Dispersal connectivity and reserve selection for marine conservation

Stuart Kininmonth, Maria Beger, Michael Bode, Eric Peterson, Vanessa M. Adams, Dan Dorfman, Daniel R. Brumbaugh and Hugh P. Possingham

Ecological Modelling, 2011, vol. 222, issue 7, 1272-1282

Abstract: Although larval dispersal is crucial for the persistence of most marine populations, dispersal connectivity between sites is rarely considered in designing marine protected area networks. In particular the role of structural characteristics (known as topology) for the network of larval dispersal routes in the conservation of metapopulations has not been addressed. To determine reserve site configurations that provide highest persistence values with respect to their connectivity characteristics, we model nine connectivity topological models derived from graph theory in a demographic metapopulation model. We identify reserve site configurations that provide the highest persistence values for each of the metapopulation connectivity models. Except for the minimally connected and fully connected populations, we observed two general ‘rules of thumb’ for optimising the mean life time for all topological models: firstly place the majority of reserves, so that they are neighbours of each other, on the sites where the number of connections between the populations is highest (hub), secondly when the reserves have occupied the majority of the vertices in the hub, then select another area of high connectivity and repeat. If there are no suitable hubs remaining then distribute the remaining reserves to isolated locations optimising contact with non-reserved sites.

Keywords: Marine larvae dispersal; Marine conservation planning; Marine reserves; Connectivity; Marine metapopulation model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304380011000445
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecomod:v:222:y:2011:i:7:p:1272-1282

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2011.01.012

Access Statistics for this article

Ecological Modelling is currently edited by Brian D. Fath

More articles in Ecological Modelling from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().