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The abundance of marine fish stocks can be affected by year-to-year fluctuations in the temperature of the water. This is the conclusion of a worldwide study. Slow fluctuations in fish stocks have been observed by fish biologists for hundreds of years. The study shows that fluctuations on timescales of decades are present in fish populations.
The lifespan and position of the fish in the food chain affect how it responds to temperature. A favorable year in terms of climate leads to population growth for short-lived fish. The effect is slower in predatory fish.
Climate change.
The results can show the effects of climate change on fish populations. Climate change will lead to a gradual increase in the temperature of the water and a stronger year-to-year change in fish populations. Climate change scenarios were also used in the simulations. Peter van der Sleen, a researcher at Wageningen University and Research, says that the simulations do not spark hope because climate change may cause fish stocks to fluctuate more strongly.
The fish bones have annual rings.
Research on growth rings in fish formed the basis of this study. It may sound strange, but fish and trees form growth rings. The otolith is a bone-like structure similar to our ear bones. A good year for a fish leads to a wide ring, a bad year to a narrow one. The researchers used annual ring data to link the temperature of the water to fish growth. Van der Sleen says they used methods similar to those used to measure growth rings in trees. It was an eye-opener to discover how sensitive fish growth is to temperature fluctuations. For some of the fish species studied, lifetime otolith growth patterns were almost perfect.
The slow fluctuations in fish populations were not explained by this. The effect of demographic factors on population density has been studied. The results from fish otoliths have been combined with those insights.
The researchers wanted to scale up the growth of individual fish to that of populations. Due to a lack of data for the thousands of marine fish species we wanted to study, we constructed simple mathematical models. The effect of year-to-year fluctuations in temperature on fish populations is simulation based on estimated lifespan and its position in the food chain. We were surprised to see that the fluctuations in fish stocks were very similar.
The research was published in a journal.
The principal driver of low-frequency fluctuations in marine fish populations is Interannual temperature variability. There is a DOI titled: 10.1038/s4 2003-021-02960-y.
The journal contains information about communications biology.
The fish stocks fluctuate with the temperature of the water.
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