Please follow the instructions below for identifying these areas of destructive fishing. If you have any questions please email Katie Reytar at kreytar@wri.org. Thank you for your contribution to Reefs at Risk Revisited!
Threat categories are defined as follows:
• Low threat (L) – threat not known to occur.
• Medium (M) – threat occurs once a month / threat known to occur occasionally.
• High (H) – threat occurs about once a week / threat occurs frequently.
• Previously blasted or poisoned (PB/PP) – area known to be a former blasting or poison fishing ground (regardless of intensity).
If you do not already have Google Earth installed, you may download it for free from: http://earth.google.com/
Instructions for creating a polygon on Google Earth that identifies areas where dynamite/blast fishing or poison fishing occurs. These instructions will create one polygon per area identified.
1. Download the Google Earth layers by clicking on the link: Destructive_Fishing.zip/.
The zip file includes the following three layers: WCMC_Coral_Reefs; Poison_Fishing_Reefcheck; and Dynamite_Fishing_Reefcheck. Save them to your computer.
2. Open the three layers that you previously saved to your computer by clicking on them. The first layer that you click will open Google Earth automatically. Each subsequent layer you click will load to “Temporary Places” in Google Earth.
3. Zoom into the location where you can identify an area of blast or poison fishing. (The zoom tool is the “+” on the right-hand side of the screen.)
4. From the “Add” menu, choose “Polygon.”
5. In the dialogue box and “Name” field, type a title for your polygon. Please specify either blast fishing or poison fishing. Example title: Blast Fishing in Indonesia.
6. In the “Description” field, add a description for the polygon and your best estimate of the level of threat on a scale of low, medium, or high where “low” represents a rare occurrence and “high” represents a frequent or intense occurrence. Example description: Area of blast fishing in the Java Sea – High.
7. Do NOT close the dialogue box yet; do NOT hit OK yet.
8. With the cursor (looks like a box with marks on each edge) draw an outline (polygon) that represents the area where destructive fishing occurs.
9. Click “OK” on the dialogue box.
10. Your polygon is now listed on the menu in the left-hand column. Right click with the mouse on the polygon listed in the menu. Choose “Email…”
11. Select your email program from the dialogue box (if this box appears, it may not).
12. Send the email (the polygon will be automatically attached) to kreytar@wri.org. Please provide your name and organization in the body of the email.
13. Repeat steps 3 through 12 for each polygon that identifies an area of destructive fishing.
If you have any questions please email Katie Reytar at kreytar@wri.org