A spatiotemporal Evaluation of Atlantic Sea Scallop Placopecten magellanicus Habitat in the Gulf of Maine Using a Bioclimate Envelope Model

Abstract

A bioclimate envelope model was developed to evaluate the impacts of climate variability on spatiotemporal availability of suitable habitat for the Atlantic sea scallop Placopecten magellanicus in the Gulf of Maine (GOM). Bioclimate envelopes were established through habitat suitability indices (HSIs) based on bottom temperature, bottom salinity, current velocity, depth, and bottom composition. The relationship between Atlantic sea scallop abundance and each environmental variable was quantified using suitability indices, which were generated based on standardized scallop abundance sampled over 10 years of dredge survey data. Boosted regression tree models were used to determine the relative importance of each environmental variable to scallop abundance, thereby establishing a weighting scheme within the HSI. A regional circulation model was coupled with the weighted HSI to hindcast spatiotemporal dynamics of suitable habitat for Atlantic sea scallop in coastal and offshore waters of the GOM from 1978 to 2013. Higher habitat suitability was found along inshore areas compared with offshore areas. Model predictions indicated an increasing trend in habitat suitability in inshore waters since 1978 and decreasing habitat suitability in offshore waters. This research provides a novel modeling framework with which to enhance research and management of commercially valuable Atlantic sea scallop stocks over broad spatiotemporal scales in the climatically altered GOM.

Development of a climate-niche model to evaluate spatiotemporal trends in Placopecten magellanicus distribution in the Gulf of Maine, USA

“…The TPRS GAM, incorporating a Tweedie distribution for zero-inflated catch data was shown to be a useful prediction tool according to cross validation. The response curves in general agreed with known information about drivers of scallop distribution (Naidu and Anderson, 1984;Thouzeau et al, 1991;Wildish and Kristmason, 1993;Stewart and Arnold, 1994;Pilditch and Grant, 1999;Hart and Chute, 2004;Torre et al, 2018).…”

“…A dominant spatial trend made apparent by this climate-niche SDM is a decline in predicted density moving from inshore to offshore locations. This finding corresponds with habitat value for scallops being higher among inshore areas relative to offshore areas likely attributed to deteriorating food availability moving offshore (Torre et al, 2018). This is thought to represent a natural gradient of habitat quality (Sarro and Stokesbury, 2009).…”

“…These trends assume that scallop-environment relationships have remained consistent over the study period (Pearson and Dawson, 2003, Crisp et al, 2009, Catullo et al, 2015. This general temporal trend is reflected in a recent study which depicts the spatiotemporal distribution of available scallop habitat in the GoM using a bioclimate envelope model (Torre et al, 2018).…”

“…where C is the magnitude of the predicted current velocity and u and y are the x and y vector components of the velocity (Chen et al, 2011;Torre et al, 2018). Bathymetry data were obtained from the U.S. Coastal Relief Model (CRM) (National Geophysical Data Center, 1999).…”

Considerations for Offshore Wind Energy Development Effects on Fish and Fisheries in the United States: A Review of Existing Studies, New Efforts, and Opportunities for Innovation

“…Fisheries resources and habitats are subject to natural and anthropogenic stressors (Saba et al, 2015), including warming temperatures from climate change (Henson et al, 2017), ocean acidification (Kroeker et al, 2013), and ocean deoxygenation (Oschlies et al, 2018). Rapid climate-induced shifts are affecting habitats and species distributions in proposed wind development areas (Torre et al, 2018). Nye et al (2009) evaluated changes in the distributions of 36 fish stocks in northeast US continental shelf waters between 1968 and 2007 and showed that the biomass of many of these stocks shifted toward the north and expanded into deeper habitats and cooler waters in response to climate-driven environmental changes.…”