BREAKING Security guard shot, seriously injured outside of Drake's Toronto mansion
A security guard working at Drake’s Bridle Path mansion in Toronto was seriously injured in a shooting outside the residence early Tuesday morning, police said.
Climate change, overfishing and pollution are threatening coral reefs worldwide, according to researchers, and their capacity to provide essential benefits and services to humans has drastically decreased.
A study published Friday in the journal One Earth offered a comprehensive look at the impact diminishing coral reef coverage has had on ecosystem services, that is, the ability of reefs to provide food and livelihoods to humans.
Global coverage of living coral has been halved since the 1950s, according to the study, and has come with a proportional decline in fish catches and abundance, as well as biodiversity.
"Coral reefs are known to be important habitats for biodiversity and are particularly sensitive to climate change, as marine heat waves can cause bleaching events," Tyler Eddy, research scientist at the Fisheries and Marine Institute, Memorial University of Newfoundland, said in a news release. "Coral reefs provide important ecosystem services to humans, through fisheries, economic opportunities and protection from storms."
Coral bleaching occurs when sources of stress, including changes in temperature, cause coral to expel the algae living in its tissue, which turns it white. Bleached coral is still alive, but much more vulnerable to disease and starvation.
In addition to providing a habitat for fish, coral reefs also act as a natural barrier protecting shorelines from waves and storms.
Eddy and his colleagues analyzed living coral cover across the globe against coral-associated fish catches, fish abundance, biodiversity and consumption of fishes by coastal Indigenous groups.
They found that the volume of fish caught peaked in 2002 and has been in decline since despite increased fishing efforts. The catch-per-unit effort, a metric that indicates abundance, has decreased by 60 per cent since 1950.
The team of researchers also calculated a 63 per cent decline in biodiversity with the loss of coral.
"Our analysis indicates that the capacity of coral reefs to provide ecosystem services has declined by about half globally," William Cheung of the University of British Columbia's Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries said. "This study speaks to the importance of how we manage coral reefs not only at regional scales, but also at the global scale, and the livelihoods of communities that rely on them."
The authors of the study note that achieving climate change emissions targets and reducing local impacts can help reduce stress on reefs and allow them to continue providing ecosystem services.
Maintaining these services is essential for coastal Indigenous peoples, the authors wrote, as their consumption of seafood is 15 times that of non-Indigenous populations, and therefore they rely on these habitats heavily for nutrition.
"Coral reef biodiversity and fisheries take on added importance for Indigenous communities, small island developing states and coastal populations where they may be essential to traditions and cultural practices," the authors wrote. "The reduced capacity of coral reefs to provide ecosystem services undermines the well-being of millions of people with historical and continuing relationships with coral reef ecosystems."
A security guard working at Drake’s Bridle Path mansion in Toronto was seriously injured in a shooting outside the residence early Tuesday morning, police said.
Prince Harry will not be seeing his father King Charles during his current visit to Britain as the monarch will be too busy, Harry's spokesperson said on Tuesday.
Movement is movement, right? Not exactly. Here’s what your body is looking for in addition to your morning walk or yoga session, according to experts.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Sporting mullets, Canadian Armed Forces officer cadets placed second in an annual military skills competition in the U.S.
The Met Gala and its fashionista A-listers on Monday included Jennifer Lopez, Zendaya and a parade of others in a swirl of flora and fauna looks on a green-tinged carpet lined by live foliage.
Quebec is looking at tightening the regulations around sperm donation in the province following the release of a documentary that revealed three men from the same family fathered hundreds of children.
As the higher cost of living continues to squeeze household budgets, many Canadians find they have even less left over at the end of every month to squirrel away for the future.
The rumours are true: Vegetables aren't real — that is, in botany, anyway. While the term fruit is recognized botanically as anything that contains a seed or seeds, vegetable is actually a broad umbrella term.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.