Restoration Objective:
This study aimed to determine 1) the variation in the abundance of germlings during all the outplanting steps; 2) the separate and combined effects of the presence of adult conspecifics and the exclusion of macrograzers on the abundance of Cystoseira recruits; 3) which conditions can increase the number of Cytoseira recruits that reach the adult stage; 4) the efficiency of adult transplant in driving germling survival; and 5) the feasibility of a restoration intervention on a scale of tens of kilometres.
Site Selection Criteria:
Sites were selected that either had an adult Cytoseira canopy or had historically had kelp beds.
Cause Of Decline:
Macroalgal forests are severely threatened by several stressors such as direct degradation or destruction of habitat, coastal urbanisation, pollution, and herbivores outbreaks, acting in combination with climate change. As with many other habitat-forming macroalgal species worldwide, Cystoseira forests have been declining in the Mediterranean basin during the last decades and natural recovery has been recorded only occasionally. Although preserving such complex and highly productive habitats represents a priority to maintain the associated biodiversity and ecosystem functioning, restoration of macroalgal forests has been largely neglected compared to other marine habitats.
Key Reasons For Decline:
Multiple
Scientific Paper
Are we ready for scaling up restoration actions? An insight from Mediterranean macroalgal canopies
PLOS ONE, Vol. 14, p.224477.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0224477
