International Workshop on Explanations for
the High Abundance of Pink and Chum Salmon and Future Trends
On 30-31 October, several ABL scientists attended the International Workshop on Explanations for the High Abundance of Pink and Chum Salmon and Future Trends hosted by the North Pacific Anadromous Fish Commission (NPAFC) in Nanaimo, British Columbia. This workshop brought together scientists from around the Pacific Rim (Korea, Japan, Russia, Alaska, British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon) to review the status and discuss the future trends of pink and chum salmon abundance.
At the workshop, there were 38 oral and poster presentations. Oral presentations by ABL scientists included: "Why are pink and chum salmon so abundant in the Gulf of Alaska?" by William Heard and Alex Wertheimer; "Do Asian pink salmon affect survival of Bristol Bay sockeye salmon?" by Alex Wertheimer and Edward Farley; and "Recent harvest trends of pink and chum salmon in Southeast Alaska: Can marine ecosystem indicators be used as predictive tools for management?" by Joe Orsi, Emily Fergusson, and Molly Sturdevant.
The workshop followed the NPAFC annual meeting (also in Nanaimo) that was attended by ABL's Ed Farley, Jeff Guyon, and Bill Heard. Many concepts were shared at the workshop, with one being that a cohort of salmon needs favorable conditions during both nearshore periods (early marine growth) and later ocean periods (winter feeding conditions) to foster high survival. Another concept was that decadal global climate change can override micro-ecosystem conditions, such as favorable early marine growth, particularly in terms of salmon exceeding temperature tolerances during their early ocean residence period in their southern ranges. Finally, the concept that stocks on a coast-wide basis do respond to localized freshwater/marine conditions was evidenced by the clustering of similar ocean survivals of some stock groups over discrete regions. The Workshop Proceedings will be published in the NPAFC Technical Report Series in early 2012.
By Joe Orsi, Ed Farley, and Bill Heard
International Workshop on Climate and Oceanic Fisheries
Anne Hollowed was invited to participate in the International Workshop on Climate and Oceanic Fisheries held in Rarotonga, Cook Islands, 3-6 October. This workshop was funded by the Asia-Pacific Network for Global Change Research, the Australian Government, the Cook Islands Meteorological Service, the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) - UNESCO, the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, the University of Auckland, and the World Meteorological Organization. The meeting organizers brought together meteorologists, oceanographers, and fisheries scientists to review knowledge on the effects of climate variability and discuss the possible effects of climate change on the world's oceans and oceanic fisheries;
evaluate the implications of climate change for plans to optimize the use of oceanic fisheries for economic development, food security, and livelihoods;
identify fisheries risk assessment or management evaluation tools that incorporate climate variability to improve the sustainable management of oceanic fisheries; and
recommend the adaptation and management measures needed to reduce the threats of climate change to oceanic fisheries and capitalize on the opportunities.
Anne Hollowed presented a talk entitled "21st Century Climate Change Impacts on Marine Fisheries." Her presentation reviewed emerging efforts within the marine science community to develop mechanistic scenarios to project bio-physical couplings in marine ecosystems and expected changes in anthropogenic trends in marine resource use. She provided an overview of the modeling approaches being employed by the global research community and discussed the costs and benefits of different modeling approaches.
An outcome of the meeting is that the World Meteorological Organization will explore the possibility of creating initiatives for the formation of a global climate database to facilitate collaborations between meteorologists, oceanographers, and fisheries scientists to understand the relative influence of climatic variation (seasonal, inter-annual, decadal, and longer variability), climate change (more long-term changes in climate associated with anthropogenic activities), and the effects of fishing on the potential for sustained harvests from the world's valuable oceanic fisheries. Selected papers from the meeting will be published in a special issue of the journal Climate Change.
By Anne Hollowed
International Flatfish Symposium
The Recruitment Processes Program contributed several presentations at the recent 8th International Flatfish Symposium held in IJmuiden, the Netherlands, 5-11 November 2011. Proceedings from the meeting will be published in a special issue of the Journal of Sea Research. The Alaska Fisheries Science Center and the International Pacific Halibut Commission are pleased to be co-hosting the next symposium in 2014 in Seattle, Washington.
