The idea for a marine national park of the west coast of Scotland was initially proposed under the National Parks Scotland Act 2000 to protect a large area of marine habitats, flora and fauna. A WDCS report by Clark et al (2010) on critical cetacean habitat identified key areas for the protection of cetaceans in Western Scotland. The WDCS is calling for the construction of a large MPA network called the Hebrides Marine Reserve and Cetacean Critical Habitat Network (HMRCCHN). The area proposed is shown in the Google Earth image below:
This image was generated from a .kmz file that was downloaded from this link: http://us.whales.org/wdc-in-action/12-marine-protected-areas-google-earth-tour. This image is very easy to generate granted the user has Google Earth installed on their computer.
The following information is extracted from a book available online. The book wasa very easy to source and contains proposals for numerous other MPAs around the coast of Britain. The area takes into account the areas of West Scotland, the Minches, the Sound of Barra and the Sea of the Hebrides and covers an area of around 24,789 km2. It is proposed as having areas of critical habitat for bottlenose dolphins, Risso's dolphins and harbour porpoise.
However, another aspect of the reserve is provide education and promote effective marine spatial planning with better management of marine users, including fisheries and naval exercises. The proposed reserve also hopes to redirect oil tankers away from inshore routes, which in turn would improve the value of tourism and products from fishing in the area, as it would carry a special marine reserve 'brand'.
Therefore, implementing this vast MPA network would bring many benefits to the conservation of cetaceans in the waters of Western Scotland. However, it may also have negative impacts on other industries, which I will look at in a later blog post.
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