCOR) was established by the International Council for Science (ICSU) in 1957 and is a co-sponsor of the international projects IMBER and SOLAS. Citation: IGBP, IOC, SCOR (2013). Ocean Acidification Summary for Policymakers – Third Symposium on the Ocean in a High-CO2 World. International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, Stockholm, Sweden. Editors: Wendy Broadgate (IGBP), Owen Gaffney (IGBP), Kirsten Isensee (IOC-UNESCO), Ulf Riebesell (GEOMAR), Ed Urban (SCOR) and Luis Valdés (IOC-UNESCO). Authors: Wendy Broadgate, IGBP; Ulf Riebesell, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Germany; Claire
    [Show full text]
  • From Mangroves to Coral Reefs; Sea Life and Marine Environments in Pacific Islands by Michael King Apia, Samoa: SPREP 2004
    SPREP fromto coral mangroves reefs sea life and marine environments in Pacific islands Michael King South Pacific Regional Environment Programme SPREP Cataloguing-in-Publication King, Michael From mangroves to coral reefs; sea life and marine environments in Pacific islands by Michael King Apia, Samoa: SPREP 2004 This handbook was commissioned by the South Pacific Regional Environment Programme with funding from the Canada South Pacific Ocean Development Program (C-SPODP) and the UN Foundation through the International Coral Reef Action Network (ICRAN) SPREP PO Box 240 Apia, Samoa Phone (685) 21929 Fax (685) 20231 Email: [email protected] Web site: www.sprep.org.ws From mangroves to coral reefs sea life and marine environments in Pacific islands ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ 1. Introduction 1 6. The classification and diversity of marine life 29 Biological classification – naming things 2. Coastal wetlands - estuaries and mangroves 5 Diversity – the numbers of species Estuaries – where rivers meet the sea 7. Crustaceans – shrimps to coconut crabs 33 Mangroves – coastal forests Smaller crustaceans 3. Shorelines – beaches and seaplants 9 Shrimps and prawns Beaches – rivers of sand Lobsters and slipper lobsters Seaweeds – large plants of the sea Crabs Seagrasses – underwater pastures Hermit crabs and stone crabs 4. Corals - from coral polyps to reefs 15 8. Molluscs – clams to octopuses 41 Stony corals and coral polyps Clams, oysters, and mussels (bivalves) Fire corals – stinging hydroids Sea snails (gastropods) Corals in deepwater Octopuses and their relatives (cephalopods) Soft corals and gorgonians - octocorals 9. Echinoderms – sea cucumbers to sand dollars 51 Coral reefs – the world’s Sea cucumbers largest natural structures Sea stars 5.
    [Show full text]
  • The Thermal Range of the Cushion Sea Star, [I]Culcita Novaeguineae
    The thermal range of the cushion sea star, Culcita novaeguineae, distribution and its behavioral response to warmer waters Alexandra G Yokley Corresp. 1 1 Environmental Science Policy and Management, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California, United States Corresponding Author: Alexandra G Yokley Email address: [email protected] Overproduction of greenhouse gases is driving climate change and increasing the average temperature of oceans worldwide. As a result, organisms are exhibiting behavioral changes and species are shifting their natural distribution. This study aimed to assess the effects of temperature on C. novaeguineae distribution and movement in order to predict the effects of rising sea temperature on this echinoderm’s behavior and ecology. The distribution study measured the temperature gradient of the cushion star’s current habitat in order to determine how temperature changes with respect to depth. Additionally, the cushion star’s distribution range in relation to depth and sea temperature was examined to demonstrate how temperature influences cushion star range. The field experiment was conducted to determine the effects of increased temperature on C. novaeguineae behavior. Movement, a common mechanism used by ectotherms to escape heat stress, was measured as the response variable in cushion stars heat shocked in ocean waters 3°C above their expected upper thermal limit and in control organisms kept in ambient ocean waters of 31°C. The results of the distribution survey found that temperature decreased as depth increased. And cushion stars were generally found at 1, 2, and 3 meters and in temperatures between 29°C and 31°C. The field experiment revealed that the heat shocked individuals moved 3.2 times further than the control organisms and twice the number of heat shocked cushion stars moved into deeper waters than control organisms.
    [Show full text]