Bertarelli Summer2024 FINAL - Flipbook - Page 63
CO M M UNIC AT IO N
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and for me, that has meant the
polar regions and coral reefs. The
poles and reefs are connected in
many different ways. I’ve spent
my career seeking the most pristine wildernesses, and there are a
few places, including islands, that
still look today the way they did 40
years ago. Currently, my projects
mainly involve using physics and
chemistry to understand whether
coral reefs are building up their architecture or if they
are decaying, and in turn, how they affect the ecosystem around them.
Patty Baiao: I’m originally from Brazil, and I have
always enjoyed having nature around me. I am a seabird ecologist by training, but I have since migrated
into field work and in particular, island conservation
and restoring islands across the globe. Islands are a
place where we can have an outsized impact for biodiversity, oceans, and people. They are home to an incredible amount of plant and animal species and cultural
diversity. At the same time, they are on the front lines
of the global climate crisis we are in. Invasive species
are a huge threat to islands—some 75 percent of all the
extinctions we have recorded today have happened
to island species, and invasive species are implicated
in the vast majority of these events. We have a great
opportunity to remove a threat by eradicating invasive
species. That one action leads to incredible ecosystem
benefits for biodiversity, oceans, and people. We can
holistically restore and rewild island ecosystems, making them more resilient to climate change impacts and
building a healthier planet.
Right now, I’m working on the Island Ocean Connection Challenge, which aims to connect islands to
the marine ecosystems and put islands at the center
of marine conservation and break down some of the
silos in science, financing, and politics to help restore,
conserve, and build up our understanding in a way that
also supports the traditional cultural knowledge of the
communities who live on these islands.
Nick Graham: My work is in coral ecology and coral
science, but I have always been interested in finding
solutions and ways to make conservation work for the
communities that rely on coral reefs. I’ve worked in the
RE W I L D I NG
Indian Ocean and the Pacific, and
in places that are heavily populated
as well as those that are uninhabited and remote.
I spent the first decade of my
career looking at how many fish live
on particular reefs and how human
use changes a reef, as well as issues
like climate change and the impacts
of coral bleaching on the reef population and fisheries. I also look at
how effective marine protected areas are. Often, marine
protected areas are in very remote places, and these
can be important, but they also maintain the status
quo. These areas are already not really being fished,
and there aren’t people present, and the water quality
is generally excellent. Yet while these areas are seemingly pristine, and that’s important, they are not necessarily at their full potential or effecting transformational change.
A big “aha” moment for me was when I was on an
expedition with an ornithologist and I realized that
the seabirds nesting on islands and the nutrients they
produce are critical for the coral reefs and the wider
ecosystem. For example, we have evidence that manta
rays feed close to seabird colonies in Palmyra, which is
an atoll in the South Pacific, because there’s more and
larger plankton present in the water. The seabird nutrients integrated all the way through the coral reef food
web and beyond the reef. The fish grew faster, they are
bigger, there is less algae. We’ve taken that insight and
we’re using it to study other reef and island systems,
and it is completely clear. The way to improve coral
reefs is to eradicate rats and, if necessary, restore native
vegetation. It’s transformational.
PAGES 58- 59 : H AVE S EE N / S H UT TER STO CK
There are a few
places, including
islands, that still look
today the way they
did 40 years ago.
If we look forward to the next few decades, where do
we need to go? And, in turn, what do we need to do
to get there?
Dunbar: We already know that we need holistic, coupled management of marine systems and terrestrial
systems, the restoration of vegetation and the removal
of rats. But I also want to talk about the challenge of
ocean acidification and sea level rise.
We know that many reefs in the western Pacific are
able to keep up with sea level rise of five centimeters
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