United States
£ GBP
Effective marine biodiversity conservation is dependent upon a clear scientific rationale for practical interventions. Marine Biodiversity Conservation is intended to provide knowledge and tools for marine conservation practitioners and to identify issues and mechanisms for upper-level undergraduate and Masters students. It also provides sound guidance for marine biology field course work and professionals. The main focus is on benthic species living on or in the surface substrate and immediately above, rather than on commercial fisheries or highly mobile vertebrates. Such species, including algae and invertebrates, are fundamental to a stable and sustainable marine ecosystem. Marine Biodiversity Conservation is a practical guide based on a clear exposition of the principles of marine ecology and species biology to demonstrate how marine conservation issues and mechanisms have been tackled worldwide and especially the criteria, structures and decision trees that practitioners and managers will find useful. Well illustrated with conceptual diagrams and flow charts, Marine Biodiversity Conservation includes case study examples from both temperate and tropical marine environments.
1. The Need for Marine Biodiversity Conservation
2. What is Where and How Much of It is There? The Role of Science
3. Ecosystem Structure, Functioning and Viability
4. Understanding Change
5. Impacts of Human Activities on Ecosystem Composition, Structure and Function
6. The Application of Science to Management: Introduction
7. 'Threatened' and 'Sensitive' Species and Habitats
8. Sampling and Recording
9. Selection, Design and Management of Marine Protected Areas
10. Assessing Likely Impacts and Monitoring Change
11. Recovery, Restoration and Replacement of Habitats and Species
12. Conclusions and the Manager's 'Toolbox'
Keith Hiscock is Associate Fellow and Senior Consultant, Biodiversity and Conservation Science, Marine Biological Association, Plymouth, UK.
"Hiscock's Marine Biodiversity Conservation is a valuable practical guide to the history, rationale, drivers, challenges and approaches to Marine Conservation. Well written and an easy read, it will be good for stimulating class discussions or recommending to aspiring marine conservation biologists."
– Mark Bertness, Robert P. Brown Professor of Biology, Brown University, USA
"This book fills a gap in the marine conservation literature by concisely covering the practical aspects of marine ecology and conservation science that practitioners need to know. It also covers, with good illustrations, the more theoretical and academic concepts that underpin this science, including ecosystem function, species traits, unpredictability of food web interactions, short and long term (decadal) changes in communities including climate change and oil spill effects."
– Mark Costello, Associate Professor, University of Auckland, New Zealand
"There has never been a time like the present to get practical on efforts to safeguard and restore the character and benefits of the ocean. Sitting neatly between conceptual textbooks and guides for implementing conservation measures, Marine Biodiversity Conservation should be essential reading for all those who care about our seas. Drawing on over four decades of experience, Keith Hiscock guides us to scientifically sound actions, helping us see in an increasingly compromised world with often incomplete knowledge of what should and can be done to better manage the ocean. It's the book I've wanted him to write for the last decade."
– Dan Laffoley, Marine Vice Chair, World Commission on Protected Areas, IUCN, based in the UK
"Hiscock's book is an indispensable practical Vade-mecum for marine conservationists. It summarizes a lifetime of study and knowledge: biologically thoughtful, ecologically analytical, it addresses in straightforward fashion the pressing issues of marine biodiversity conservation. Before returning to the ocean – read it and learn!"
– John Roff, Professor and Canada Research Chair (ret), European Scholar Erasmus Mundus Program, Nova Scotia, Canada
