Modeling Habitat Distribution of the Delphinidea using MaxEntIn Makran Sea, South of Iran

Spatial-Temporally knowledge on distribution of key species is an important component for systematic conservation planning. However, there has been little efforts on habitat modeling for marine mammals such as the Cetaceans in Iran. The coasts of Makran Sea, South of Iran is a high biodiversity region that has a vital marine habitat for a lot of marine species. Dolphins are of the most important species in this region. In this paper, we present predictive habitat modelling as a potential tool to support decisions for conservation planning. A maximum entropy algorithm (MaxEnt) was used to develop habitat models. The information that will be obtained from habitat models, which investigate Delphinidea-habitat preferences by quantifying relationships between occurrences of the focal species and their environment. Because of the distribution of marine species is influenced by biotic and abiotic parameters, in the first phase of the project, four physical parameters including sea surface temperature, bathymetry, distance from shoreline and turbidity, and two ecological components including Chlorophyll-a concentration and distance from habitat benthic were selected. The model was tested by assessing correlation with independent survey estimates of relative species abundance. The results of this study showed that Chlorophyll-a concentration was one of the important abiotic factor of Delphinidae distribution in the study region. Dolphin’s presence points were mostly around the beaches, islands and some other part of the study area with the high concentration of Chlorophyll a. The further results of this study can provide more insight into Dolphins distribution and could be useful for identifying potential spatial-temporal hotspots for designing marine protected area (MPA) in Northern part of Oman Sea.

Kai M. A Chan , M. Rebecca Shaw, David R Cameron, Emma C Underwood, Gretchen C Daily,Conservation Planning for Ecosystem Services2006