Enhancing Fishery Management Through Habitat Science Integration

1. Incorporating Habitat Science into the Assessment & Management of Fishery StocksCaribbean Fishery Management CouncilAugust 13, 2014 Tony Marshak, 2014 NOAA Sea Grant John A. Knauss Fellow NOAA Fisheries Service, Office of Science and Technology

2. Outline • Habitat Assessment Improvement Plan • Habitat Assessment Prioritization of Stocks • Inshore/Offshore Pilot Projects • Regional Habitat Science and LMRs

3. Habitat Assessment Improvement Plan • The HAIP defines NMFS’ role in pursuing habitat science, and in developing habitat assessments to meet its mandated responsibility to sustain marine fisheries and associated habitats. • Fisheries Habitat Science Working Group • A habitat assessment is the process/products associated with the best available information on habitat characteristics relative to the population dynamics of fishery species and other LMRs. • The ultimate goal of a habitat assessment is to determine the function of habitats in relation to fishery production and ecosystems • This supports management decisions that are a mandated responsibility of NOAA

4. HAIP Recommendations • Engage partners within and outside of NOAA • Develop habitat science budget/staffing initiatives • Initiate demonstration projects incorporating habitat data into stock assessments • Convene regional and national habitat science workshops • Develop a NOAA-wide strategic plan for habitat science • Prioritize stocks & geographical locations for habitat assessment

5. (HAIP) Habitat Assessment Prioritization • NMFS should develop criteria to prioritize stocks and geographic locations that would benefit from habitat science and assessment • NMFS should identify and prioritize data inadequacies for stocks and their respective habitats, as relevant to information gaps identified in the HAIP

6. Habitat Assessment Prioritization • Stock prioritization results are intended to help guide: • Science planning • Funding allocation • Prioritization now complete for SW & NW; in progress for PI, NE, and AK • Efforts are beginning for the SE region with all three councils • Knowing council research priorities would help greatly in these prioritizations

7. Prioritization Process Habitat Scientists Ecologists Stock Assessment Scientists Initial Pool of Stocks (FMP) Filter Criteria (Y/N) Stocks not meeting Filter Criteria Stocks meeting Filter Criteria Scorable Criteria High Priority Stocks for Habitat Science Low Priority Stocks for Habitat Science Medium Priority Stocks for Habitat Science

8. Initial Pool of Stocks (FMP) Stock Assessment Improvement Stocks not meeting Minimum Criteria Filter Criteria (Y/N) Scorable Criteria, 0 – 5 pts each Filter Criteria • FSSI stock or Council research priority • Likely to benefit a stock assessment (and inform EFH) • Benefit to stock assessment survey or model • Fisheries status (e.g. overfished) • Habitat disturbance, vulnerability, and rarity • Habitat dependence • Ecological importance • Economic, social, managerial value Stocks meeting Minimum Criteria Scorable Criteria High Priority Stocks Low Priority Stocks Medium Priority Stocks

9. Hypothetical list of prioritized stocks

10. Regional Habitat Science and LMRs • NMFS Inshore/Offshore Pilot Projects • NMFS Pacific Groundfish Habitat Mapping (EFH) • Queen conch habitat-stock abundance surveys “Habitat is the currency for Ecosystem Based Management” – Michael Parke, PIFSC

11. Inshore/Offshore Pilot Projects • 2nd National Habitat Assessment Workshop (NHAW2): Understanding the link between inshore habitat and offshore fisheries production has been identified as a high priority knowledge gap • Three pilot projects jointly funded by OST & OHC

12. North Atlantic Pilot Project Restoring Access to Diadromous Fish Habitat and Linkages to Forage Fish Biomass in the North Atlantic Large Marine Ecosystem Drs. Wes Patrick (OSF), Tom Miller (U Maryland), and JP Walsh (E Carolina University) • Goal: Predict long-term biological and sociological benefits of restoring diadromous fish habitat • Progress: Historic ranges and abundances of American shad and river herring show substantial declines from pristine conditions as a loss of habitat quality and accessibility over time.

13. Mid-Atlantic Pilot Project Parameterizing the Relationship Between Inshore Habitat Quantity and Quality and Summer Flounder Production Drs. Howard Townsend (NCBO), Tom Ihde (NCBO), David Stevenson (GARFO), and John Manderson (NEFSC) Goal: To provide habitat managers with methods to quantify the cumulative impacts of inshore habitat loss and degradation on the survival/production of juvenile summer flounder. • Progress: Using the Chesapeake Atlantis Model (CAM) and datasets compiled from ASMFC’s Atlantic Coast Fish Habitat Program, scientists are finding that marsh loss strongly impacts forage fish.

14. West Coast Pilot Project Pacific Marine and Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership Nursery Assessment PMEP Steering Committee and Assessment Team (KristanBlackhart, Dr. Correigh Greene, Korie Schaefer, John Bragg et al.) Goals: Identify key threats and limiting factors to juvenile fish, and describe the role of nearshore habitats to offshore stock recruitment. Progress: Inventory and classification of West Coast estuaries is complete, and spatial framework is being further refined to support modeling. Ongoing collection of data on fish abundance and habitat quantity/quality. A State of the Knowledge Report on 15 species that utilize estuary nursery habitats will be available in September 2014.

15. Adaptation for inshore-offshore work Estuary characteristics • Amount of habitat • Temperature • Dissolved oxygen • Urbanization Fish characteristics • Abundance • Distance from estuary • Recruitment size Estuary characteristic Offshore abundance Hypothetical abundance of an estuarine or nearshore nursery species

16. Mapping of Pacific groundfish habitat • Groundfish EFH • Habitat-based predictions of distribution and abundance • This is being used to refine five-year EFH designations with the council

17. Queen Conch Surveys

18. GIS Plotting of Conch Stock Surveys - Determine conch locations with transect GPS start/endpoints - Time of encounter  Distance - Habitat, depth, conch size/stage - GIS Spatial Analyst Density calculator tan-1 y/x =θ Dcos,sinθ= x, y D θ

19. 1995-96 Densities Marshak et al. 2006 Proc. GCFI Marshak 2009 SEAMAP Report

20. 2006 Densities • Identification of locations important to the life history of PR queen conch • Demonstrate spatial dynamics of the stock and potential areas for protection • Can enhance EBFM

21. Conclusions • NOAA continues to make advancements in the incorporation of habitat into stock assessment and monitoring • Continued initiatives and support for habitat science will enhance stock management and EBFM • Habitat prioritization of stocks is being initiated for the SE region, including council priorities • Spatial analyses and habitat science can be applied to the management of Caribbean stocks

22. More Information Science and Technology Habitat Science: http://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/st4/HabitatScience.html Habitat Assessment Improvement Plan http://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/ecosystems/habitat/plans/haip/index NOAA Habitat Blueprint: http://www.habitat.noaa.gov/habitatblueprint/index.html Habitat Science Pilot Projects: http://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/ecosystems/habitat/funding/projects/index

23. THANK YOU!