Climate‐influenced shifts in a highly migratory species recreational fishery

Climate‐influenced shifts in a highly migratory species recreational fishery

The distribution of marine species is changing as a direct result of climate change. Large pelagic highly migratory species (HMS), like tunas, billfishes, and sharks, are particularly sensitive to environmental change due to their migratory nature and use of large‐scale ocean features. These tempora...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Fisheries oceanography Vol. 32; no. 4; pp. 327 - 340
Main Authors: Crear, Daniel P., Curtis, Tobey H., Hutt, Cliff P., Lee, Yong‐Woo
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Oxford Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01-07-2023
Subjects:
billfishes
Catch composition
Climate change
Distribution
Environmental changes
Fisheries
fisheries management
Fishing
Geographical distribution
Interception
Large Pelagics Survey
Marine fishes
Migratory species
New species
Pelagic fisheries
pelagic sharks
Recreation
Sea surface
Sharks
spatiotemporal models
tunas
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Summary:The distribution of marine species is changing as a direct result of climate change. Large pelagic highly migratory species (HMS), like tunas, billfishes, and sharks, are particularly sensitive to environmental change due to their migratory nature and use of large‐scale ocean features. These temporal and spatial shifts are likely reflected in the Atlantic HMS recreational fishery and could have downstream effects on coastal communities. We utilized dockside intercept data from the Large Pelagics Survey (LPS) from 2002 to 2019, which conducts sampling from June to October and spans Maine to Virginia, USA. We assessed how species catch composition has changed and developed spatiotemporal models to understand latitudinal and temporal shifts in the recreational catch of 12 HMS groups. Latitudinal shifts were significantly affected by Northeast Shelf SST for 11 of the 12 HMS groups and ranged from 3 ± 1 km°C−1 for the large bluefin tuna to 40 ± 1 km°C−1 for the blue shark. In addition, the estimated day of the year when the first 25% of bigeye tuna intercepts occurred, happened over 50 days earlier in 2019 compared to 2002, suggesting the initial catch is happening earlier in recent years. These results suggest that changes in species distribution and phenology are affecting where and when HMS recreational catch occurs. Understanding these shifts would allow managers to be more responsive and flexible and also help communities prepare for changes, whether it would be a switch to a new species or shifts in the fishing season.
Bibliography:Funding information
Funding for the study was provided by the NOAA NMFS.
ISSN:1054-6006
1365-2419
DOI:10.1111/fog.12632