1. Marine Reserves The New Zealand Experience Compiled by Bill Ballantine Leigh Marine Laboratory, University of Auckland

2. The world centred on NZ

3. The South West Pacific

4. The New Zealand Region

5. Usual Map

6. Land Habitats

7. Marine Habitats !

9. Little Barrier Island – 1 st land reserve 1888 Leigh – 1 st marine reserve 1975

10. The rules in Marine Reserve 1. No fishing - by big boats

11. or little boats

12. No fishing by anyone

13. 2. No constructions

14. 3. No dumping or filling

15. 4. No disturbances

16. Marine reserves are pieces of the sea that are left undisturbed so that - They continue in their natural state Or recover towards the natural state

17. The problem is we do not know much about life in the sea – it is out of sight

18. Most countries try - 1. To protect the large special things

19. 2. To sustain fisheries

20. 3. And some oddments

21. But these things are only a tiny part of life in the sea

22. Marine life is abundant, varied, complex and different from life on land

23. It is even difficult to tell the plants from the animals

24. If we have places in the sea where there are no disturbances – would these marine reserves have any use?

25. We could them to find out what is natural, and what we have changed.

26. Counting fish – a place to start

27. But even well-meant disturbances matter – like people feeding fish

28. So in the reserve fish mob the divers while outside they flee

29. Do we believe the fish counts that show more fish in the reserve than outside?

30. Check by fishing ! (with barbless hooks)

31. Results of 4 surveys for snapper Inside the reserve

32. Outside reserve

33. The tagging system – inject coloured latex

34. Into a fin ray – this one yellow in a tail fin ray

35. Third method of counting fish. Video camera over a bait box

36. No divers, no hooks, just sit in the boat and watch on video

37. Cheaper Easier No harm to fish So taken to many other places including the Poor Knights Islands

38. Some fishing at Poor Knights till November 1998

39. No increase at places still fished

40. Movement matters Fish can be tracked with acoustic tags

41. And their position fixed with sound receivers

42. One snapper’s range in a week

43. With the first two marine reserves we learnt important new things about snapper – although snapper were the best studied fish

44. Also new things about rock lobster

45. Complex movements

46. New behaviour

47. Changes with time

48. Heavily fished species increase inside marine reserves but this is only the start of the story -

49. The big changes are to habitats

50. In 1976 the commonest sub-tidal reef habitat was grazed by sea-urchins

51. But with protection predators not only become commoner, they also grow larger

52. Large lobsters can open large sea urchins

53. Inside the reserve, 30% of tethered sea urchins are eaten within 24 hours – outside almost none.

54. Urchin “barrens” like this in 1976

55. Are now kelp forest

59. Marine Reserves give everyone more opportunity to see and appreciate the full range of marine life.

60. In displays on land

61. In visits to the shore

62. Or directly in the sea

63. Whole classes of children go snorkelling

64. And can see bottom living fish – such as skates

65. Fish in the water column, such as sweep

66. Fish in the kelp forest, such as snapper

67. A natural abundance of fish

68. A glass-bottomed boat will do

69. Or just watch it on film

70. Is this education, recreation or tourism?

71. What is the target audience or market?

72. Is it just people?

73. Compressing a 30 year story into 30 minutes means a lot of simplification. Most of the things that happened in the reserve were complete surprises. We are still learning. Recently we learnt more about fish feeding

74. Many people, especially children enjoyed feeding the fish

75. This produced feeding frenzies

76. Angela Parsons, a young part-time ranger said this was wrong in a marine reserve

77. She wrote and put up this sign – and the feeding stopped

78. An illustration from a pamphlet about fish and other animals in the reserve

79. A female ‘spotty’, a small common labrid fish

80. A male ‘spotty’ All are female first, but change sex at 3 years

81. The only stakeholders I recognize are our grandchildren – the rest of us are users.

82. What are we going to leave them?

83. End of Part 1 Thanks to all the research workers and photographers who supplied material for this presentation – especially Kim WesterskovJohn Walsby Tony AylingGeoff Jones Roger GraceHoward Choat Allie MacDiarmidChris Battershill Shane KellyMike Kingsford Russ Babcock Trevor Willis Nick ShearsDarren Parsons Tim HaggittTim Langlois

84. Part 2 Principles for SYSTEMS of marine reserves Bill Ballantine, Leigh Marine Laboratory New Zealand

85. Written for a workshop at the UBC Fisheries Center, Vancouver in 1997 I was specially invited, so I tried to upgrade:- (a) from single reserves to systems (b) from particular aims to principles

86. Basic Principles 1. Representation 2. Replication 3. Network Design 4. Sustainable Amount

87. Need a real example to explain these principles North-east New Zealand

88. 1. Representation All regions require marine reserves. In each region, all major habitats must be represented in reserves. Test with just 4 major habitats -

89. Harbours and Estuaries sheltered shallow enclosed

90. Sheltered waters less than 50 m not open to ocean storms and swell

91. Open coast and inner shelf

92. Outer shelf and open sea

93. Existing reserves represent all four major habitats

94. 2. Replication At least three separate (in space) examples of each major habitat. Many reasons including: scientific, conservation, and social

95. Adding 8 more reserves would replicate each major habitat

96. 3. A Network Design A network spread over the region to encourage connections by larval dispersal.

97. A further 8 reserves would provide such a network

98. Existing reserves provide few connections

99. But 24 reserves provide many connections

100. 4. A Sustainable Amount The system must be large enough to maintain itself. This amount is not known precisely. It is unlikely to be less than 10% (or more than 50%). So establishing at least 10% immediately is a sensible programme.

101. This is 10% of the whole region and 10% of each habitat

102. That completes the scientific principles. But science only indicates the constraints. Many possibilities exist within these and which of these are chosen is subject to the full democratic process.

103. The blue squares show one of the alternatives.

104. The example given was for 10% This would be the minimum for science, education and recreation. At least 20% would be needed for adequate conservation. At least 30% would be needed to maximise benefits to fisheries

105. There is much to be done, and time is not on our side.