Long-Term Change in Benthopelagic Fish Abundance in the Abyssal Northeast Pacific Ocean

Bailey, David M.; Ruhl, Henry A.; Smith, Kenneth L.

doi:10.1890/04-1832

Cited by 61 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 39 publications

(53 reference statements)

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“…Our results are similar to the ecological shifts observed in oceanic ecosystems (Francis et al 1998) and the deep-sea benthos (Wigham et al 2003, Ruhl and Smith 2004, Bailey et al 2006, where climate changes appear to impact ecosystems by causing significant variations in the quantity and quality of food, usually in a bottom-up process. If a longer-term climate trend impacts the sandy bottoms more than, or in addition to, El Viejo, we predict it will still be related to lower plankton productivity caused by warmer water preventing effective delivery of deeper nutrients to the photic zone (Roemmich andMcGowan 1995, McGowan et al 1998).…”

Section: Alternate Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 86%

Sandy bottom communities at the end of a cold (1971-1975) and warm (1997-1998) regime in the California Current: impacts of high and low plankton production

et al. 2008

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Abstract. There were highly significant changes in the structure of benthic infaunal communities at the end of the last cold regime (1976) compared to the end of the last warm regime (1999) in the California Current. The warm regime is characterized by much lower plankton production, which we argue is the primary cause of the degraded infaunal community at the end of the warm regime. In 1997-98, we resampled a depth gradient along a subtidal, high-energy sandy beach (6-24m) in Monterey Bay that was sampled for five years at the end of the last cold regime . There was a dramatic decline in the total number species, number of individuals, and biomass by the end of the warm period. There was no overlap in benthic assemblages at all water depths between the decades in either non-metric multidimensional scaling ordination or cluster analysis. In the 1970s, the community dominants in the shallow crustacean zone, centered in 9 m, were pericarid crustaceans, including predacious phoxocephilid amphipods, haustoriid amphipods, and ostracods, which all live in the sediment. The amphipods, in particular, are well adapted to burrowing in sand. The numerical dominants in the deeper polychaete zone (18-24m) were large, sedentary polychaete worms. The largest was a tube-dwelling predator (Nothria) accounting for most of the biomass. The other was a suspension and surface deposit feeding polychaete worm, Magelona. By the 1990s, the most abundant crustacean was a small, swimming amphipod; and the most abundant polychaetes were small, relatively mobile, and deposit feeding. This trend from large size, sedentary, and suspension feeding to smaller size, higher mobility, and deposit feeding also characterizes infaunal shifts from the food-rich continental shelf into the food-poor deep sea. The dominant polychaetes had more opportunistic life histories, and shallow faunal zones extended into deeper water in the 1990s. If global warming continues, the ongoing cold regime may be less productive and the sandy bottom communities should not develop the species composition and high diversity, abundance, and biomass observed in the 1970s.

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Section: Alternate Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 86%

Sandy bottom communities at the end of a cold (1971-1975) and warm (1997-1998) regime in the California Current: impacts of high and low plankton production

et al. 2008

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“…While useful, such data tell us little about the normal functioning of deep-water communities, provide no information on non-target species and cover only the depths that are commercially fished. When Bailey et al (2006) examined long-term trends in Pacific fishes living in areas deeper than commercial fishing, they discovered that populations varied greatly from year to year. The changes in prey availability, which apparently drove the changes in fish abundance, were probably a result of natural changes in oceanic regime (Ruhl & Smith 2004).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Long-term changes in deep-water fish populations in the northeast Atlantic: a deeper reaching effect of fisheries?

et al. 2009

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A severe scarcity of life history and population data for deep-water fishes is a major impediment to successful fisheries management. Long-term data for non-target species and those living deeper than the fishing grounds are particularly rare. We analysed a unique dataset of scientific trawls made from 1977 to 1989 and from 1997 to 2002, at depths from 800 to 4800 m. Over this time, overall fish abundance fell significantly at all depths from 800 to 2500 m, considerably deeper than the maximum depth of commercial fishing (approx. 1600 m). Changes in abundance were significantly larger in species whose ranges fell at least partly within fished depths and did not appear to be consistent with any natural factors such as changes in fluxes from the surface or the abundance of potential prey. If the observed decreases in abundance are due to fishing, then its effects now extend into the lower bathyal zone, resulting in declines in areas that have been previously thought to be unaffected. A possible mechanism is impacts on the shallow parts of the ranges of fish species, resulting in declines in abundance in the lower parts of their ranges. This unexpected phenomenon has important consequences for fisheries and marine reserve management, as this would indicate that the impacts of fisheries can be transmitted into deep offshore areas that are neither routinely monitored nor considered as part of the managed fishery areas.

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“…Intuitively, food web studies of abyssal ecosystems often connect the epibenthic megafauna, primarily echinoderms, with top level consumers such as fishes (Smith 1992, Bailey et al 2006. Previous stomach content and isotope analyses have suggested that these 2 macrourid species bypass much of the benthic food web and rely nutritionally upon dead fish and squid sinking from surface waters instead (Drazen et al 2008c).…”

Section: Macrourid Diet Inferred From Fatty Acid Profilesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Results from the present study clearly suggest the absence of echinoderms as prey and the importance of carrion, as well as the importance of benthic crustaceans to the macrourids' diet. Bailey et al (2006) suggested that while variation in macrourid abundance covaried with that of echinoderms, it may be other taxa, more important as prey yet not as visible in their camera sled surveys, which are responsible for the population trends observed. Our findings suggest that benthic crustaceans would be the most likely candidate.…”

Section: Macrourid Diet Inferred From Fatty Acid Profilesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Long time-series investigations on the abyssal plains have documented shifts in animal abundances and size frequencies (Billett et al 2001, Ruhl & Smith 2004, Bailey et al 2006, providing insight into possible climate change effects on deep-sea ecosystems. Interdecadal fluctuations in the abundance of 2 abyssal macrourids, Coryphaenoides armatus and C. yaquinae, have been described (Bailey et al 2006). These species are abundant on the abyssal plains of the eastern North Pacific Ocean and dominate the benthic fish fauna under the California Current (Pearcy et al 1982, Cailliet et al 1999.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Lipid composition and diet inferences of abyssal macrourids in the eastern North Pacific

Drazen¹,

Phleger²,

Guest³

et al. 2009

Mar. Ecol. Prog. Ser.

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The lipid compositions of 2 abyssal macrourids, Coryphaenoides armatus and C. yaquinae, from the eastern North Pacific were examined and used to infer diet. The resulting fatty acid (FA) profiles are the first published for C. yaquinae and among the first for abyssal fishes. They indicated a greater proportion of polyunsaturated FAs and lower monounsaturated FAs than shallower living congeners, suggestive of homeoviscous adaptations to great pressure. Cholesterol was the predominant sterol, which is frequently the case for exclusively carnivorous species. Comparisons of macrourid FA profiles were made to those of benthic prey and epipelagic carrion sources, including the Humboldt squid Dosidicus gigas captured in surface waters of the abyssal study site. The FA profiles of macrourid muscle were very similar to those of squid mantle muscle. The FA profiles of macrourid liver and swimbladder were similar to benthic crustaceans, whole squid, squid digestive gland and the epipelagic fish Trachurus symmetricus. For both tissues, the FA profiles of echinoderms were the most different. These comparisons suggest a strong link to carrion and benthic crustaceans and a weak one to echinoderms, the dominant megafauna at the study site and in most of the abyssal ocean. These results support previous stomach content and stable isotope analyses, reinforcing the hypothesis that there are closer food web ties between abyssal fishes and epipelagic nekton than to many abyssal benthic groups. The abyssal grenadier Coryphaenoides armatus feeds predominantly on crustaceans and carrion, and not on echinoderms, which are the most abundant benthic megafauna.

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Long-Term Change in Benthopelagic Fish Abundance in the Abyssal Northeast Pacific Ocean

Cited by 61 publications

References 39 publications

Sandy bottom communities at the end of a cold (1971-1975) and warm (1997-1998) regime in the California Current: impacts of high and low plankton production

Sandy bottom communities at the end of a cold (1971-1975) and warm (1997-1998) regime in the California Current: impacts of high and low plankton production

Long-term changes in deep-water fish populations in the northeast Atlantic: a deeper reaching effect of fisheries?

Lipid composition and diet inferences of abyssal macrourids in the eastern North Pacific

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