The purpose of this report is to synthesize available information relevant to fishery management in the New England portion of the US Northeast Shelf. This 2019 report highlights where management interventions have proven successful to achieve ecological objectives, but also characterizes the considerable challenges for management posed by climate change and increasing trade-offs across conservation, fishing, and other human activities in this region. Finally, we describe combinations of ecological signals that present opportunities for further integrated research and possibly creative management solutions.

• Feeding guilds assigned based on NEFSC food habits data base

  • Food habits change with age and size, so guilds assigned based on most common size class

• Simplified from existing guild structures^1,2

Because we focus on ecosystem context, we've aggregated species in most of our indicators up to the level of feeding guild, shown here.

These feeding guilds were derived from NEFSC food habits data and existing guilds identified in the literature

The maps here show density estimates of the widely distributed harbor porpoise in the spring and fall months, as estimated by the Atlantic Marine Assessment Program for Protected Species.

The red line in the time series plot shows the potential biological removal. Above this line removals from the population will prevent the stock from reaching a stable population size.

2016 and 2017 estimates for bycatch are among the lowest values in the series, suggest that management actions have been effective in reducing harbor porpoise bycatch.

While management action has had a postive impact on harbor porpoise mortality, there are multiple signals indicating challenges to meeting management goals.

Management objectives are being met for 20 species at the single species level, but 9 stocks are below biomass thresholds.

Many social-ecological systems in New England are reliant on lobster, as in Gulf of Maine, or scallop, for Georges Bank. As these species are considered moderately to highly at risk due to climate change, the communities dependent on them could be a heightened risk as well.

Maine and South coast of MA have high reliance

This reliance becomes apparent if we look at the breakdown of catch volume and prices by feeding guild.

In these figures, the catch price is shown in blue and the catch volume is shown in green, and total revenue change from the long term is shown by the black line. It's not perfect, but it's relatively clear that the benthivore feeding guild is driving revenue in Gulf of Maine and benthos in Georges Bank.

Along with strong reliance on a few species in New England, we've also seen a decline in catch of managed species since the mid 1980s.

While commercial fisheries have high specialization of catch, there's a positive long-term trend for recreational catch diversity in the recreational sector.

Updated Marine Recreational Information Program data shows that there's been an upswing in harvest since the mid-90s, although the trend overall is negative

An increase in diversity of recreational catch will likely benefit communities that are reliant upon recreational fisheries by increasing their resilience to ecosystem changes.

Fisheries interactions are the largest contributor to NARW mortality, with more than half of the mortality events in 2018-2019 attributed to vessel strikes or entanglement

Changing ecosystem conditions may contribute to increased interactions between NARW and fisheries.

Changes in fishery management to address the issue of fishery interactions with protected species could have large implications for the fixed gear sector, and particularly for pot gear fisheries like lobster.

Unusual mortality event in gray and harbor seals may be caused by phocine distemper virus

SST Figure on left shows estimated time series of SST extending back to to 1850s. *7 out of 10 of the hottest years have been in the past decade

GSI The figure on the right shows that deviation from the mean latitude of the north wall of the gulf stream, showing anomalously high value for the past 5 years

Regional currents are major influencers of ocean temperatures in the NW Atlantic

The Gulf Stream is a reliable indicator of bottom water temps

An offshoot of the gulf stream is the warm slope water, which makes its way into gulf of maine through the northeast channel

These changes have implications for fish populations in the region that are already at the southern extent of their ranges, like Atlantic cod. Suitable habitat for these species is predicted to contract as waters continue to warm.

• Gulf of Maine summer SSTs were the highest on record in 2018 (~3°C > long-term mean)

Distributions of managed species within feeding guilds have changed.

Increase in MAFMC species proportiongs in GOM/GB driven by mackerel

The decline in NEFMC species in the mid survey is driven mostly by ocean pout, which has seen proportional declines in the gulf of maine and georges bank survey

• Driven by warmer temperatures and increased bacterial remineralization and nutrient recycling
• Increasing primary production likely due to higher productivity of smaller phytoplankton

To assess the size structure of copepods in the region, we use the small-large index.

• A measure of relative size composition of the dominant copepod taxa
• A lower value means higher abundance of large copepods (Calanus)
• Primary production may play a role in copepod size dynamics*

Looking at condition in aggregate across all managed stocks, we can see a clear decline in condition between 2000-2010

Recent improvement within past decade

Interestingly, the drop-off in condition around 2000 resembles a shift in zooplankton size-structure on the shelf, and this is a topic for future research

This workflows also ensures that there's no information lost between SOE cycles. We know exactly how a data set was analyzed and handled so that the data can be updated for next year's reports.

A new approach to incorporating ecosystem information into the management process is the ECSA, or the Ecosystem Context for Stock Assessment, which is the brainchild of Kevin Friedland, and relies heavily on his modeling work on the shelf.

The goal of the ECSA is to provide seasonal ecosystem information for specific stocks, so that ecosystem information can form a backdrop for the stock assessment process.

An exciting part of the ECSA is that the data are visualized in an interactive way and data are quickly accessible

The ECSA is a very different product from the State of the Ecosystem report, but relies on many of the same principals we use to develop the SOE

Specifically, we rely upon automated workflows, and in the case of the ECSA, this allows us to rapidly generate reports for single stocks.

By hosting our work on open-source platforms like github, we ensure that our analyses are transparent for those whom are interested. This further allows us to elaborate upon our methods in detail without overwhelming readers.

A major difference in the two reports is the audience each report is aimed at. By design, State of the Ecosystem reports are high-level overviews, whereas the ECSA is technical and aimed at stock-assessment scientists.