Understanding the spatial and temporal preferences of toxic phytoplankton species is of paramount importance in managing and predicting harmful events in aquatic ecosystems. In this study we address the realised niche of the species Alexandrium minutum, Pseudo-nitzschia fraudulenta and P. australis. We used them to highlight distribution patterns at different scales and determine possible drivers. To achieve this, we have developed original procedures coupling niche theory and habitat suitability modelling using abundance data in four consecutive steps: 1) Estimate the realised niche applying kernel functions. 2) Assess differences between the species’ niche as a whole and at the local level. 3) Develop habitat and temporal suitability models using niche overlap procedures. 4) Explore species temporal and spatial distributions to highlight possible drivers. Data used are species abundance and environmental variables collected over 27 years (1988-2014) and include 139 coastal water sampling sites along the French Atlantic coast. Results show that A. minutum and P. australis niches are very different, although both species have preference for warmer months. They both respond to decadal summer NAO but in the opposite way. P. fraudulenta realised niche lies in between the two other species niches. It also prefers warmer months but does not respond to decadal summer NAO. The Brittany peninsula is now classified as an area of prevalence for the three species. The methodology used here will allow to anticipate species distribution in the event of future environmental challenges resulting from climate change scenarios.

Marine protected areas (MPAs) provide biodiversity conservation benefits in a range of marine habitats. Many protected areas are established and governed through top-down or shared governance arrangements, yet little is known about how these governance strategies compare in terms of the protection benefits they provide to MPAs globally. Using an extensive data set of MPA conditions, we developed a set of Bayesian hierarchical models to understand the role of shared governance versus federal governance on reef fish biomass from 218 global MPAs. We find greater reef fish biomass benefits in MPAs with shared governance than with top-down, or federal arrangements. We also find greater benefits in older MPAs and MPAs farther away from shore. Our results highlight the fundamental importance of multi-stakeholder participation for improving conservation outcomes, representing an important conservation opportunity for new or existing MPAs. 

The willingness to pay (WTP) of people to protect animal populations can be used as a tool for these populations’ conservation. The WTP reflects the non-use value of animals, which can be significant for charismatic species. This value can be used as an economic criterion for decision-makers in order to recommend protective measures. The definition of the WTP to protect a species is challenging, as valuation methods are time-consuming and expensive. To overcome these limitations, we built a benefit transfer function based on 112 valuation studies and apply it to 440 Mediterranean marine species. We extracted these species from the IUCN database and retrieved some required parameters from, amongst others, the FishBase database. Marine mammals appear to have the highest WTP value followed in order by sea turtles, sharks and rays, and ray-finned fishes. Commercial fish species appear to have the highest values amongst the fish class.

Worldwide, shellfish aquaculture and fisheries in coastal ecosystems represent crucial activities for human feeding. But these biological productions are under the pressure of climate variability and global change. Anticipating the biological processes affected by climate hazards remains a vital objective for species conservation strategies and human activities that rely on. Within marine species, filter feeders like oysters are real key species in coastal ecosystems due to their economic and societal value (fishing and aquaculture) but also due to their ecological importance. Indeed oysters populations in good health play the role of ecosystem engineers that can give many ecosystem services at several scales: building reef habitats that contribute to biodiversity, benthic-pelagic coupling and phytoplankton bloom control through water filtration, living shorelines against coastal erosion… The Pacific oyster, Crassostrea gigas (Thunberg, 1793), which is currently widespread worldwide, was introduced into the Atlantic European coasts at the end of the 19th century for shellfish culture purposes and becomes the main marine species farmed in France (around 100 000 tons) despite severe mortalities crisis. But in the same time and because of warming, natural oysters beds has spread significantly along the French coast and are supposed to have reach approximately 500 000 tons. In that context, Pacific oyster populations (natural and cultivated) in France are the subjects of many scientific projects. Among them, a specific long-term biological monitoring focuses on the reproduction of these populations at a national scale: the VELYGER national program. With more than 8 years of weekly data at many stations in France, this field-monitoring program offers a valuable dataset for studying processes underpinning reproduction cycle of this key-species in relation to environmental parameters, water quality and climate change.   Database content: Larval concentration (number of individuals per 1.5 m3) monitored, since 2008, at several stations in six bays of the French coast (from south to north): Thau Lagoon and bays of Arcachon, Marennes Oléron, Bourgneuf, Vilaine and Brest (see map below).   Methods used to monitor larval concentration: An important volume of seawater (1.5 m3) is pumped twice a week throughout the spawning season (june-september), at one meter below the surface at high tide (+/- 2h) in several sites within each VELYGER ecosystem. Water is filtered trough plankton net fitted with 40 µm mesh. After a proper rinsing of the net, the retained material is transferred into a polyethylene bottle (1 liter) and fixed with alcohol. At laboratory, sample is then gently filtered and rinse again and transferred into eprouvette. Two sub-samples of 1 mL are then taken using a pipette and examined on a graticule slide for microscope. The microscopic examination is made with a conventional binocular optical microscope with micrometer stage at a magnification of 10 X (or above). During the counting, a special care is necessary as larvae of other bivalves are also collected and confusion is possible. Larvae of C. gigas are also classified into four stage of development: - Stage I = D-shaped straight hinge larvae (shell length <105 µm) - Stage II = Early umbo evolved larvae (shell length between 105 and 150 µm) - Stage III = Medium umbo larvae (shell length between 150 and 235 µm) - Stage IV*= Large umbo eyed pediveliger larvae (shell length > 235 µm) * Larvae that are very closed to settle are sometimes identified into a separated 5th stage, but generally this stage is included in stage IV.   Illustrations: Location of the different Velyger sites along the French coast. From south to north: Thau Lagoon and bays of Arcachon, Marennes Oléron, Bourgneuf, Vilaine and Brest.   Legend: Pacific Oyster Larvae (left side) and Natural oyster bed (right side). Photos : © S. Pouvreau/Ifremer

The dataset includes age- and length-based catch per unit effort data for commercial fish species collected by the French trawl survey EVHOE.

Tracking data of 7 grey seals were obtained from the deployment of Fastloc GPS/GSM tags developed by the Sea Mammal Research Unit (UK). Full tag description is available at: http://www.smru.st-andrews.ac.uk/Instrumentation/GPSPhoneTag/. The tags include a wet-dry sensor from which haulout events are recorded, a pressure sensor providing detailed dive data, as well as a Fastloc GPS recording irregular locations when the seal is not underwater. Data is stored onboard and transmitted via the GSM network when the seal is in the reception range. The data provided here are the individual GPS locations of the seals fitted with these tags for an average duration of 135 days.

############# # Data description # #############   This dataset have been constructed and used for scientific purpose, available in the paper "Detecting the effects of inter-annual and seasonal changes of environmental factors on the the striped red mullet population in the Bay of Biscay" authored by  Kermorvant C., Caill-Milly N., Sous D., Paradinas I., Lissardy M. and Liquet B. and published in Journal of Sea Research. This file is an extraction from the SACROIS fisheries database created by Ifremer (for more information see https://sextant.ifremer.fr/record/3e177f76-96b0-42e2-8007-62210767dc07/) and from the Copernicus database. Biochemestry comes from the product GLOBAL_ANALYSIS_FORECAST_BIO_001_028 (https://resources.marine.copernicus.eu/?option=com_csw&view=details&product_id=GLOBAL_ANALYSIS_FORECAST_BIO_001_028). Temperature and salinity comes from GLOBAL_ANALYSIS_FORECAST_PHY_001_024 product (https://resources.marine.copernicus.eu/?option=com_csw&view=details&product_id=GLOBAL_ANALYSIS_FORECAST_PHY_001_024). As fisheries landing per unit of effort is only available per ICES rectangle and by month, environmental data have been aggregated accordingly. ############### # Colomns description # ############### rectangle - The 6 ICES statistical rectangles used in the study. time_m - Time in months, from the beginning to the end of the study. annee = year mois = month (from 1 to 12) Poids = Weight of red mullet landed valeur = Temps_peche = fishing time Nb_sequence = number of fishing sequences Moy / Med / Var / StD Quartil_1 / Quartil_3 / min / max / CV / IQR = statistical descriptors of landing by rectangle and by month log_cpue = log of Med colomn mean_surface_s = mean of surface salinity by month and by rectangle median_surface_s = median of surface salinity by month and by rectangle mean_surface_t = mean of surface temperature by month and by rectangle median_surface_t = median of surface temperature by month and by rectangle si / zeu /po4 / pyc / o2/ nppv / no3 and nh4 mean and median concentration by rectangle and by month pc3 / pc2 / pc1 - projections of previous biochemestry variables on the three first axes of a PCA

The Commission for the Conservation Southern Bluefin Tuna collects a variety of data types from its Members and Cooperating Non-Members, including total catch, catch and effort data, and catch at size data. Catch, size and trade information is also collected through the Commission's Catch Documentation Scheme, Japanese import statistics, and other monitoring programs. Annual catches provided on this page are reported on a calendar year basis. CCSBT Members use quota years (not calendar years) for managing catching limits, but quota years differ between Members, so calendar years are used to provide catches on a common timescale. Relevant subsets and summaries of these data are provided below. All figures are subject to change as improved data or estimates become available. In particular, reviews of SBT data in 2006 indicated that southern bluefin tuna catches may have been substantially under-reported over the previous 10-20 years and the data presented here do not include estimates for this unreported catch. Also, data for the last reported year of catch (2020) are preliminary and are subject to revision. Any latitudes and longitudes presented in these summaries represent the north western corner of the relevant grid, which is a 5*5 grid unless otherwise specified. Other information on Members and Cooperating Non-Members fishing activities appears in the reports of the Extended Scientific Committee, Compliance Committee and Extended Commission.

This folder contains two examples of PAGURE datasets, corresponding to three surveys: -CGFS conducted in 2018 in the English Channel (Northeast Atlantic) -EPIBENGOL conducted in 2019 in the Gulf of Lion (Western Mediterranean) -EVHOE conducted in 2020 in the Bay of Biscay and Celtic Shelf (Northeast Atlantic) Files include metadata for the sampling stations, annotation files. A readme tex file contains the links to the voyage metadata This folder is aimed at providing an example of documented underwater imagery dataset. These data are part of the data exchange conducted in the QuatreA collaboration between the French Research Institute for the Exploitation of the Sea (Ifremer), the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), and the University of Tasmania (UTAS).

The PHYTOBS-MARCOBOLO dataset comprises long-term time series on marine microphytoplankton, from 2003 to 2021, along the entire French metropolitan coastline. Microphytoplankton data cover microscopic taxonomic identifications and counts. The PHYTOBS-MARCOBOLO dataset corresponds to a dataset extracted from the PHYTOBS network (DOI:10.17882/85178). The PHYTOBS network provides the scientific community and stakeholders with validated and qualified data on the biomass, abundance and composition of marine microphytoplankton in coastal and lagoon waters, with the aim of supporting scientific research. PHYTOBS-MARCOBOLO is a dataset used as part of the Horizon Europe MARCO-BOLO project (https://marcobolo-project.eu/), in which we are currently working to understand and analyze multi-decadal trends in coastal and marine biodiversity on a European scale. The PHYTOBS-MARCOBOLO dataset gathers data from 18 sampling sites, selected from the PHYTOBS-Network dataset according to requirements of time series quality and geographical location of sampling sites established as part of the MARCO-COLO project. This dataset was also formatted according to a template imposed for the European project.