Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
A marine coastal ecosystem is a marine ecosystem which occurs where the land meets the ocean. Worldwide there is about 620,000 kilometres (390,000 mi) of coastline. Coastal habitats extend to the margins of the continental shelves, occupying about 7 percent of the ocean surface area.
Human uses of marine ecosystems and pollution in marine ecosystems are significantly threats to the stability of these ecosystems. Environmental problems concerning marine ecosystems include unsustainable exploitation of marine resources (for example overfishing of certain species), marine pollution , climate change , and building on coastal areas.
Marine life depends in some way on the saltwater that is in the sea (the term marine comes from the Latin mare, meaning sea or ocean). A habitat is an ecological or environmental area inhabited by one or more living species. [1] The marine environment supports many kinds of these habitats. Marine habitats can be divided into coastal and open ...
One of the most comprehensive early classifications was the system of 53 coastal provinces developed by Briggs in 1974. [3] The near-global system of 64 large marine ecosystems has a partial biogeographic basis. WWF Global 200. The World Wildlife Fund—WWF identified 43 priority marine ecoregions, as part of its Global 200 initiative. [4]
Within the neritic, marine biologists also identify the following: [citation needed] The infralittoral zone is the algal -dominated zone down to around five metres below the low water mark. The circalittoral zone is the region beyond the infralittoral, which is dominated by sessile animals such as oysters .
The following is a list of marine ecoregions, as defined by the WWF and The Nature Conservancy. The WWF/Nature Conservancy scheme groups the individual ecoregions into 12 marine realms, which represent the broad latitudinal divisions of polar, temperate, and tropical seas, with subdivisions based on ocean basins.
According to workshops performing questionaries, it is stated that eighty-six percent of respondents believe mismanagement of mangrove and coastal ecosystems are due to lack of knowledge to steward the ecosystems, yet forty-four percent of respondents state that there is a fair amount of knowledge used in those regions for fisheries.
The Mid Atlantic Bight's ecosystem can be seen as a transitional ecosystem between that of temperate and tropical ocean. Like the Gulf of Maine, it is an area of relatively high primary production. Much of the primary production in the Mid Atlantic Bight is in the summer and winter, and is highest near shore, and in estuarine environments.