Ecoregional planning in marine environments: identifying priority sites for conservation in the northern Gulf of Mexico

1. The overall aim of this work was to identify sites within the northern G ulf of Mexico that. if protected. would fully represent the biological dive rsity of the nearshore waters of this ecoregion. In this paper. we focus on the eastern subregion, northwest Florida, to illustrate the process of eco regional planning in marine environments. 2. The basic steps in ecoregional planning include: identification of conse rvation targets, i.e. species and habitats, collection of data on their eco logy and distribution; determination of conservation goals for the amount o f targets that must be protected: and identification of a set of sites that meets these goals for all targets. 3. As a preliminary goal. it was determined that the set of priority sites should contain at least 20%, of the current distribution of each target hab itat and species. 4. Two primary tools were used to choose a set of priority sites: a reserve selection program. SITES. and interviews and a workshop with scientists an d managers. The final set of priority sites integrated information from the se various sources. 5. The goals were exceeded for all conservation targets in the priority sit es. On average, 75 and 58% of the distributions of the habitat targets were contained Within the priority and high priority sites. respectively. These priority and high priority sites only occupied 29 and 17% of the study are a. respectively. 6. One of the first steps in the conservation of the bays identified as pri ority sites is the recognition that they are integrally linked by important processes to the surrounding terrestrial and aquatic environments. Conserv ation in a part of these estuarine landscapes will benefit biodiversity acr oss environments. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons. Ltd.