Productivity responses of a widespread marine piscivore, Gadus morhua, to oceanic thermal extremes and trends

TY - JOUR

T1 - Productivity responses of a widespread marine piscivore, Gadus morhua, to oceanic thermal extremes and trends

AU - Mantzouni, Irene

AU - MacKenzie, Brian R

PY - 2010/6/22

Y1 - 2010/6/22

N2 - Climate change will have major consequences for population dynamics and life histories of marine biota as it progresses in the twenty-first century. These impacts will differ in magnitude and direction for populations within individual marine species whose geographical ranges span large gradients in latitude and temperature. Here we use meta-analytical methods to investigate how recruitment (i.e. the number of new fish produced by spawners in a given year which subsequently grow and survive to become vulnerable to fishing gear) has reacted to temperature fluctuations, and in particular to extremes of temperature, in cod populations throughout the north Atlantic. Temperature has geographically explicit effects on cod recruitment. Impacts differ depending on whether populations are located in the upper (negative effects) or in the lower (positive effects) thermal range. The probabilities of successful year-classes in populations living in warm areas is on average 34 per cent higher in cold compared with warm seasons, whereas opposite patterns exist for populations living in cold areas. These results have implications for cod dynamics, distributions and phenologies under the influence of ocean warming, particularly related to not only changes in the mean temperature, but also its variability (e.g. frequency of exceptionally cold or warm seasons).

AB - Climate change will have major consequences for population dynamics and life histories of marine biota as it progresses in the twenty-first century. These impacts will differ in magnitude and direction for populations within individual marine species whose geographical ranges span large gradients in latitude and temperature. Here we use meta-analytical methods to investigate how recruitment (i.e. the number of new fish produced by spawners in a given year which subsequently grow and survive to become vulnerable to fishing gear) has reacted to temperature fluctuations, and in particular to extremes of temperature, in cod populations throughout the north Atlantic. Temperature has geographically explicit effects on cod recruitment. Impacts differ depending on whether populations are located in the upper (negative effects) or in the lower (positive effects) thermal range. The probabilities of successful year-classes in populations living in warm areas is on average 34 per cent higher in cold compared with warm seasons, whereas opposite patterns exist for populations living in cold areas. These results have implications for cod dynamics, distributions and phenologies under the influence of ocean warming, particularly related to not only changes in the mean temperature, but also its variability (e.g. frequency of exceptionally cold or warm seasons).

KW - Animals

KW - Climate Change

KW - Gadus morhua

KW - Oceans and Seas

KW - Population Dynamics

KW - Predatory Behavior

KW - Reproduction

KW - Seasons

KW - Temperature

U2 - 10.1098/rspb.2009.1906

DO - 10.1098/rspb.2009.1906

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 20147332

SN - 0962-8452

VL - 277

SP - 1867

EP - 1874

JO - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

JF - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

IS - 1689

ER -