State of the Ecosystem (SOE) reporting
Improving ecosystem information and synthesis for fishery managers
Ecosystem indicators linked to management objectives (DePiper, et al., 2017)
- Contextual information
- Report evolving since 2016
- Fishery-relevant subset of full Ecosystem Status Reports
Open science emphasis (Bastille, et al., 2020)
Used within Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council's Ecosystem Process (Muffley, et al., 2020)
The IEA Loop1
State of the Ecosystem summary
Ecosystem synthesis themes
Characterizing ecosystem change for fishery management
- Societal, biological, physical and chemical factors comprise the multiple system drivers that influence marine ecosystems through a variety of different pathways.
- Changes in the multiple drivers can lead to regime shifts — large, abrupt and persistent changes in the structure and function of an ecosystem.
- Regime shifts and changes in how the multiple system drivers interact can result in ecosystem reorganization as species and humans respond and adapt to the new environment.
Document Orientation
Spatial scale
A glossary of terms (Memo 5), detailed technical methods documentation and indicator data are available online.
Key to figures
Trends assessed only for 30+ years: more information
Orange line = significant increase
Purple line = significant decrease
No color line = not significant or < 30 yearsGrey background = last 10 years
State of the Ecosystem → Risk assessent example: Commercial revenue
This element is applied at the ecosystem level. Revenue serves as a proxy for commercial profits.
| Risk Level | Definition |
|---|---|
| Low | No trend and low variability in revenue |
| Low-Moderate | Increasing or high variability in revenue |
| Moderate-High | Significant long term revenue decrease |
| High | Significant recent decrease in revenue |
Ranked moderate-high risk due to the significant long term revenue decrease for Mid-Atlantic managed species (red points in top plot)
Key: Black = Revenue of all species combined;
Red = Revenue of MAFMC managed species
State of the Ecosystem → Risk assessent example: Commercial revenue
This element is applied at the ecosystem level. Revenue serves as a proxy for commercial profits.
| Risk Level | Definition |
|---|---|
| Low | No trend and low variability in revenue |
| Low-Moderate | Increasing or high variability in revenue |
| Moderate-High | Significant long term revenue decrease |
| High | Significant recent decrease in revenue |
Ranked moderate-high risk due to the significant long term revenue decrease for Mid-Atlantic managed species (red points in top plot)
Key: Black = Revenue of all species combined;
Red = Revenue of MAFMC managed species
Risk element: CommRev, unchanged
Performance relative to management objectives
Objective: Seafood production 
Risk elements: ComFood and RecFood, unchanged
Indicators: Commercial and recreational landings
Key: Black = Landings of all species combined;
Red = Landings of MAFMC managed species
Multiple drivers: ecosystem and stock production, management, market conditions, and environment
Is biomass driving?
Key: Black = NEFSC survey;
Red = NEAMAP survey
Landings drivers: Ecosystem or stock production? Risk elements: Fstatus, Bstatus mostly unchanged
Key: Orange background = Tipping point overfishing threshold, Link and Watson 2019 Green background = Optimal range, Link and Watson 2019
One change: Butterfish Bstatus
Implications: Seafood Production
Key: Black = Landings of all species combined;
Red = Landings of MAFMC managed species
Drivers:
market dynamics affecting commercial landings of surfclams and ocean quahogs
other drivers affecting recreational landings: shark fishery management, possibly survey methodology
Monitor:
- climate risks including warming, ocean acidification, and shifting distributions
- ecosystem composition and production changes
- fishing engagement
Objective: Commercial Profits Risk element: CommRev, unchanged
Indicator: Commercial Revenue
Key: Black = Revenue of all species combined;
Red = Revenue of MAFMC managed species
Monitor changes in climate and landings drivers:
- Climate risk element: Surfclams and ocean quahogs are sensitive to ocean warming and acidification.
- pH in surfclam summer habitat is approaching, but not yet at, pH affecting surfclam growth
Indicator: Bennet--price and volume indices
Objective: Recreational opportunities 
; Risk element: RecValue, unchanged; add diversity?
Indicators: Recreational effort and fleet diversity
Implications
Decline in recreational fleet diversity suggests a potentially reduced range of opportunities.
Driven by party/charter contraction (from a high of 24% of angler trips to 7% currently), and a shift toward shore based angling.
Absence of a long-term trend in recreational effort suggests relative stability in the overall number of recreational opportunities in the MAB.
Memo 22-23, Cumulative weather index and management complexity drivers under construction
Objective: Stability Risk elements: FishRes1 and FleetDiv, unchanged, add recreational elements?
Fishery Indicators: Commercial fleet count, fleet diversity
Fishery Indicators: commercial species revenue diversity, recreational species catch diversity
Objective: Stability 
Risk element: ecological diversity put aside, new indices
Ecological Indicators: zooplankton and larval fish diversity
Ecological Indicator: expected number of species, NEFSC bottom trawl survey
Implications:
- stable capacity to respond to the current range of commercial fishing opportunities
- recreational catch diversity maintained by a different set of species over time
- monitor zooplankton diversity driven by declining dominant species
Objective: Fishing community status Risk element: Social, unchanged; new community level info
Indicators: Social vulnerability, fishery engagement and reliance
Mid-Atlantic recreational fishing communities
Mid-Atlantic commercial fishing communities
Implications: Highlighted communities may be vulnerable to changes in fishing patterns due to regulations and/or climate change. When any of these communities are also experiencing social vulnerability, they may have lower ability to successfully respond to change. These indicators may also point to communities that are vulnerable to environmental justice issues.
Objectives: Protected species Maintain bycatch below thresholds 
Indicators: Harbor porpoise and gray seal bycatch (Memo 14)
Implications:
Currently meeting objectives
Risk element: TechInteract, evaluated by species and sector: 14 low, 6 low-mod, 3 mod-high risk, unchanged
The downward trend in harbor porpoise bycatch can also be due to a decrease in harbor porpoise abundance in US waters, reducing their overlap with fisheries, and a decrease in gillnet effort.
The increasing trend in gray seal bycatch may be related to an increase in the gray seal population (U.S. pup counts).
Objectives: Protected species Recover endangered populations
Indicators: North Atlantic right whale population, calf counts
Implications:
Population drivers for North Atlantic Right Whales (NARW) include combined fishery interactions/ship strikes, distribution shifts, and copepod availability.
Unusual mortality events continue for 3 large whale species, harbor and gray seals.
Risk elements:
- FW2Prey evaluated by species: 13 low, 3 low-mod risk, unchanged
- TechInteract, evaluated by species and sector, unchanged
Risks to meeting fishery management objectives
Risks: Climate change, multiple elements
Indicators: ocean currents, bottom and surface temperature, marine heatwaves
Risks: Climate change Risk element: EstHabitat 10 low, 4 high risk species, unchanged, new indices
Indicators: Estuarine conditions, Chesapeake Bay
Risks: Climate change Risk element: offshore habitat put aside, new indices
Indicator: cold pool area
Indicator: acidification
Risks: Ecosystem productivity Risk element: EcoProd, unchanged, new indices
Indicators: primary production, zooplankton
Implications: increased production by smaller phytoplankton implies less efficient transfer of primary production to higher trophic levels. Monitor implications of increasing gelatinous zooplankton and krill.
Risks: Ecosystem productivity Risk element: EcoProd, unchanged, new indices
Indicators: plankton-based forage anomaly and forage fish energy content (Memo 17)
Implications: fluctuating environmental conditions and prey for forage species affect both abundance and energy content. Energy content varies by season, and has changed over time most dramatically for Atlantic herring
Risks: Ecosystem productivity Risk element: EcoProd, unchanged, new analyses
Indicators: fish condition (Memo 18)
Preliminary results:
- Multiple, different condition drivers by species
- Acadian redfish, butterfish and winter flounder more affected by fishing pressure and stock size
- Weakfish, windowpane flounder, and American plaice more affected by local bottom temperatures and zooplankton
Risks: Ecosystem structure Risk element: DistShift, unchanged, add elements?
Indicators: distribution shifts (slide 7), diversity (slide 16), predators (Memo 12, 15, 25)
No trend in aggregate sharks
Gray seals increasing
- Breeding season ~ 27,000 US gray seals, Canada's population ~ 425,000 (2016)
- Canada's population increasing at ~ 4% per year
- U.S. pupping sites increased from 1 (1988) to 9 (2019)
- Harbor and gray seals are generalist predators that consume more than 30 different prey species: red, white and silver hake, sand lance, yellowtail flounder, four-spotted flounder, Gulf-stream flounder, haddock, herring, redfish, and squids.
Implications: stable predator populations suggest stable predation pressure on managed species, but increasing predator populations may reflect increasing predation pressure.
Implications: Climate change and managed species Risk elements unchanged, new info:
Climate: 6 low, 3 low-mod, 4 mod-high, 1 high risk
Multiple drivers with different impacts by species
Chesapeake Bay warm winter, low freshwater flow
- Striped bass poor recruitment observed
- plankton prey too early?
- poor plankton transport?
- Blue crab better survival over winter
- Striped bass poor recruitment observed
Ocean acidification impact on shellfish growth
- Surfclams vulnerable to increased temperature and acidification
- Areas of low pH identified in surfclam and scallop habitat
- Lab work in progress identified pH thresholds for surfclam growth: approaching threshold
DistShift: 2 low, 9 mod-high, 3 high risk species
Shifting species distributions alter both species interactions, fishery interactions, and expected management outcomes from spatial allocations and bycatch measures based on historical fish and protected species distributions.
Risks: Offshore Wind Development Element: OceanUse
Indicators: development timeline, revenue in lease areas, survey overlap (full map)
