In this article published in Science at the beginning of March, Tom B Letessier, researcher at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL), and his colleagues, including David Mouillot (UM), Laura Mannocci (IRD), Nicolas Mouquet (CNRS) et Laure Velez (UM) from MARBEC, present the results of an impressive study on fish body size: data collected over 14 years was analysed, representing around 20 000 hours of underwater videos filming almost a million individuals of 1460 different species! From the recordings of 823,849 individual fish, they report divergent responses between systems, with the pelagic size structure being more deeply eroded in the vicinity of human markets than the benthic size structure, signifying a greater vulnerability of pelagic systems to human pressure. "The location and size of marine protected areas are therefore fundamental factors to be taken into account to best protect marine biodiversity".
To know more
Press release: [Aires marines protégées] Une vaste étude sur la taille des poissons pour mieux comprendre l’impact des
activités humaines et la pertinence des AMP
https://www.cnrs.fr/fr/presse/une-vaste-etude-sur-la-taille-des-poissons-pour-mieux-comprendre-limpact-des-activites
Reference : Letessier, T. B., Mouillot, D., Mannocci, L., Jabour Christ, H., Elamin, E. M., Elamin, S. M., Friedlander, A. M., Hearn, A., Juhel, J.-B., Kleiven, A. R., Moland, E., Mouquet, N., Nillos-Kleiven, P. J., Sala, E., Thompson, C. D. H., Velez, L., Vigliola, L., Meeuwig, J. J. (2024). Divergent responses of pelagic and benthic fish body-size structure to remoteness and protection from humans. Science 383, 976–982. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adi7562