River pipefish (Syngnathus watermeyeri) Case Study
Home > Biodiversity Nature & People > Conservation Philanthropy > Grants > MBZF Grant 172516007
Continent: Africa
Country: South Africa
Grant Amount: $10,704
Awarded Date: January 26, 2018
Peter Teske
Centre for Ecological Genomics and Wildlife Conservation, University of Johannesburg
Kingsway Campus
Auckland Park
Gauteng
2006
South Africa
Tel: +27 (0)11 559 3373
Mob: +27 (0)71 236 0489
A multidisciplinary conservation initiative to save South Africa's critically endangered estuarine pipefish Syngnathus watermeyeri from imminent extinction
1. Field surveys
Establish the extant range and status of S. watermeyeri through intensive field surveys. Focus will be placed on estuaries where this species has been recorded previously. Where possible, localised populations will be studied using VIFE tags to ascertain population abundance, movement patterns, and life-history traits. In addition, information will be gathered on habitat and freshwater flows in the different systems.
2. Captive breeding
A captive breeding programme will be developed in partnership with Ushaka Marine World. A microsatellite library will be developed using next-generation shotgun sequencing, and used to create genetically maximally divergent breeding pairs. Details: Development of genetic resources; use genetic resources in captive breeding programme; release of genetically maximally diverse offspring into all estuaries where the species has been recorded previously.
Grant document
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