Iain R. Caldwell

Oct 7, 2024 | theconversation.com | Joshua Cinner |Iain R. Caldwell

Ocean fish populations have in the past half-century, and climate change is make the problem worse. Governments have designated “marine protected areas”, where where human activity is constrained to protect ocean life. But have these efforts worked? About 8% of Earth’s oceans are protected, including about 3% where fishing is banned altogether. Our new study of nearly 2,600 tropical coral reefs around the world is the first to examine whether these areas have helped fish populations.

Jul 18, 2024 | nature.com | Joshua Cinner |Diego R. Barneche |Iain R. Caldwell |David Mouillot |James Robinson |Alexandre C. Siqueira | +1 more

AbstractFish fecundity scales hyperallometrically with body mass, meaning larger females produce disproportionately more eggs than smaller ones. We explore this relationship beyond the species-level to estimate the “reproductive potential” of 1633 coral reef sites distributed globally. We find that, at the site-level, reproductive potential scales hyperallometrically with assemblage biomass, but with a smaller median exponent than at the species-level.