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MAY 2021
Welcome Ray to the lab! Do oyster farms have a richer soundscape than control areas, suggesting more biological acitivity? Ray Delvillar is conducting an independent research project this summer to answer that question. He will be using passive acoustics to compare the soundscape between oyster farms, control areas, and an oyster sanctuary. This involves using a hydrophone (see pic) to record sound at these sampling areas and analyzing the acoustic data with specialized software. |
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Sheepshead batch fecundity estimated Garrett Sage completed his independent study this past spring, as part of the Semester at the Coast program at CSI. He determined the first estimates of batch fecundity for NC sheepshead. He made a poster summarizing his project. The next steps for this study will be combining Garrett's results with other data on sheepshead spawning aggregations and publishing a manuscript. |
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Lela wins award from SECOORA The Southeast Coastal Ocean Observing Regional Association (SECOORA) gives out an annual travel award for the Vembu Subramanium Ocean Scholar program. Lela received the award this year for using climate data from buoys and weather stations to model shrimp recruitment in NC. |
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APRIL 2021
Presentations and outreach during the past month Andrew gave a lightning talk at the Tidewater Chapter of the American Fisheries Society this month, on his acoustic telemetry experiment LINK. Maddie gave demonstrations about fish and the importance of nursery habitats to 6th graders as part of the NC Science Festival, which conducts science outreach each year across the state. Lela gave an invited seminar at UC-Davis. Finally, Jim was interviewed on CSI's Meet the Scientist series. |
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FEBRUARY 2021
Verena and Jim present launch of climate-fisheries study Lenfest Ocean Program hosted a webinar where Verena, Jim and collaborators presented the research that we will be conducting over the next three years on how marine species respond to climate change. Over 100 fisheries managers, researchers, NGO members, and other interested people attended. A recording of the webinar can be found here. |
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Welcome Garrett to the lab! Garrett Sage is an undergrad intern working in our lab this spring. He is at CSI this spring as part of the ECU Semester Experience at the Coast. His independent research project is analyzing gonad samples from sheepshead to determine batch fecundity of the NC spawning population. This involves digitizing images of samples and then counting and measuring oocytes with image analysis software. |
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JANUARY 2021
New paper out showing projected future economic impacts on commercial fisheries due to climate change Paper published in Climate Change Economics (LINK) that projects a 2 to 4 billion dollar negative impact of future climate change on key U.S. fisheries during the 21st century. This research was a collaborative effort between members of the EPA, NOAA, and Industrial Economics Inc., with scientists from ECU, Rutgers, and the University of Bern. |
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Welcome Verena to the lab! Verena Wang is joining the lab as a postdoc. She was previously a postdoc at the University of Southern Mississippi where she was working on habitat use of larval fishes. Before that she did her graduate work at UNC-Wilmington. At ECU she will be examining how life history and habitat requirements affect a species sensitivity to climate change. |
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DECEMBER 2020
New paper out showing that shifting species distributions should be considered when ocean planning for multiple sectors Paper published in Science Advances (LINK) that uses future projections of species distributions to quantify trade-offs associated with ocean planning including fishing, conservation, and energy development. The paper shows that planning for future species distributions does not require sacrificing present day management goals. |
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SEPTEMBER 2020
Hiring postdoc to examine how life history and habitat requirements impact responses to climate change
While it is generally well documented that marine species distributions are shifting in response to climate change, the mechanisms that lead to those shifts are unresolved for most species. In particular, specific habitat requirements of species, and connectivity between life stages, are probably very important in determining how a species will respond to changes in climate. However, with the exception of a few select species, these processes remain poorly understood. We are looking for a postdoc to analyze existing fisheries survey data to help create some unifying principles behind species shifts and what drives them. For a full description of this posting click (POSITION FILLED).
Hiring postdoc to examine how life history and habitat requirements impact responses to climate change
While it is generally well documented that marine species distributions are shifting in response to climate change, the mechanisms that lead to those shifts are unresolved for most species. In particular, specific habitat requirements of species, and connectivity between life stages, are probably very important in determining how a species will respond to changes in climate. However, with the exception of a few select species, these processes remain poorly understood. We are looking for a postdoc to analyze existing fisheries survey data to help create some unifying principles behind species shifts and what drives them. For a full description of this posting click (POSITION FILLED).
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Welcome Lela to the lab! Lela is coming to us from the University of Miami RSMAS lab, where she has been examining the movements and environmental responses of individual fish in pelagic ocean habitat, using archival satellite tags. Now she will be modeling population level responses of penaeid shrimp to climate factors in North Carolina coastal waters. |
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AUGUST 2020
New paper out about uncertainty in future habitat projections Paper published in ICES Journal of Marine Science (LINK) that quantifies the amount of prediction uncertainty among four modeled components of species' niche and forecasted climate. This paper is one of the most comprehensive looks at projection uncertainty to date, and also provides future projections of seven important fisheries species. |
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Welcome Maddie and Andrew to the lab! Maddie is going to be working towards an M.S., looking at habitat use, hatch date and growth of juvenile sheepshead. Andrew was previously working as a technician, but is now starting the PhD program researching the impacts of habitat and environmental change on marine species. |
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MAY 2020
Hiring postdoc to examine shrimp recruitment Penaeid shrimp represent one of the most important commercial fisheries in the U.S. We are hiring a postdoc to examine existing long-term biological survey data from Pamlico Sound and other coastal areas of NC. The postdoc will determine how climate affects recruitment patterns of shrimp, and how recruitment dynamics differ between white and brown shrimp. (POSITION FILLED) |
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MARCH 2020
New outreach web page for oyster farmers Check out our new web page that highlights the work we've done on oyster aquaculture leases in NC. This page is set up to show our partners in the oyster culture industry some of the data that we collected on their leases during 2018 and 2019. We will update the webpage as new products and results come out. Big shout out to Andrew McMains for putting together the data summaries and videos. Also, thanks to all the hard work from Mary Conroy and Marianna Miller for measuring THOUSANDS of fish in our sonar samples. |