Christine A Ward-Paige

eOceans · R&D

Globally, more than 121 million people enjoy nature-based marine tourism, making it one of the largest marine industries. Ocean degradation threatens this industry and management has not kept pace to ensure long-term sustainability. In response, some individuals within the industry are taking it upon themselves to monitor the ocean and provide the...

We needed a measurable definition of the “Blue Economy” that protects and promotes ocean health and equitable access — the original intention of the term. Here, we outline the eOceans definition, which can be deployed to prioritize marine spatial planning and investments in activities that help, and not just hurt less.

By all accounts, fishers are on the frontlines of ocean change and should be considered an important ally in ocean monitoring, management, and conservation. Yet, a history of misinformation, broken trust, and unsustainable practices-following decades of subsidies to maximize catch and profit-has dissolved relationships and pitted fishers against ot...

Context Globally, more than 121 million people enjoy nature-based marine tourism, making it one of the largest marine industries. Ocean degradation threatens this industry and management has not kept pace to ensure long-term sustainability. In response, some individuals within the industry are taking it upon themselves to monitor the ocean and prov...

Context: Globally, more than 121 million people enjoy nature-based marine tourism, making it one of the largest marine industries. Ocean degradation threatens this industry and management has not kept pace to ensure long-term sustainability. In response, some individuals within the industry are taking it upon themselves to monitor the ocean and pro...

The human response to the COVID-19 pandemic set in motion an unprecedented shift in human activity with unknown long-term effects. The impacts in marine systems are expected to be highly dynamic at local and global scales. However, in comparison to terrestrial ecosystems, we are not well-prepared to document these changes in marine and coastal envi...

Over the past 4 decades there has been a growing concern for the conservation status of elasmobranchs (sharks and rays). In 2002, the first elasmobranch species were added to Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Less than 20 yr later, there were 39 species on Appendix II and 5 o...

Globally, economies and marine ecosystems are increasingly dependent on sustainable fisheries management (SFM) to balance social, economic, and conservation needs. The overarching objectives of SFM are to maximize both conservation and socio-economic benefits, while minimizing short-term socio-economic costs. A number of tools have been developed t...

The human response to the COVID-19 pandemic set in motion an unprecedented shift in human activity with unknown long-term effects. The impacts in marine systems are expected to be highly dynamic at local and global scales. However, in comparison to terrestrial ecosystems, we are not well-prepared to document these changes in marine and coastal envi...

The oceans are in a state of rapid change - both negatively, due climate destabilization and misuse, and positively, due to strengthening of policies for sustainable use combined with momentum to grow the blue economy. Globally, more than 121 million people enjoy nature-based marine tourism - e.g., recreational fishing, diving, whale watching - mak...

Many marine animals around the world are threatened by a variety of anthropogenic activities, yet there is often a paucity of data to monitor patterns in abundance and distribution or to evaluate human interventions. The new citizen science program eOceans helps to fill this gap by gathering observations of various marine animals from worldwide oce...

Many marine animals around the world are threatened by a variety of anthropogenic activities, yet there is often a paucity of data to monitor patterns in abundance and distribution or to evaluate human interventions. The new citizen science program eOceans helps to fill this gap by gathering observations of various marine animals from worldwide oce...

Due to well-documented declines in many shark populations there is increasing pressure to implement new management and rebuilding strategies at the national and international scale. Since 2009, fifteen coastal countries in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans have opted to ban commercial shark fishing altogether, and have laws that prohibit the...

Due to rapid declines of shark populations across many species and regions of the world, the need for large-scale conservation measures has become widely recognized. Some coastal states have opted to implement ‘Shark Sanctuaries’, which prohibit commercial shark fishing and the export of shark products across large areas, typically their entire Exc...

The Government of Canada has committed to creating a national network of marine protected areas (MPAs) that will protect at least 10% of coastal and marine areas by 2020. The Scotian Shelf Bioregion is one of five bioregions in Canada currently developing an MPA network. An important design principle in the development of an MPA network is “ecologi...

The purpose of this report is to provide Science advice on the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) criteria (vii); that is, to identify areas of high biological diversity for the identification of Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas (EBSAs) in Canada’s Scotian Shelf marine bioregion (i.e., Scotian Shelf and Bay of Fundy). Biological...

The successful management of shark populations requires juvenile recruitment success. Thus, conservation initiatives now strive to include the protection of areas used by pre-adult sharks in order to promote juvenile survivorship. Many shark species use inshore areas for early life stages; however, species often segregate within sites to reduce com...

Despite being the world's largest rays and providing significant revenue through dive tourism, little is known about the population status, exploitation and trade volume of the Mobulidae (mobulids; Manta and Mobula spp.). There is anecdotal evidence, however, that mobulid populations are declining, largely due to the recent emergence of a widesprea...

Several developing nations have established shark sanctuaries, most commonly in the form of a moratorium on both commercial shark fishing and the export of shark products in Exclusive Economic Zones ([ 1 ][1]). In her Letter "Shark sanctuaries: Substance or spin?" (21 December 2012, p. [1538][2]), L

Many elasmobranchs have experienced strong population declines, which have been largely attributed to the direct and indirect effects of exploitation. Recently, however, live elasmobranchs are being increasingly valued for their role in marine ecosystems, dive tourism and intrinsic worth. Thus, management plans have been implemented to slow and ult...

Observations and experience records from recreational divers in Thailand. (CSV)

Recollections of observations and experience from dive instructors in Thailand. (CSV)

Around the world, researchers are using the observations and experiences of citizens to describe patterns in animal populations. This data is often collected via ongoing sampling or by synthesizing past experiences. Since elasmobranchs are relatively rare, obtaining data for broad-scale trend analysis requires high sampling effort. Elasmobranchs ar...

Many marine populations and ecosystems have experienced strong historical depletions, yet reports of recoveries are increasing. Here, we review the growing research on marine recoveries to reveal how common recovery is, its magnitude, timescale and major drivers. Overall, 10-50% of depleted populations and ecosystems show some recovery, but rarely...

Recent concerns about changing elasmobranch populations have prompted the need to understand their patterns of distribution and abundance through non-destructive sampling methods. Since scientific divers represent a small portion of the total number of divers worldwide, the use of non-scientific divers could drastically increase the number of obser...

In recent decades, large pelagic and coastal shark populations have declined dramatically with increased fishing; however, the status of sharks in other systems such as coral reefs remains largely unassessed despite a long history of exploitation. Here we explore the contemporary distribution and sighting frequency of sharks on reefs in the greater...

Code for the simulation AnimDens (written in R). (0.01 MB TXT)

Bias results produced by AnimDens (2.44 MB XLS)

Background: Increasingly, underwater visual censuses (UVC) are used to assess fish populations. Several studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of protected areas for increasing fish abundance or provided insight into the natural abundance and structure of reef fish communities in remote areas. Recently, high apex predator densities (>100,000...

The gorgonians Plexaura spp. occur throughout the Florida Reef Tract, and lay down annual bands of a tough protein, gorgonin, in their skeletons. We analyzed stable isotopes of nitrogen (δ15N) and carbon (δ13C) from individual annual bands in skeletons of Plexaura homomalla and P. flexuosa from 10 locations on the Florida Reef Tract, producing a pr...

Bioerosion by Cliona delitrix and Cliona lampa was assessed at 43 sites along the Florida Reef Tract, USA, in the summer of 2001. Sponge abundances were estimated using rapid visual assessment. Tissue samples of sponges were taken for analysis of delta15N. Comparison samples were taken from Belize. Annual trends in sponge abundance were estimated f...