Cited by 346Fish Ecology and Management StudiesFreshwater macroinvertebrate diversity and ecologyHydrology and Sediment Transport Processes

Habitat recovery and restoration in aquatic ecosystems: current progress and future challenges

Open access
Geist, Juergen, Hawkins, Stephen J.·2016·Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems

Abstract

Aquatic ecosystems are degraded by a variety of pressures as a result of the growing human population. Global‐scale impacts include homogenization of biological communities, removal of top predators and ecosystem engineers, chemical pollution by excess nutrients and contaminants as well as deteriorating structural diversity, connectivity and process dynamics. There is a pressing societal need to reverse the decline in biodiversity and replace lost ecosystem functioning and services in aquatic ecosystems by enabling natural recovery or by active restoration. Common concepts and approaches for conservation, recovery and restoration in freshwater and marine ecosystems, aided by recent advances in ecological theory, include decision criteria on priorities for conservation, harnessing natural recovery by cessation of impacts, restoring connectivity and meso‐habitat diversity as well as the geomorphological structural template including hydrodynamic processes. Re‐oligotrophication at catchment or regional sea‐scale benefits from integrating freshwater and marine restoration. Species or assemblages that convey biogenic structure or act as ecosystem engineers and keystone species should be given priority. Top‐down control can be reinstated in closed systems. Differences between freshwater and marine ecosystems include the greater spatial restriction of many species in fresh water, the importance of rooted vegetation and insects in freshwater, and the much greater dispersal and connectivity in marine systems. These differences dictate different approaches, with more scope for active restoration work in fresh water and harnessing natural recovery in marine systems. Restoration schemes need clearly defined target states. They should generally take a process‐oriented and stepwise adaptive management approach judging success against reference or control sites. Societal and political expectations need to be managed and restoration schemes should not promise too much. Even minor rehabilitation of degraded ecosystems can put back some biodiversity and key services. Sometimes ´Ersatz´‐ecosystems are better than nothing and the best that can be achieved, especially in urban settings. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Crossref · 10.1002/aqc.2702

Cites

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  • Global total wetland area is a minimum of 1.5-1.6 billion hectares.

    “Despite widespread declines, global total wetland area is a minimum of 1.5-1.6 billion hectares.59”

    From Protecting and restoring habitats to benefit freshwater biodiversity (2024) · cites this paper as [59]

    The Introduction (page unavailable) describes worldwide deterioration of aquatic ecosystems, supporting the sentence’s reference to widespread declines. It does not give a global wetland-area estimate; searches for “1.5–1.6 billion hectares” and worldwide wetland extent found no supporting passage in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.76)

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1 of the 175 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Research works printed but not linked: 9

  1. Council of the European Communities, 1992, Directive 92/43/EEC of the European Parliament and the Council of 21st May 1992 on the conservation of natural habitats and of wild fauna and flora, Official Journal of the European Communities, 206, 7
  2. Council of the European Communities, 2000, Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23rd October 2000 establishing a framework for Community action in the field of water policy, Official Journal of the European Communities, 327, 1
  3. 10.2800/944899 · DOI
  4. Gleick PH, 2011, The world's water, Vol. 7. The biennial report on freshwater resources
  5. Hawkins SJ, 1992, Restoring the nation's marine environment, 583
  6. Hawkins S, 1992, Culture of mussels in Sandon dock, a disused dock basin in Liverpool, Journal of Medical and Applied Malacology, 4, 165
  7. Hawkins SJ, 1999, Ecology and landscape development: A history of the Mersey Basin, 155
  8. LANUV NRW (Landesamt für Natur, Umwelt und Verbraucherschutz Nordrhein‐Westfalen), 2011, Strahlwirkungs‐ und Trittsteinkonzept in der Planungspraxis
  9. White KN, 1993, Urban waterside regeneration: problems and prospects, 366

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Authors
Geist, J., & Hawkins, S. J.
Affiliations
  • Technical University of Munich (DE)
  • Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom (GB)
Corresponding author
Geist, Juergen
Venue
Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2016-08-31
Volume
26
Issue
5
Pages
942-962
ISSN
  • 1052-7613 (ISSN-L)
  • 1099-0755
OpenAlex
W2512035795
Cited by
346
References
175
Citations by year
2026: 32 · 2025: 58 · 2024: 47 · 2023: 44 · 2022: 40 · 2021: 41 · 2020: 29 · 2019: 25 · 2018: 19 · 2017: 11
FWCI
15.83
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Aquatic Conservation Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems (publishedVersion)
  • ePrints Soton (University of Southampton) (acceptedVersion)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Fish Ecology and Management Studies
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Freshwater macroinvertebrate diversity and ecology
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Hydrology and Sediment Transport Processes
Keywords
aquatic ecosystem restoration, habitat recovery, natural recovery, ecosystem engineers, keystone species, connectivity, re-oligotrophication, freshwater ecosystems, marine ecosystems, top-down control, adaptive management, target states, ecosystem services, biodiversity conservation, nutrient pollution

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