Spatial and Temporal Influences of Nearshore Hydrography on Fish Assemblages Associated with Energy Platforms in the Northern Gulf of Mexico

Munnelly, Ryan T.; Reeves, David B.; Chesney, Edward; Baltz, Donald M.

doi:10.1007/s12237-020-00772-7

Cited by 8 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 56 publications

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“…This is because occasional visits by highly mobile species (or frequent visits by few individuals) may not necessarily result in increased seascape connectivity for populations or ecosystems. Species may only be present at O&G structures during specific ontogenetic stages (Dance & Rooker, 2019; Fujii, 2015; Munnelly et al, 2021). Intraspecies segregation among structures suggests that different structures support different ecological niches.…”

Section: How Does Oandg Infrastructure Influence the Movement Of Mobi...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of offshore oil and gas structures on seascape ecological connectivity

McLean

Ferreira

Benthuysen

et al. 2022

Global Change Biology

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Offshore platforms, subsea pipelines, wells and related fixed structures supporting the oil and gas (O&G) industry are prevalent in oceans across the globe, with many approaching the end of their operational life and requiring decommissioning. Although structures can possess high ecological diversity and productivity, information on how they interact with broader ecological processes remains unclear. Here, we review the current state of knowledge on the role of O&G infrastructure in maintaining, altering or enhancing ecological connectivity with natural marine habitats. There is a paucity of studies on the subject with only 33 papers specifically targeting connectivity and O&G structures, although other studies provide important related information.Evidence for O&G structures facilitating vertical and horizontal seascape connectivity exists for larvae and mobile adult invertebrates, fish and megafauna; including threatened and commercially important species. The degree to which these structures represent a beneficial or detrimental net impact remains unclear, is complex and ultimately needs more research to determine the extent to which natural connectivity networks are conserved, enhanced or disrupted. We discuss the potential impacts of different decommissioning approaches on seascape connectivity and identify, through expert elicitation, critical knowledge gaps that, if addressed, may further inform decision making for the life cycle of O&G infrastructure, with relevance for other industries (e.g. renewables). The most highly ranked critical knowledge gap was a need to understand how O&G structures modify and influence the movement patterns of mobile species and dispersal stages of sessile marine species. Understanding how different decommissioning options affect species survival and movement was also highly ranked, as was understanding the extent to which O&G structures contribute to extending species distributions by providing rest stops, foraging habitat, and stepping stones. These

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Section: How Does Oandg Infrastructure Influence the Movement Of Mobi...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of offshore oil and gas structures on seascape ecological connectivity

McLean

Ferreira

Benthuysen

et al. 2022

Global Change Biology

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“…In laboratory settings, the IPFs associated with OWF development have demonstrable effects on pelagic species (Jones et al, 2021;Klimely et al, 2021). Although rare in the OWF literature, pelagic species have been the frequent focus of research at other manmade offshore structures including oil and gas platforms and artificial reefs where clear evidence of an aggregation effect has been demonstrated (e.g., Munnelly et al, 2020). The spatial and temporal patterns of finfish including pelagic species at manmade structures other than wind turbines is the subject of many recent reviews (Bolser et al, 2020;Munnelly et al, 2020;Paxton et al, 2020;Snodgrass et al, 2020).…”

Section: Finfishmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although rare in the OWF literature, pelagic species have been the frequent focus of research at other manmade offshore structures including oil and gas platforms and artificial reefs where clear evidence of an aggregation effect has been demonstrated (e.g., Munnelly et al, 2020). The spatial and temporal patterns of finfish including pelagic species at manmade structures other than wind turbines is the subject of many recent reviews (Bolser et al, 2020;Munnelly et al, 2020;Paxton et al, 2020;Snodgrass et al, 2020). Much more research is needed in order to understand the scope, scale, and magnitude of effect that OWF development has on pelagic fish and invertebrate species and distance-based methods could aid these efforts.…”

Section: Finfishmentioning

confidence: 99%

Distance-Based Sampling Methods for Assessing the Ecological Effects of Offshore Wind Farms: Synthesis and Application to Fisheries Resource Studies

Methratta

2021

Front. Mar. Sci.

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Renewable energy, sustainable seafood, and a healthy marine ecosystem are integral elements of a sustainable blue economy. The rapid global advancement of offshore wind coupled with its potential to affect marine life compels an urgent need for robust methodologies to assess the impacts of this industry on fisheries resource species. Basic Before-After-Control-Impact (BACI) and Control-Impact (CI) designs are the most common experimental designs used to study the effects of offshore wind development on fisheries resources. These designs do not account for spatial heterogeneity which presents a challenge because empirical evidence shows that impact gradients occur at wind farms, with larger effect sizes close to turbine foundations that attenuate with increasing distance. Combining the before-after sampling design with distance-based methods could provide a powerful approach for characterizing both the spatial and temporal variance associated with wind development. Toward enhancing future monitoring designs for fisheries resource species at offshore wind farms, this paper aims to: (1) examine distance-based sampling methods that have been or could potentially be used to study impacts on fisheries resources at offshore wind farms including distance-stratified BACI, distance-stratified CI, Before-After-Gradient (BAG), and After-Gradient (AG) methods; (2) synthesize the methods and findings of studies conducted to date that have used distance-based methods to examine ecological impacts of offshore wind development for benthic macroinvertebrates, finfish, birds, and small mammals; (3) examine some of the central methodological elements and issues to consider in developing distance-based impact studies; and (4) offer recommendations for how to incorporate distance-based sampling methods into monitoring plans at offshore wind farms.

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“…Platforms support abundant fish communities, and they allow fishes to redistribute vertically to avoid stressors (e.g., hypoxia, predation) while remaining associated with refugia (Stanley and Wilson 2004; Reeves et al 2018b; Egerton et al 2021). However, there have been substantial reductions in the number of platforms in the GOM over the past decade (BOEM 2019; Munnelly et al 2020). There is debate over whether platforms and similar structures make a substantial contribution to fish stocks (Bohnsack 1989; Claisse et al 2014; Karnauskas et al 2017), but platforms certainly have an impact on local ecology and fishing opportunities of coastal communities (Franks 2000; Gallaway et al 2009; Ajemian et al 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Prior work has described depth‐specific assemblage zonation (Gallaway and Lewbel 1982; Wilson et al 2006; Ajemian et al 2015), and seasonal fluctuations in fish density and assemblage composition (Stanley and Wilson 1997; Barker and Cowan 2018; Reynolds et al 2018). Further, a variety of environmental and habitat‐related influences on platform‐associated fishes have been identified, including dissolved oxygen concentration (Stanley and Wilson 2004; Reeves et al 2018b; Egerton et al 2021), salinity (Gallaway and Lewbel 1982; Munnelly et al 2019; Bolser et al 2020), temperature (Gallaway and Lewbel 1982; Stanley and Wilson 1997; Reynolds et al 2018), artificial light (Barker and Cowan 2018), substrate type, river discharge and Sargassum abundance (Munnelly et al 2020), distance from shore (Bolser et al 2020), and the number of platforms within 5 km (Bolser et al 2020; Egerton et al 2021). These studies provide an abundance of valuable information but were conducted at different scales with different methodology.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Optic–acoustic Analysis of Fish Assemblages at Petroleum Platforms

et al. 2021

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Petroleum platforms provide high‐relief reef habitat in several ocean basins and are important to fishes and fishers alike. To determine which variables were important for shaping platform‐associated fish assemblages on a basin‐wide scale in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, we employed optic and acoustic methods to measure fish distribution (geographic and water‐column), abundance, biomass, density, size, diversity, and richness at 54 platforms. We found that variables related to freshwater inflow and meso‐scale circulation patterns (e.g., salinity) affected more metrics than platform characteristics (e.g., platform depth). Platform fish assemblages varied gradually along gradients of these variables instead of exhibiting distinct assemblage groupings in non‐metric multidimensional scaling space. These effects contributed to the presence of biomass, density, diversity, and richness “hotspots” at platforms offshore of the Atchafalaya River. Our findings underscore the importance of freshwater inflow and circulation patterns in explaining variation in reef fish assemblages in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.

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Spatial and Temporal Influences of Nearshore Hydrography on Fish Assemblages Associated with Energy Platforms in the Northern Gulf of Mexico

Cited by 8 publications

References 56 publications

Influence of offshore oil and gas structures on seascape ecological connectivity

Influence of offshore oil and gas structures on seascape ecological connectivity

Distance-Based Sampling Methods for Assessing the Ecological Effects of Offshore Wind Farms: Synthesis and Application to Fisheries Resource Studies

Optic–acoustic Analysis of Fish Assemblages at Petroleum Platforms

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