Nebrius ferrugineus | UAE National Red List of Marine Species: Reef-building corals, cartilaginous fishes and select bony fishes
Taxa
Nebrius ferrugineus | (Lesson, 1831)
Publication
Asessment status in full
Near Threatened
Assessment status abreviation
NT
Assessment status criteria
A2cd
Assessment rationale/justification
The Tawny Nurse Shark occurs throughout UAE coastal waters, and is presumably naturally uncommon there. This species is not targeted or valued in markets of the UAE. It is taken as bycatch in some areas of the Arabian Sea region (Sri Lanka and India), and declines have been noted. Slow life history characteristics, including low fecundity and a low annual rate of population increase causes the species to have a low capacity to recover from even moderate levels of exploitation. It is especially susceptible to exploitation (target and bycatch) in many largely unregulated gill net, longline and trawl fisheries that operate within its range outside and surrounding UAE waters. Some management measures are now in place in the Arabian Sea region, although domestic fisheries are likely to continue. Though data specifically from the UAE are not available, individuals in the UAE are a component of a larger, interconnected and migratory population that occurs broadly in the north-western Indian Ocean. It is inferred that declines reported in the Arabian Sea region are representative of its status in the UAE. Based on recorded levels of exploitation and decline in habitat quality, it is suspected to have declined by 20-30% over the past three generation lengths, or about 90 years. It is listed as Vulnerable A2cd.
Assessment year
2019
Assessors/contributors/reviewers listed
UAE National Red List Workshop
Affliation of assessor(s)/contributors/reviewers listed on assessment
Government
IGO
Assessor affiliation specific
Government|IGO
Criteria system specifics
IUCN v3.1
Criteria system used
IUCN
Criteria Citation
IUCN. 2012. IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria: Version 3.1, Second edition. IUCN, Gland, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK. iv + 32pp pp. And IUCN. 2012. Guidelines for Application of IUCN Red List Criteria at Regional and National Levels: Version 4.0. Gland, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK: IUCN. iii + 41pp.
Endemic to region
Not_assigned
Endemism Notes
Is an endemic?: Not_assigned
Threats listed in assessment
In the UAE, this species is not directly targeted by fisheries, but may be discarded as bycatch throughout the Arabian Gulf. This species is impacted by bycatch fisheries that are active elsewhere in its range. Marine habitats in the Gulf are experiencing high levels of disturbance and quickly deteriorating due to major impacts from development activities (including dredging and reclamation), desalination plants, industrial activities, habitat destruction through the removal of shallow productive areas and major shipping lanes (Sheppard et al. 2010). Corals in the UAE and Arabian Gulf have severely declined due to the increasing frequency of mass bleaching events caused by rising water temperatures, which is a consequence of climate change, as well as pervasive coastal development (Riegl et al. 2018, Burt et al. 2019).
Conservation Measures
Conservation measures:
Conservation measures notes:
Required conservation measures:
Scientific Name | Kingdom | Phylum | Class | Order | Family | Genus |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nebrius ferrugineus | Animalia | Chordata | Chondrichthyes | Orectolobiformes | Ginglymostomatidae | Nebrius |