Dear colleagues:
Apologies for cross posting!
We would like to inform you of the workshop to be held at the 21st
Biennal Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals in San Francisco.
*ECOLOGICAL ROLES AND IMPORTANCE OF MARINE MAMMALS IN AQUATIC ECOSYSTEMS
*Date/time: Saturday, December 12th, 2015. From 830am to 530pm.
Organizers and contact email: Jeremy Kiszka, Michael Heithaus (Florida
International University) and Peter Corkeron (NOAA)
Contact email: [email protected]
Description: Top predators have the potential to impact ecosystems
through direct predation, risk effects, and their interaction as well as
through “bottom-up” processes stimulating primary production (“ecosystem
engineers”) or moving nutrients across ecosystem boundaries. Recently,
it has been argued that strong top-down effects of predators are likely
the rule rather than the exception based on the broad-scale community
rearrangements that accompany the loss or reintroduction of top
predators. Marine mammals, including some freshwater species, feed at a
variety of trophic levels, from herbivores to large apex predators, and
occur from freshwater to open ocean systems of all latitudes. Due to
their high abundance and considerable energetic needs as homeotherms,
they have a strong potential affect the structure and function of
ecosystems. In addition, due to their size and large movements, often
across ecosystem boundaries, aquatic mammals might also influence
nutrient dynamics within and among ecosystems. Because of historical and
ongoing changes in aquatic mammal abundances and distributions, their
function in aquatic ecosystems likely has been, and continues to be,
altered. Therefore, investigating the ecological roles and importance of
these species represents a major challenge for research. Empirical
evidence of the ecological roles of aquatic mammals is still lacking or
incomplete in most cases. While some species have been shown to play
crucial roles in marine systems, but how the relative importance of
aquatic mammals varies within and among species, ecosystems and contexts
remains underexplored.
This workshop will review empirical and ecosystem modeling studies on
the ecological role of mammals in aquatic ecosystems and attempt to
bring together the two major strands of research (top-down and bottom up
processes) together. The audience of this workshop is likely to be very
broad, from marine mammal and fishery ecologists to conservationists.
Secondly, we will discuss approaches for investigating the roles of
marine mammals in aquatic ecosystems and work towards a predictive
framework for marine mammal ecological roles.
This will be a full day workshop divided into two main sections. The
first (morning) will be dedicated to case studies and review
presentations on the role of various aquatic mammal species in various
ecological contexts (10-15 min presentations with 5 minutes for
questions and comments). The second section (afternoon) will focus on
discussions and round tables, especially to enhance approaches to
investigating the role of marine mammals in aquatic ecosystems.
Cost: $80 (early bird), $90 (after September 15th, 2015)
For more information:
https://www.marinemammalscience.org/conference/workshops/#ecological
or please contact me!
See you there!
Jeremy Kiszka, Peter Corkeron and Mike Heithaus
--
Jeremy Kiszka (PhD)
Marine Sciences Program, Florida International University
3000 NE 151 St., FL-33181, North Miami, USA.
Tel office (direct): (305)-919-4104
Cell: (786)-717-9797
Skype: jeremy.kiszka
The Heithaus lab: http://www2.fiu.edu/~heithaus/
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L'absence de virus dans ce courrier électronique a été vérifiée par le logiciel
antivirus Avast.
http://www.avast.com
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