Newspapers describe long-term trends in whale occurrence in the nearshore New York Bight

Ocean & Coastal Management · 2024-06-18 · 4 citations

To understand trends in species occurrence, it is important to incorporate historical data. The digitization of printed newspapers dating back to colonial times allows for a cost-effective way of acquiring long-term ecological information. We used digital newspaper archives to gather data and characterize trends in whale sightings and strandings in the nearshore (0–25 km) New York Bight (NYB), including the New York-New Jersey harbor estuary and the Delaware estuary. Most records were found from 1831 to 2020. Sighting records per year (RPY) exhibited a bimodal pattern, with a drop in RPY between 1931 and 1970. Stranding RPY showed an increasing trend over time, with separate spikes from 1941-1950 and 2011–2020. The species most often mentioned in newspaper records were right ( Eubalaena glacialis) , fin ( Balaenoptera physalus ), humpback ( Megaptera novaeangliae ), and sperm whales ( Physeter macrocephalus ). The predominant species in early records were right, fin, and sperm whales, while after 1980 the most commonly reported species were humpback and fin whales. There were species-specific differences in seasonal peaks, but sightings and strandings overall were most often reported in July. Newspapers provided valuable information on the historic occurrence of whales, filling in gaps from time frames prior to formal data collection. These results suggest that the whale species composition of the nearshore NYB has changed over the last two centuries, with a decline in right whales and an increase in humpback whales. The regular occurrence of humpback whales in the region appears to have begun more recently, which conflicts with theories that suggest they may be reoccupying former habitat. The increasing trend found for humpback whales and the evidence that endangered whale species such as right, fin, and sperm whales occur in the nearshore region is important for management and should be considered in future impact assessments.

Trends in Area of Occurrence and Biomass of Fish and Macroinvertebrates on the Northeast U.S. Shelf Ecosystem

Marine and Coastal Fisheries · 2023-04-01 · 8 citations

Abstract Climate change can affect the habitat of marine species and hence their persistence and adaptation. Trends in area of occurrence and population biomass were examined for 177 fish and macroinvertebrates resident to the Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf ecosystem. Samples of these organisms were taken during a time series of research bottom trawl surveys conducted in the spring and autumn 1976–2019. The occurrence area of each taxon was modeled as the distribution of occurrence probability based on a random forest presence/absence classification model. Following, a population biomass of each taxon was modeled as a minimum swept area estimate, where the ecosystem was stratified biannually based on each taxon's spatial distribution. In both seasons, the sum of occurrence area and biomass across all modeled species increased over the study period. The summation of biomass is problematic since catchability is not known for most species; more importantly, most time series of individual species biomass trended higher. We found that the ratio of biomass to occurrence area, intended as a measure of productivity, showed no change in the autumn and had a weak increasing trend in spring. For the majority of taxa, the rate of change in biomass tracked changes in occurrence area (either positive or negative), but there were cases where the direction of change in biomass was opposite to the direction of change in occurrence area. Thermal conditions in surface waters appear to be a more important driver of occurrence area and biomass change than the change in thermal conditions near the bottom. These findings provide critical insights into the expected changes in ecosystem productivity transpiring with climate change.

Coherence and potential drivers of stock assessment uncertainty in Northeast US groundfish stocks

ICES Journal of Marine Science · 2022-09-24 · 5 citations

Abstract Failure to account for the impacts of climate and ecosystem change on stock dynamics can introduce uncertainty to stock assessments that can make meeting the objective of sustainable fisheries management challenging. The increased prevalence and magnitude of uncertainty in New England groundfish stock assessments (i.e. retrospective patterns) in recent years suggest that there may be common drivers impacting these stocks that are currently unaccounted for in the stock assessment. We examined the coherence in retrospective patterns across groundfish stock assessments and evaluated candidate drivers of retrospective patterns, including large-scale climate and ecosystem change, as well as significant management and monitoring changes. We found high coherence in moving window Mohn's rho time series for groundfish within the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank areas. Fluctuations in Gulf of Maine groundfish Mohn's rho values were most strongly related to lagged bottom temperature and spiny dogfish biomass time series, whereas fluctuations in Georges Bank groundfish Mohn's rho values were strongly related to lagged time series of warm core rings formation from the Gulf Stream. Our identification of coherence in retrospective patterns across groundfish stocks by region supports the idea of common regional drivers with climate and ecosystem changes emerging as the leading contributing factors.

Something strange in the neighborhood: Diverging signals in stock assessment data for Northeast U.S. fish stocks

Fisheries Management and Ecology · 2022 · 14 citations

• Fishery
• Econometrics
• Geography

Abstract In the Northeast U.S., many stock assessments have a history of problematic model diagnostics, with multiple age‐based assessments recently being rejected in the peer review process, and are not suitable for management advice. The role in which diverging signals in the coastwide bottom trawl survey may be contributing to assessment problems was explored here for 18 stocks in the region. Specifically, trends in total mortality ( Z ) estimated from catch curve analysis and a relative measure of the harvest rate (total catch/survey index; called relative F ) were evaluated. Across stocks, relative F has declined over time, on average, since the mid‐1990s, yet Z has not for many stocks. Weak positive or even negative correlations between relative F and Z resulted for 13 stocks. This diverging signal appears to be contributing to assessment model performance, as larger retrospective patterns (a measure of assessment uncertainty) occurred for stocks with negative correlations between relative F and Z . While a variety of mechanisms could be involved in these diverging signals, the available evidence suggests that unreported catch and/or increasing natural mortality likely play a role to varying degrees for each stock.

Harvest control rules used in U.S. federal fisheries management and implications for climate resilience

Research Square · 2022-08-23 · 1 citations

Abstract Climate change is altering the productivity of marine fisheries and challenging the effectiveness of historical fisheries management. Harvest control rules, which describe the process for determining catch limits in fisheries, represent one pathway for promoting climate resilience. In the United States, flexibility in how regional management councils specify harvest control rules has spawned diverse approaches for reducing catch limits to precautionarily buffer against scientific and management uncertainty, some of which may be more or less resilient to climate change. Here, we synthesize the control rules used to manage all 507 U.S. federally-managed fish stocks and stock complexes. We classified these rules into seven typologies: (1) catch-based; (2) constant catch; (3) constant escapement; (4) constant F; (5) stepped F; (6) ramped F, and (7) both stepped and ramped F. We also recorded whether the control rules included a biomass limit (“cutoff”) value or were environmentally-linked as well as the type and size of the buffers used to protect against scientific and/or management uncertainty. Finally, we review the advantages and disadvantages of each typology for managing fisheries under climate change and provide seven recommendations for updating harvest control rules to improve the resilience of U.S. federally-managed fisheries to climate change.

Harvest control rules used in US federal fisheries management and implications for climate resilience

Fish and Fisheries · 2022 · 35 citations

• Fishery
• Environmental resource management
• Business

Abstract Climate change is altering the productivity of marine fisheries and challenging the effectiveness of historical fisheries management. Harvest control rules, which describe the process for determining catch limits in fisheries, represent one pathway for promoting climate resilience. In the USA, flexibility in how regional management councils specify harvest control rules has spawned diverse approaches for reducing catch limits to precautionarily buffer against scientific and management uncertainty, some of which may be more or less resilient to climate change. Here, we synthesize the control rules used to manage all 507 US federally managed fish stocks and stock complexes. We classified these rules into seven typologies: (1) catch‐based; (2) constant catch; (3) constant escapement; (4) constant F; (5) stepped F; (6) ramped F and (7) both stepped and ramped F. We also recorded whether the control rules included a biomass limit (‘cut‐off’) value or were environmentally linked as well as the type and size of the buffers used to protect against scientific and/or management uncertainty. Finally, we review the advantages and disadvantages of each typology for managing fisheries under climate change and provide seven recommendations for updating harvest control rules to improve the resilience of US federally managed fisheries to climate change.

Author response for "Evaluation of natural mortality of an unfished gastropod ( <i>Buccinum undatum</i> ) population using statolith age‐frequency data in the southern Mid‐Atlantic Bight"

2022-03-29

Incidence of microplastic fiber ingestion by Common Terns (Sterna hirundo) and Roseate Terns (S. dougallii) breeding in the Northwestern Atlantic

Marine Pollution Bulletin · 2022 · 37 citations

• Biology
• Ecology
• Zoology

Data-rich but model-resistant: an evaluation of data-limited methods to manage fisheries with failed age-based stock assessments

Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences · 2022-09-12 · 10 citations

Age-based stock assessments are sometimes rejected by review panels due to large retrospective patterns. When this occurs, data-limited approaches are often used to set catch advice, under the assumption that these simpler methods will not be impacted by the problems causing retrospective patterns in the age-based assessment. This assumption has never been formally evaluated. Closed-loop simulations were conducted where a known source of error caused a retrospective pattern in an age-based assessment. Twelve data-limited methods, an ensemble of a subset of these methods, and a statistical catch-at-age model with retrospective adjustment were all evaluated to examine their ability to prevent overfishing and rebuild overfished stocks. Overall, none of the methods evaluated performed best across the scenarios. A number of methods performed consistently poorly, resulting in frequent and intense overfishing and low stock sizes. The retrospective adjusted statistical catch-at-age assessment performed better than a number of the alternatives explored. Thus, using a data-limited approach to set catch advice will not necessarily result in better performance than relying on the age-based assessment with a retrospective adjustment.

Evaluation of natural mortality of an unfished gastropod ( <i>Buccinum undatum</i> ) population using statolith age‐frequency data in the southern Mid‐Atlantic Bight

Aquaculture Fish and Fisheries · 2022-05-23

Abstract Natural mortality estimates of harvested stocks are key parameters used in stock assessments to aid in understanding the dynamics of populations, but these estimates are difficult to obtain and have a high degree of uncertainty. Data from unfished populations, which is often rare, provide a unique and valuable opportunity to estimate natural mortality. This study provides estimates of natural mortality using multiple methods from an unfished whelk ( Buccinum undatum ) population using statolith ages which prove to be an accurate method to assess age of gastropods. Using statolith age‐frequency data, natural mortality for this unexploited Mid‐Atlantic Bight whelk population was estimated to be 0.45–0.60 year −1 . Due to the unexploited state of this population, the mortality estimate in this study can be assumed to be a true reflection of natural mortality and thus compared with mortality estimates for populations under varying degrees of exploitation to understand how exploitation affects population dynamics.