Conservation of Asian horseshoe crabs on spotlight
Unlike the American horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus), whose fishery and harvest are well monitored and managed by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, the conservation of Asian species, i.e., the tri-spine horseshoe crab (Tachypleus tridentatus), the coastal horseshoe crab (T. giga...
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en en en |
| Published: |
Springer Science and Business Media B.V.
2020
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://irep.iium.edu.my/84708/1/84708_Conservation%20of%20Asian%20horseshoe%20crabs%20on%20spotlight.pdf http://irep.iium.edu.my/84708/2/84708_Conservation%20of%20Asian%20horseshoe%20crabs%20on%20spotlight_SCOPUS.pdf http://irep.iium.edu.my/84708/3/84708_Conservation%20of%20Asian%20horseshoe%20crabs%20on%20spotlight_WoS.pdf http://irep.iium.edu.my/84708/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7651794/pdf/10531_2020_Article_2078.pdf https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-020-02078-3 |
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| Summary: | Unlike the American horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus), whose fishery and harvest are
well monitored and managed by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, the
conservation of Asian species, i.e., the tri-spine horseshoe crab (Tachypleus tridentatus),
the coastal horseshoe crab (T. gigas) and the mangrove horseshoe crab (Carcinoscorpius
rotundicauda), is a more formidable challenge, due to the intricacies of regional laws and
inconsistent enforcement (John et al. 2018). In the near future, four scenarios will intensify
the negative pressure on the wild populations of Asian horseshoe crabs: (1) unsustainable
harvest pressure on T. tridentatus and its cross-border trade from Vietnam to the mainland
China for biomedical bleeding practice and human consumption, (2) legal or illegal export
of T. gigas and C. rotundicauda between ASEAN countries for consumption as a local
delicacy, (3) spawning and nesting habitat degradation due to coastal reclamation,
industrialization and climate change, and (4) at the genomic level, ritual release and
confiscated illegally exported Tachypleus spp. released into non-native habitat or far from
the home range of respective species might trigger ‘genetic bottle-neck’ and the ‘founder
effect’ (Herborg et al. 2007; Yang et al. 2009).
Destruction of horseshoe crab spawning grounds has led to the extinction of adult T.
tridentatus in Kinmen Island, Taiwan. Similarly, with C 90% population decline of
juvenile T. tridentatus in Hong Kong will likely end up in its local extirpation. Gravid
female-biased harvesting of T. gigas from Indonesia and Malaysia exported to Thailand for
local delicacy has steeply increased in the last decade, resulting in imbalanced sex ratio in
the wild (Mat Zauki et al. 2019a, b). Owing to continued population decline, T. tridentatus
biomedical bleeding harvest for Tachypleus amebocyte lysate (TAL) production in
mainland China has dropped from 600,000 pairs during the 1990s to 100,000 pairs currently (Gauvry 2015). T. tridentatus has recently been listed as ‘Endangered’ on the IUCN |
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