Marine ecoregion

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Marine ecoregions are regions of the world's oceans, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), to aid in conservation activities for marine ecosystems.

World Wildlife Fund defines an ecoregion as "a large area of land or water that contains a geographically distinct assemblage of natural communities that: share a large majority of their species and ecological dynamics; share similar environmental conditions, and; interact ecologically in ways that are critical for their long-term persistence."

The scheme used to designate and classify marine ecoregions is analogous to the classification system used by WWF for terrestrial ecoregions. major habitat types are identified—polar, temperate shelfs and seas, temperate upwelling, tropical upwelling, tropical coral, pelagic (trades and westerlies), abyssal, and hadal (ocean trench)—which correspond to the terrestrial biomes. Major biogeographic realms, analogous to the seven terrestrial ecozones, represent large regions of the ocean basins: North Temperate Atlantic, Eastern Tropical Atlantic, Western Tropical Atlantic, South Temperate Atlantic, North Temperate Indo-Pacific, Central Indo-Pacific, Eastern Indo-Pacific, Western Indo-Pacific, South Temperate Indo-Pacific, Southern Ocean, Antarctic, Arctic, and Mediterranean.

The classification of Marine ecoregions is not developed to the same level of detail and comprehensiveness as that of the terrestrial ecoregions; only the priority conservation areas of the Global 200 are listed.

A similar system of identifying areas of the oceans for conservation purposes is the system of large marine ecosystems (LMEs), developed by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). LMEs are regions of the world's oceans, encompassing coastal areas from river basins and estuaries to the seaward boundaries of continental shelves and the outer margins of the major ocean current systems. They are relatively large regions on the order of 200,000 km² or greater, characterized by distinct bathymetry, hydrography, productivity, and trophically dependent populations.

Although the LMEs cover only the continental margins and not the deep oceans and oceanic islands, the 64 LMEs produce 95% of the world's annual marine fishery biomass yields. Most of the global ocean pollution, overexploitation, and coastal habitat alteration occur within their waters. NOAA has conducted studies of principal driving forces affecting changes in biomass yields for 33 of the 64 LMEs, which have been peer-reviewed and published in ten volumes [1].

[edit] Global 200 Marine Ecoregions (World Wildlife Fund)

  • Polar
    • Antarctic
      • Antarctic Peninsula & Weddell Sea
    • Arctic
      • Bering Sea (Canada, Russia, United States)
      • Barents-Kara Sea (Norway, Russia)
  • Temperate shelfs and seas
    • Mediterranean
      • Mediterranean Sea (Albania, Algeria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Lebanon, Libya, Malta, Monaco, Morocco, Serbia & Montenegro, Slovenia, Spain, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey)
    • North Temperate Atlantic
      • Northeast Atlantic Shelf Marine (Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Russia, Sweden, United Kingdom)
      • Grand Banks (Canada, St. Pierre and Miquelon (France), United States)
      • Chesapeake Bay (United States)
    • North Temperate Indo-Pacific
    • Southern Ocean
      • Patagonian Southwest Atlantic (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay)
      • Southern Australian Marine (Australia)
      • New Zealand Marine (New Zealand)
  • Temperate upwelling
  • Tropical upwelling
    • Central Indo-Pacific
      • Western Australian Marine (Australia)
    • Eastern Indo-Pacific
      • Panama Bight (Colombia, Ecuador, Panama)
      • Gulf of California (Mexico)
      • Galápagos Marine (Ecuador)
    • Eastern Tropical Atlantic
      • Canary Current (Canary Islands, Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Morocco, Senegal, Western Sahara)
  • Tropical coral
    • Central Indo-Pacific
      • Nansei Shoto (Japan)
      • Sulu-Sulawesi Seas (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines)
      • Bismarck-Solomon Seas (Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands)
      • Banda-Flores Sea (Indonesia)
      • New Caledonia Barrier Reef (New Caledonia)
      • Great Barrier Reef (Australia)
      • Lord Howe-Norfolk Islands Marine (Australia)
      • Palau Marine (Palau)
      • Andaman Sea (Andaman and Nicobar Islands (India), Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand)
    • Eastern Indo-Pacific
      • Tahitian Marine (Cook Islands, French Polynesia)
      • Hawaiian Marine (Hawaii)
      • Rapa Nui (Easter Island)
      • Fiji Barrier Reef (Fiji)
    • Western Indo-Pacific
      • Maldives, Chagos, Lakshadweep Atolls (Chagos Archipelago (United Kingdom), India, Maldives, Sri Lanka)
      • Red Sea (Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Yemen)
      • Arabian Sea (Djibouti, Iran, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen)
      • East African Marine (Kenya, Mozambique, Somalia, Tanzania)
      • West Madagascar Marine (Comoros, Madagascar, Mayotte and Iles Glorieuses (France), Seychelles)
    • Western Tropical Atlantic
      • Mesoamerican Reef (Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico)
      • Greater Antillean Marine (Bahamas, Cayman Islands, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Turks and Caicos Islands, United States)
      • Southern Caribbean Sea (Aruba, Columbia, Netherlands Antilles, Panama, Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela)
      • Northeast Brazil Shelf Marine (Brazil)

[edit] Large Marine Ecosystems (NOAA)

  1. East Bering Sea
  2. Gulf of Alaska
  3. California Current
  4. Gulf of California
  5. Gulf of Mexico
  6. Southeast U.S. Continental Shelf
  7. Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf
  8. Scotian Shelf
  9. Newfoundland-Labrador Shelf
  10. Insular Pacific-Hawaiian
  11. Pacific Central-American Coastal
  12. Caribbean Sea
  13. Humboldt Current
  14. Patagonian Shelf
  15. South Brazil Shelf
  16. East Brazil Shelf
  17. North Brazil Shelf
  18. West Greenland Shelf
  19. East Greenland Shelf
  20. Barents Sea
  21. Norwegian Shelf
  22. North Sea
  23. Baltic Sea
  24. Celtic-Biscay Shelf
  25. Iberian Coastal
  26. Mediterranean Sea
  27. Canary Current
  28. Guinea Current
  29. Benguela Current
  30. Agulhas Current
  31. Somali Coastal Current
  32. Arabian Sea
  33. Red Sea
  34. Bay of Bengal
  35. Gulf of Thailand
  36. South China Sea
  37. Sulu-Celebes Sea
  38. Indonesian Sea
  39. North Australian Shelf
  40. Northeast Australian Shelf/Great Barrier Reef
  41. East-Central Australian Shelf
  42. Southeast Australian Shelf
  43. Southwest Australian Shelf
  44. West-Central Australian Shelf
  45. Northwest Australian Shelf
  46. New Zealand Shelf
  47. East China Sea
  48. Yellow Sea
  49. Kuroshio Current
  50. Sea of Japan
  51. Oyashio Current
  52. Sea of Okhotsk
  53. West Bering Sea
  54. Chukchi Sea
  55. Beaufort Sea
  56. East Siberian Sea
  57. Laptev Sea
  58. Kara Sea
  59. Iceland Shelf
  60. Faroe Plateau
  61. Antarctica
  62. Black Sea
  63. Hudson Bay
  64. Arctic Ocean
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