Abstract
AbstractFinancial and human resources allocated to biodiversity conservation are often limited, making it impossible to protect all natural places, and priority areas for protection must be identified. In this study, we applied ecological niche models to predict fish assemblages in the stream network of France. Four non‐correlated conservation objectives were derived from these species assemblages: taxonomic diversity, functional diversity, natural heritage importance and socio‐economic value. We proposed a multi‐objective prioritization method based on the Pareto optimality principle to rank the planning units (i.e. 6097 subcatchments) according to their inherent trade‐offs between the four conservation objectives. Four types of hydrosystems of great conservation importance presenting specific fish assemblages were identified: (i) the most upstream areas of large catchments; (ii) the most downstream areas of large catchments; (iii) the small coastal catchments of the English Channel and the Atlantic Ocean; and (iv) the Mediterranean streams of medium altitude. The fish assemblages characterizing these hydrosystems were complementary and representative of the entire fish fauna of France. Most of these priority subcatchments were found to be practically suitable for the implementation of conservation actions, which is very promising for the protection of river biodiversity. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Highlights
Given the increasing loss of freshwater biodiversity worldwide, immediate conservation actions are crucially required to protect aquatic ecosystems (Dudgeon et al, 2006; Vörösmarty et al, 2010)
We proposed a prioritization procedure based on the Pareto optimality principle (Zitzler and Thiele, 1999) which classifies the solutions of a multi-objective optimization problem according to a relationship of dominance between them (Kennedy et al, 2008; Irisarri et al, 2011)
We have developed a prioritization framework that focuses on different aspects of the diversity of fish assemblages instead of the raw spatial distribution of species
Summary
Given the increasing loss of freshwater biodiversity worldwide, immediate conservation actions are crucially required to protect aquatic ecosystems (Dudgeon et al, 2006; Vörösmarty et al, 2010). It is impossible to protect all natural areas because the financial and human resources available for conservation are limited (Wilson et al, 2006). There is an urgent need to identify freshwater environments that should be protected as a priority (Abell et al, 2007; Strayer and Dudgeon, 2010). Species can be targeted directly by identifying a reserve network that ensures the protection of the whole regional species pool (Collier, 2011). Species surrogates such as diversity metrics can be used to prioritize
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