The distribution of deep-sea sponge aggregations in the North Atlantic and implications for their effective spatial management

Howell, Kerry L.; Piechaud, Nils; Downie, Anna‐Leena; Kenny, Andrew

doi:10.1016/j.dsr.2016.07.005

Cited by 81 publications

(107 citation statements)

References 86 publications

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“…The main challenge for standardization is the scale of management (see Section Scale): while many individual countries are developing their own protocols (Guarinello et al, 2010), calls are being made for common frameworks for instance across the European Union (Lengyel et al, 2008;Levin et al, 2014;Howell et al, 2016) and at the international level for areas beyond national jurisdiction or for the protection of migratory species (Di Sciara et al, 2016;Gjerde et al, 2016;Wenzel et al, 2016). To save time, costs and efforts, each level of protocol should be in line with the others, which is quite challenging considering that no solution is universally applicable at all scales and in all contexts (but see Section Toward a Digital Resilience in Marine Conservation and Management).…”

Section: Supervised/unsupervised Examplesmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the Use of Maps and Models in Conservation and Resource Management (Warning: Results May Vary)

Lecours

2017

Front. Mar. Sci.

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Conservation planning and management typically require accurate and spatially explicit data at scales that are relevant for conservation objectives. In marine conservation, these data are often combined with spatial analytical techniques to produce marine habitat maps. While marine habitat mapping is increasingly used to inform conservation efforts, this field is still relatively young and its methods are rapidly evolving. Because conservation efforts do not always specify standards or guidelines for the production of habitat maps, results can vary dramatically. As representations of real environmental characteristics, habitat maps are highly sensitive to how they are produced. In this review paper, I present four concepts that are known to cause variation in spatial representation and prediction of habitats: the methodology used, the quality and scale of the data, and the choice of variables in regards to fitness for use. I then discuss the potential antinomy associated with the use of habitat maps in conservation: while habitat maps have become an invaluable tool to inform and assist decision-making, maps of the same area built using different methods and data may provide dissimilar representations, thus providing different information and possibly leading to different decisions. Exploring the theories and methods that have proved effective in terrestrial conservation and the spatial sciences, and how they can be integrated in marine habitat mapping practices, could help improve maps used to support marine conservation efforts and result in more reliable products to inform conservation decisions. Having a strong, consistent, transparent, repeatable, and science-based protocol for data collection and mapping is essential for effectively supporting decision-makers in developing conservation and management plans. The development of user-friendly tools to assist in the application of such protocol is crucial to a widespread improvement in practices. I discuss the potential to use interactive and collaborative Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to encourage the conservation and management community, from data collectors and mapmakers to decision-makers, to move toward a digital resilience and to develop such science-based protocol. Until standards and protocols are developed, habitat maps should always be interpreted with care, and the methods and metadata associated with their production should always be explicitly stated.

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Section: Supervised/unsupervised Examplesmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the Use of Maps and Models in Conservation and Resource Management (Warning: Results May Vary)

Lecours

2017

Front. Mar. Sci.

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“…The modeling of the distribution of boreo-arctic Geodia species by Howell et al (2016) failed to predict the presence of boreal Geodia in the NES, which is probably an indication of the knowledge gaps pertaining to the distribution of deep-sea sponges. Geodia spp.…”

Section: Discussion Biogeographymentioning

confidence: 99%

First records of Geodia demosponges from the New England seamounts, an opportunity to test the use of DNA mini-barcodes on museum specimens

Cárdenas

Moore

2017

Mar Biodiv

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We report the first records of the sponge genus Geodia (Demospongiae, Tetractinellida, Geodiidae) from the New England Seamounts and Muir Seamount, at lower bathyal depths. Nine specimens collected between 2000 and 2005 belong to two boreal species (Geodia macandrewii and Geodia barretti) and a temperate species (Geodia megastrella). These records extend the distributions of these deep-sea amphi-Atlantic species to the west. Most of these specimens were originally fixed in formalin, which substantially degraded the DNA. We nonetheless managed to sequence two cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) minibarcodes: the universal mini-barcode at the 5′ end of the Folmer barcode (130 bp) and a newly proposed minibarcode at the 3′ end of the Folmer barcode (296 bp). These mini-barcodes unambiguously confirmed our identifications. As an additional test, we also successfully sequenced these two mini-barcodes from the holotype of G. barretti, collected in 1855. We conclude by advocating the use of mini-barcodes on formalin-fixed or old specimens with degraded DNA.

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“…Bottom-water temperature and concentration of some nutrients have also been identified as important variables controlling sponge distribution at local scales (Huang et al, 2011;Howell et al, 2016). However, the distribution of sponges as a function of temperature, dissolved oxygen and nutrient (nitrate and phosphate) concentrations extracted from WOCE (see Supplementary Material) revealed that the distribution of sponge taxa along these gradients is not strongly differentiated, in contrast to the dSi and depth gradients.…”

Section: Effects Of Dsi Availability and Habitat Depth On Sponge Distmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…Depth is an important factor controlling sponge distribution (Vacelet, 1988;Huang et al, 2011;Howell et al, 2016), though it acts indirectly via its correlation with ecologically meaningful parameters (including dSi concentrations, but also light, food availability, temperature, etc.,). It is evident that either dSi, depth or both play a major role controlling the spatial distribution of sponge taxa (Figures 3-5).…”

Section: Effects Of Dsi Availability and Habitat Depth On Sponge Distmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Here, sponge distributions have been related to depth, temperature and light availability (Vacelet, 1988;Finks and Keith Rigby, 2003;Leys et al, 2004;Downey et al, 2012), or to biogeographic regions (Hooper and Lévi, 1994;Van Soest, 1994;Van Soest et al, 2012) delimited by underlying abiotic drivers and characteristic marine biotas (e.g., Spalding et al, 2007). Interestingly, results from predictive models using physico-chemical environmental variables (Huang et al, 2011) and regional surveying (Howell et al, 2016) suggest that temperature, depth and nutrient status-including dSi-are major drivers controlling sponge distribution.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Assessing the Potential of Sponges (Porifera) as Indicators of Ocean Dissolved Si Concentrations

et al. 2017

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We explore the distribution of sponges along dissolved silica (dSi) concentration gradients to test whether sponge assemblages are related to dSi and to assess the validity of fossil sponges as a palaeoecological tool for inferring dSi concentrations of the past oceans. We extracted sponge records from the publically available Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) database and linked these records with ocean physiochemical data to evaluate if there is any correspondence between dSi concentrations of the waters sponges inhabit and their distribution. Over 320,000 records of Porifera were available, of which 62,360 met strict quality control criteria. Our analyses was limited to the taxonomic levels of family, order and class. Because dSi concentration is correlated with depth in the modern ocean, we also explored sponge taxa distributions as a function of depth. We observe that while some sponge taxa appear to have dSi preferences (e.g., class Hexactinellida occurs mostly at high dSi), the overall distribution of sponge orders and families along dSi gradients is not sufficiently differentiated to unambiguously relate dSi concentrations to sponge taxa assemblages. We also observe that sponge taxa tend to be similarly distributed along a depth gradient. In other words, both dSi and/or another variable that depth is a surrogate for, may play a role in controlling sponge spatial distribution and the challenge is to distinguish between the two. We conclude that inferences about palaeo-dSi concentrations drawn from the abundance of sponges in the stratigraphic records must be treated cautiously as these animals are adapted to a great range of dSi conditions and likely other underlying variables that are related to depth. Our analysis provides a quantification of the dSi ranges of common sponge taxa, expands on previous knowledge related to their bathymetry preferences and suggest that sponge taxa assemblages are not related to particular dSi conditions.

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The distribution of deep-sea sponge aggregations in the North Atlantic and implications for their effective spatial management

Abstract: The distribution of deep-sea sponge aggregations in the North Atlantic and implications for their effective spatial management.

Cited by 81 publications

References 86 publications

On the Use of Maps and Models in Conservation and Resource Management (Warning: Results May Vary)

On the Use of Maps and Models in Conservation and Resource Management (Warning: Results May Vary)

First records of Geodia demosponges from the New England seamounts, an opportunity to test the use of DNA mini-barcodes on museum specimens

Assessing the Potential of Sponges (Porifera) as Indicators of Ocean Dissolved Si Concentrations

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