Marine ecoregions o f n o rth a m e r i c a Marine ecoregions o f n o r t h a m e r i c a This report was written for the Secretariat of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation as a collaborative effort with the following authors of the Marine Ecoregions Project Team. Its publication has been made possible thanks to the generous support of its copublishers. Numerous individuals have contributed to the completion of this work (please see the acknowledgments section for additional information). The information contained herein is the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily reflect the views of the CEC, or the governments of Canada, Mexico or the United States of America. Authors Tara A. C. Wilkinson, McGill University, Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) Ed Wiken, Wildlife Habitat Canada (WHC) Juan Bezaury Creel, The Nature Conservancy Mexico (TNC Mexico) Thomas F. Hourigan, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Tundi Agardy, Sound Seas Hans Herrmann, Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) Lisa Janishevski, Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) Chris Madden, Natureserve Lance Morgan, Marine Conservation Biology Institute (MCBI) Moreno Padilla, Canadian Council on Ecological Areas (CCEA) Co-Publishers Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas Comisión Nacional para el Conocimiento y Uso de la Biodiversidad National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Parks Canada Instituto Nacional de Ecología Reproduction of this publication, in whole or in part and in whatever form, may be done without seeking express authorization of the CEC, provided that the reproduced material is to be used for educational or nonprofit purposes and that it cites the source of the original. The CEC would appreciate receiving a copy of all publications or material that utilize this work as a source. Published by the Communications Department of the CEC Secretariat. © Commission for Environmental Cooperation, 2009 Cite as: Wilkinson T., E. Wiken, J. Bezaury-Creel, T. Hourigan, T. Agardy, H. Herrmann, L. Janishevski, C. Madden, L. Morgan, M. Padilla. 2009. Marine Ecoregions of North America. Commission for Environmental Cooperation. Montreal, Canada. 200 pp. ISBN 978-2-923358-41-3 (print version); ISBN 978-2-923358-71-0 (electronic version) Legal deposit – Bibliothèque national du Québec, 2009 Legal deposit – National Library of Canada, 2009 Disponible en Español: ISBN 978-2-923358-42-0 (versión impresa); ISBN 978-2-923358-72-7 (versión electrónica) Disponible en français : ISBN 978-2-923358-43-7 (version imprimée); ISBN 978-2-923358-73-4 (version électronique) For more information about this or other publications from the CEC, contact: Commission for Environmental Cooperation 393, rue St-Jacques Ouest, Bureau 200 Montreal (Quebec) Canada H2Y 1N9 T 514.350.4300 F 514.350.4314 [email protected] / http://www.cec.org Marine ecoregions o f n o r t h a m e r i c a Commission for Environmental Cooperation Comisión para la Cooperación Ambiental Commission de coopération environnementale Preface The wealth of North America’s marine and coastal waters is unparalleled. These rich storehouses of biodiversity underpin our quality of life, our economies and much of our cultural identity. From the prolific areas of the Grand Banks of Newfoundland to the exceptionally diverse Mesoamerican Coral Reef, Canada, Mexico, and the United States share a vast array of ecosystems—an interconnected continental web of life, dynamic and wondrous. Yet, when one looks at the continent as a whole, this bewildering assemblage of marine life, already threatened by land-based pollution, overfishing, and invasive species, among a wide array of stressors, is now facing new challenges from rapidly changing climatic conditions. As much of the damage occurs hidden from our view, under the deceptively unchanging blanket of the ocean’s surface, North Americans are seeking new means to protect our common natural endowment. Establishing an effective system for linking places in the ocean to ensure biological connectivity, increased resilience, and protection of ecosystem integrity, required a meaningful ecological framework. In 2002 a trinational group of marine scientists and CEC officials met at NOAA’s Coastal Services Center in Charleston, South Carolina, to agree on a new, unified, ecological classification for oceanic and coastal regions. This book is the result of that endeavor: an approach, system of classification, and map attempting to create consistent, standardized and understandable units out of the vastness of the continent’s ocean and coastal waters; a system that could be scalable, ecosystem-oriented, and linked to existing maps and classifications. It presents the developing consensus of American, Canadian, and Mexican ecologists, marine biologists, geographers, planners, and managers on what this continent holds in terms of marine biodiversity. While the division of the oceans and coasts into discrete parcels is admittedly a difficult task and may even seem an artificial construct, naming and describing places is the only way we can begin to grasp the overwhelming complexity that binds them together. By determining how the continental waters may be catalogued as sets of habitats and assemblages of species, we can begin to understand more fully the great richness that our oceans present. Mapping ecosystems provides us a way of looking at our world on a scale we can fathom. Using descriptive profiles, this book classifies the ocean and coastal regions of North America into 24 marine ecoregions, large masses of water differentiated by oceanographic features and geographically distinct assemblages of species that interact ecologically in ways that are critical for their long-term persistence. Each chapter briefly describes the key features of each ecoregion—in terms of its physical, oceanographic, and biological characteristics, as well as the impacts we humans have had upon it. Each chapter also enables the reader to have a quick glance at the state of knowledge by means of Fact Sheets to be found near the beginning of each section. These Fact Sheets summarize geographical, oceanographical, physiological and biological information, such as the size of the region, its sea surface temperature, its primary productivity, and provide a thumbnail description of the region by depth, its key habitats, species at risk and the principal human activities engaged in there. Sometimes categories may not be present, according to their importance for the region, or to the information available. For example, the category of endemic species is quite extensive within the well-studied Gulf of California ecoregion, but omitted for the Arctic Basin, where information on the subject is more sparse. Each profile also contains information on how the region was delineated. vii There are also important sections at the back of the book that contain acronyms and abbreviations; a glossary of common conservation and scientific terms used throughout the book; a list of important species, including endemic and invasive species, highlighted in the text, given by common name (English, French and Spanish) and scientific name; a list of related websites; and a reference list. Finally, and for the sake of completeness, the book also contains short descriptions of the distinct ecoregions of the US Pacific Island Territories. The resultant framework cannot presume to be a complete, all-encompassing product that will be all things to all people. Rather, its goal was to provide a common starting point, a scalable framework to collect and organize information, encourage further cooperation, and be used as a tool to better understand and manage our North American marine ecosystems. This unprecedented effort to promote a better understanding of our oceans has been possible thanks to the leadership and generous contributions of Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas (Conanp), Comisión Nacional para el Conocimiento y Uso de la Biodiversidad (Conabio), and Instituto Nacional de Ecología (INE) in Mexico; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in the United States, and Parks Canada. Marine Ecoregions of North America represents an early step in the process of coming to terms with the complex and awe-inspiring marine world of North America. We can now point to marine regions and seascapes, connected not only by species and ecological processes but also by our own movements and interactions with the sea and its creatures. With better knowledge of what lies under that watery blanket, together, we can move more confidently to protect it. Hans Herrmann CEC viii Marine Ecoregions of North America Acknowledgments and Contributors Charleston Drafting Meeting Participants Technical Facilitators for the Charleston Workshop Rebecca Allee (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA), George Dias (Applied Geomatics Research Group, Annapolis Valley Saúl Álvarez Borrego (Centro de Investigación Científica y de Educación Campus), Daniel Asher Hackett (McGill University), Thomas Meredith Superior de Ensenada, CICESE), Jeff Ardron (Living Oceans Society, LOS), (McGill University). Juan Bezaury Creel (WWF, Programa México), Luis Eduardo Calderón (CICESE-Ecología), Arturo Carranza Edwards (Universidad Nacional Peer Reviewers Autónoma de México, UNAM), Kimberly Cohen (NOAA Coastal Services Saúl Álvarez Borrego (Centro de Investigación Científica y de Educación Center), Antonio Díaz de León (Instituto Nacional de Ecología, INE/El Superior de Ensenada,