CalOceans News

Protecting our protections

Consider the rockfish. These astounding fish become more reproductively viable with each passing year, leading scientists to call (and not sarcastically) for the conservation of BOFFFFS: Big, Old, Fat, Fecund, Female Fish. There aren’t many left in California, traditionally home to one of the planet’s largest number of rockfish species, but the state’s ambitious plan to create a statewide network of underwater parks will hopefully bring the BOFFFFS back.

We’ve made a lot of progress already, with marine protected area networks in place for the Central and North Central regions of the coast. But the state’s ongoing budgetary woes mean agencies, nonprofits, community groups, and fishermen have to work together to make the protections work.

A fascinating story from KQED-FM’s Quest program talks about plans to study and enforce California’s new marine protected areas. The fact is, it’s going to take a concentrated, ongoing effort. And enforcement is far more effective when paired with education, something CalOceans is dedicated to helping with.

It’s heartening to hear that, while the game wardens are tasked with patrolling more waters while facing staffing cuts and furloughs, fishermen and non-profits have been stepping up to help educate people about our new ocean parks and support monitoring needs. It shows the collaborative spirit necessary to make the Marine Life Protection Act work: Californians coming together to create a legacy of ocean conservation for future generations.

• Tags:
• marine life protecton act
• mlpa
• enforcement
• wardens
• monitoring
• state budget

MPAs as living labs

California's new marine protected areas (MPAs) are being studied by legions of scientists working on the most comprehensive assessment of the state's coastal ecosystems ever undertaken.

Ongoing monitoring will enable scientists to track the effects of the new MPAs as well as climate change on the state's waters. From Peter Raimondi, professor and chair of ecology and evolutionary biology at UC Santa Cruz:

“The MPA monitoring program has made a real effort to bring together groups that can do rigorous assessments across all the coastal systems; it's assessing all the nearshore habitats in a very integrated way, and that just hasn't been done before.”

This monitoring effort is an example of California’s MPA network working as a “living laboratory,” allowing scientists to better understand how the ocean functions. As the science improves, so do our ocean management practices, which is good for all ocean users.

The results of the baseline monitoring surveys have just been published by the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans (PISCO).

Scientists warn that it may take five to 10 years to see the effects of the new protections, but if the thousands of MPAs used in countries around the world are any indication, California's ocean sanctuaries will produce more and bigger fish, and healthier, more resilient ecosystems.

• Tags:
• Marine Protected Areas
• monitoring
• enforcement
• ocean protection council
• baseline monitoring