Ocean and Coastal Management 198 (2020) 105328 Available online 30 August 2020 0964-5691/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Predicting mobulid ray distribution in coastal areas of Lesser Sunda Seascape: Implication for spatial and fsheries management Mochamad Iqbal Herwata Putra a, * , Edy Setyawan b, c , Betty J.L. Laglbauer c, d, e , Sarah Lewis a, f, g , Dharmadi Dharmadi h , Abraham Sianipar i , Isabel Ender c a Marine Megafauna Research Group, Misool Foundation, Savu Sea Program, Jl. Eltari, Larantuka, 86219, Indonesia b Institute of Marine Science, The University of Auckland, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand c Manta Trust, Catemwood House, Corscombe, Dorset, DT2 0NT, UK d Okeanos Centre of the University of the Azores, Department of Oceanography and Fisheries, Horta, Portugal e School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Australia f Indonesia Manta Project, Manta Trust, Catemwood House, Corsecombe, Dorset, UK g Sea Sanctuaries Trust, UK h Center for Fisheries Research, Agency for Marine Research and Human Resources, Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, Jakarta, 14430, Indonesia i Conservation International, Jalan Pejaten Barat No. 16A, Kemang, Jakarta, 12550, Indonesia A R T I C L E INFO Keywords: Conservation Ecological niche model Fisheries spatial management Habitat preference Mobula birostris Mobula mobular Mobula tarapacana ABSTRACT The Lesser Sunda Seascape (LSS) is considered one of the regions with the largest mobulid fsheries in Indonesia, although their spatial distribution and habitat preference in the LSS is still largely unknown. The goal of the present study was to describe the habitat preference and distribution of the oceanic manta rays, spinetail devil rays, and Chilean devil rays in the coastal area of LSS. We used multiple data sources of mobulid ray sightings and selected signifcant environmental predictors to execute the maximum entropy model. The model performed well in predicting mobulid ray habitat in the coastal area of LSS and indicated that sea-surface chlorophyll-a (SSC-a), sea-surface temperature (SST), sea-surface salinity (SSS), distance to the 200-m isobath, distance to the 3000-m isobath, and slope were all signifcant environmental predictors of their distribution. This study confrms that the habitat preference of mobulid rays were in the areas that close to the 200-m isobath and with higher chlorophyll-a concentration as proxy for their prey density. Combining habitat models with fsheries activity records indicated that the areas where these overlaps may represent key mobulid habitats. This study highlights a critical need for species-specifc and populations-level management measures for Indonesian mobulid rays, whereas current MPA design has focused on a broad-scale coastal ecosystem management approach, which may have limited effectiveness in practice. This study provides valuable information for the improvement of MPA design and fsheries management tools, through maximum entropy modeling as a powerful means to describe species’ distributions and habitat preference. We recommend that future efforts focus on documenting and incorporating data from large-scale commercial fsheries to improve our knowledge of habitat preference and distribution models in offshore areas and the high seas, and to assess the preference for coastal versus oceanic habitats. 1. Introduction There has been growing international concerns regarding the sus- tainability of mobulid ray fsheries. The demand for gill plates of a manta ray and devil ray for use in Asian medicine has raised in recent decades (Couturier et al., 2012; O’Malley et al., 2017). This has been aggravated by their frequent capture as retained bycatch in small-scale fsheries (White et al., 2006; Croll et al., 2016; Alfaro-Cordova et al., 2017). The conservative life-history strategies of mobulid rays, such as slow growth, late maturation, low reproductive rates, longer life spans and gestation periods, make them highly vulnerable to overfshing (Dulvy et al., 2003; Musick and Ellis, 2005). In response to these con- cerns, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) included all mobulid ray species in * Corresponding author. E-mail address: iqbalherwata@gmail.com (M.I.H. Putra). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Ocean and Coastal Management journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ocecoaman https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2020.105328 Received 22 May 2019; Received in revised form 1 August 2020; Accepted 3 August 2020