TY - JOUR
T1 - Anomalously high recruitment of the 2010 Gulf menhaden (Brevoortia patronus) year class
T2 - evidence of indirect effects from the Deepwater Horizon blowout in the Gulf of Mexico
AU - Short, Jeffrey W.
AU - Geiger, Harold J.
AU - Haney, J. Christopher
AU - Voss, Christine M.
AU - Vozzo, Maria L.
AU - Guillory, Vincent
AU - Peterson, Charles H.
N1 - Copyright the Author(s) 2017. Version archived for private and non-commercial use with the permission of the author/s and according to publisher conditions. For further rights please contact the publisher.
PY - 2017/7
Y1 - 2017/7
N2 - Gulf menhaden (Brevoortia patronus) exhibited unprecedented juvenile recruitment in 2010 during the year of the Deepwater Horizon well blowout, exceeding the prior 39-year mean by more than four standard deviations near the Mississippi River. Abundance of that cohort remained exceptionally high for two subsequent years as recruits moved into older age classes. Such changes in this dominant forage fish population can be most parsimoniously explained as consequences of release from predation. Contact with crude oil induced high mortality of piscivorous seabirds, bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus), waders, and other fish-eating marsh birds, all of which are substantial consumers of Gulf menhaden. Diversions of fresh water from the Mississippi River to protect coastal marshes from oiling depressed salinities, impairing access to juvenile Gulf menhaden by aquatic predators that avoid low-salinity estuarine waters. These releases from predation led to an increase of Gulf menhaden biomass in 2011 to 2.4 million t, or more than twice the average biomass of 1.1 million t for the decade prior to 2010. Biomass increases of this magnitude in a major forage fish species suggest additional trophically linked effects at the population-, trophic-level and ecosystem scales, reflecting an heretofore little appreciated indirect effect that may be associated with major oil spills in highly productive marine waters.
AB - Gulf menhaden (Brevoortia patronus) exhibited unprecedented juvenile recruitment in 2010 during the year of the Deepwater Horizon well blowout, exceeding the prior 39-year mean by more than four standard deviations near the Mississippi River. Abundance of that cohort remained exceptionally high for two subsequent years as recruits moved into older age classes. Such changes in this dominant forage fish population can be most parsimoniously explained as consequences of release from predation. Contact with crude oil induced high mortality of piscivorous seabirds, bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus), waders, and other fish-eating marsh birds, all of which are substantial consumers of Gulf menhaden. Diversions of fresh water from the Mississippi River to protect coastal marshes from oiling depressed salinities, impairing access to juvenile Gulf menhaden by aquatic predators that avoid low-salinity estuarine waters. These releases from predation led to an increase of Gulf menhaden biomass in 2011 to 2.4 million t, or more than twice the average biomass of 1.1 million t for the decade prior to 2010. Biomass increases of this magnitude in a major forage fish species suggest additional trophically linked effects at the population-, trophic-level and ecosystem scales, reflecting an heretofore little appreciated indirect effect that may be associated with major oil spills in highly productive marine waters.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85022181590&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s00244-017-0374-0
DO - 10.1007/s00244-017-0374-0
M3 - Article
C2 - 28695256
AN - SCOPUS:85022181590
SN - 0090-4341
VL - 73
SP - 76
EP - 92
JO - Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology
JF - Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology
IS - 1
ER -