Animal Sciences Commons^™

Preferences For Derelict Gear Mitigation Strategies By Commercial Fishers, James A. Delbene, Andrew M. Scheld, Donna Marie Bilkovic

VIMS Articles

Local, national, and international efforts to address the issue of derelict fishing gear are often limited by resources and costs. Managers and policymakers have implemented various preventative, impact reducing, and curative measures to decrease derelict fishing gear abundance and impacts, but stakeholder support is essential for success. To identify stakeholder preferences and the most efficient measures to address the issue of derelict blue crab pots in Chesapeake Bay, we distributed a stated preference survey with a discrete choice experiment to 1,032 licensed commercial fishers in Virginia and received a 42% response rate. The choice experiment consisted of hypothetical scenarios with …

Virginia Seafood Sustainability, Samantha E. Askin, Robert A. Fisher

Reports

Virginia’s commercial fisheries operate sustainability under a suite of management tools based upon information received from marine scientists and fishery managers who regularly conduct biological sampling of fish while tracking commercial landings and other gathering of required information. Analyses of fishing effort and overall stock conditions, as well as formulas designed to calculate threshold limits for maintaining sustainable stocks are regularly performed. Restrictions on seasons, size, days at sea, and gear are imposed as needed to achieve management supporting long-term biological sustainability.

Estimated Consumer Sensory Shell Life Of Fresh Blue Catfish Filets Stored In Ice (Ictalurus Furcatus), Robert A. Fisher

Reports

Blue Catfish (Ictalurus furcatus) is the largest species of catfish in North America where it is native to the Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio river drainages. It was introduced in fresh water Virginia tributaries of the Chesapeake Bay to enhance recreational fisheries in the 1970’s, from which significant recreational and commercial wild caught catfish fisheries developed. Since introduction, Blue catfish populations have expanded from upriver freshwater habitat to brackish-water sub-estuaries with reports of blue catfish in the Chesapeake Bay proper. Blue catfish are voracious, opportunistic predators feeding on a variety of natural prey items, including native fish and shellfish species, and …

Results For The 2021 Vims Industry Cooperative Surveys Of The Mid-Atlantic, Nantucket Lightship, Closed Area I, And Closed Area Ii Resource Areas, Sally Roman, David Rudders

Reports

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) conducted high resolution sea scallop dredge surveys of the Mid-Atlantic (MAB), the Nantucket Lightship (NLCA), Closed Area I (CAI), and Closed Area II (CAII) during May - July 2021 (Figure 1). These surveys were funded by the Sea Scallop Research Set-Aside Program (RSA). Exploitable biomass for each survey is shown in Table 1 for each SAMS Area (Scallop Area Management Simulator). SAMS Areas represent management relevant spatial subunits of the resource and explicitly account for differences in recruitment, vital rates, and fishing effort in the forward projection of survey information. This information is …

Community Dynamics Under Environmental Extremes: Coastal Plain Wet Prairie In A Natural State And Under Restoration, Cinnamon M. Dixon, Kerry E. Flaherty-Walia, Richard A. Snyder

VIMS Articles

Ecological restoration is increasingly employed to restore degraded or destroyed ecosystems and evaluation of restoration success requires that natural community dynamics be understood. Wet prairies in the Southeast US have diverse plant communities subject to disturbances including fire, drought, flooding, tropical storms, and freezes. This habitat covers a fraction of its former range and reversing that trend requires ecological restoration; but, long-term data on the dynamics of this system are rare. We analyzed a 12-year plant community composition dataset from a fire-maintained Gulf of Mexico Coastal Plain wet prairie to characterize plant community dynamics and identify indicator species. The site …

The Effect Of Density On Growth, Yield, And Reproduction Of The Sea Scallop, Placopecten Magellanicus: Final Report, Sally Roman, David Rudders, Roger L. Mann, Kaitlyn R. Clark

Reports

Results from this project indicate that density in combination with settlement at depth in potentially marginal habitat contribute to reductions in growth, yield, and reproductive effort. In general, Study Area was not a contributing factor to the reductions in the three areas of scallop biological processes we measured. Scallops that settle in dense aggregations at varying depths may respond differentially to environmental conditions, food availability, habitat, and removals. (...)

Results from this study will enhance our knowledge of the scallop population with respect to conditions that diverge from expected biological processes. Results will also allow for better management and assessment …

Annual Report - 2020 Data Collection And Analysis In Support Of Single And Multispecies Stock Assessments In Chesapeake Bay: The Chesapeake Bay Multispecies Monitoring And Assessment Program, Christopher F. Bonzek, James Gartland, Debra J. Gauthier, Robert J. Latour

Reports

Historically, fisheries management has been based on the results of single-species stock assessment models that focus on the interplay between exploitation level and sustainability. There currently exists a suite of standard and accepted analytical frameworks (e.g., virtual population analysis (VPA), biomass dynamic production modeling, delay difference models, etc.) for assessing the stocks, projecting future stock size, evaluating recovery schedules and rebuilding strategies for overfished stocks, setting allowable catches, and estimating fishing mortality or exploitation rates. A variety of methods also exist to integrate the biological system and the fisheries resource system, thereby enabling the evaluation of alternative management strategies on …

Fisheries Landings For The Eastern Shore Of Virginia (Esva) 2021, Richard A. Snyder

Reports

Virginia (VA) landings data were requested from VMRC (Table 1) and analyzed by Richard Snyder at VIMS ESL. Landings data reflect where seafood entered market systems, and so may have different origins that will blur categorizing economic activity ascribed to the act of harvest and the act of processing for market. For example, almost all menhaden are landed in Deltaville, VA, some of the conch/welks and dogfish recorded for Accomack may have originated elsewhere to be processed in Wachapreague, and visiting Maryland crabbers early in the season contribute to blue crab landings. Shellfish data (oysters and clams) are separated as …

The Path To An Ecosystem Approach For Forage Fish Management: A Case Study Of Atlantic Menhaden, Kristen A. Anstead, Katie Drew, David Chagaris, (...), Robert J. Latour, Et Al

VIMS Articles

Atlantic menhaden (Brevoortia tyrannus) support the largest fishery by volume on the United States East Coast, while also playing an important role as a forage species. Managers’ and stakeholders’ increasing concerns about the impact of Atlantic menhaden harvest on ecosystem processes led to an evolution in the assessment and management of this species from a purely single-species approach to an ecosystem approach. The first coastwide stock assessment of Atlantic menhaden for management used a single-species virtual population analysis (VPA). Subsequent assessments used a forward projecting statistical catch-at-age framework that incorporated estimates of predation mortality from a multispecies VPA …

The Status Of Virginia’S Public Oyster Resource 2020, Melissa Southworth, Roger L. Mann

Reports

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) monitors recruitment of the Eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica (Gmelin, 1791), annually from late spring through early fall, by deploying spatfall[1] (settlement and recruitment of larval oysters to the post metamorphic form termed spat) collectors (shellstrings) at various sites in three Virginia western Chesapeake Bay tributaries. The survey provides an estimate of a particular area’s potential for receiving a "strike" or settlement (set) of oysters on the bottom and helps describe the timing of recruitment events in a given year. Information obtained from this monitoring effort provides an overview of long-term recruitment …

Monitoring The Abundance Of American Shad And River Herring In Virginia’S Rivers 2020 Annual Report, Eric J. Hilton, Patrick E. Mcgrath, Brian Watkins, Ashleigh Magee

Reports

This report describes the results of the twenty-third year of a continuing study to estimate the relative abundance and assess the status of American shad (Alosa sapidissima) stocks in Virginia by monitoring the spawning runs in the James, York and Rappahannock rivers in spring 2020, evaluating hatchery programs, and contributing to coast-wide assessments (ASMFC 2007, ASMFC 2020).

We also report on two fisheryindependent monitoring programs using anchor gillnets in the Rappahannock River (year 3) and the Chickahominy River (year 6; a major tributary of the James River), to determine relative abundance and stock structure for the adult spawning run of …

Investigation Of Red-Cockaded Woodpeckers Within The Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge: 2020 Report, B. D. Watts, C. Hines, L. Duval, B. J. Paxton

CCB Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Maps Depicting Extent Of Suitable Habitats For Four Forage Fish Species In Chesapeake Bay, 2000-2016, Mary C. Fabrizio, Troy D. Tuckey, Aaron J. Bever, Michael L. Macwilliams

Data

Habitat suitability maps are provided as tif files embedded in a Word document for each of the four forage fishes studied: juvenile spotted hake, juvenile spot, juvenile weakfish, and bay anchovy. Suitability maps are provided for each season and year, 2000 – 2016 for tidal waters of the Chesapeake Bay. Habitat suitability indices range between 0 (red) indicating poor habitat to 1 (blue) indicating most suitable habitat. These indices were estimated using procedures described in Fabrizio et al. (2021; see associated publication below). Estimates of the annual extent of suitable habitats baywide, and for Maryland waters only and Virginia waters …

Stock Composition Of Striped Marlin (Kajikia Audax) In The Central North Pacific Ocean Inferred By Analyses Of Genome-Wide Molecular Markers, Jackson Martinez

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

Relative to many highly migratory fishes, Striped Marlin, Kajikia audax, exhibit considerable stock structure. At least four genetically distinct stocks of Striped Marlin have been delineated in the Pacific and Indian oceans, although stock composition in the central North Pacific (CNP) remains unclear and the presence of an additional stock in the North Pacific has been suggested in two recent studies. The goals of this research were to clarify the number of Striped Marlin stocks in the North Pacific and utilize temporal sampling to better understand the stock dynamics of Striped Marlin exploited by the Hawaii-based pelagic longline fishery (HBPLLF). …

Improving Observation, Assessment, And Management Of Atlantic Coastal Sharks, Cassidy Dawn Peterson

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

Coastal sharks represent a group of stocks for which observation, assessment, and management are particularly challenging. Large distributional ranges, complex migratory behavior, low economic value, and relatively few observations in fishery independent surveys hinder relative abundance estimation. Assessing stock status of coastal sharks is encumbered by limited data availability, data quality, and knowledge of life history strategy. Further, coastal sharks are challenging to manage due to their slow intrinsic population growth rates, competing stakeholder interests, history of overexploitation, and in some cases, subjection to international exploitation. This dissertation aimed to improve the capacity to observe relative abundance of coastal sharks. …

An Ecosystem Is Not A Monument, And Other Challenges To Fishing In The 21st Century, Roger Mann

VIMS Articles

The continental shelf of the United States was once the preserve of commercial fishermen. This is no longer the case. The exclusive economic zone is increasingly becoming the focus of other economically powerful, sometimes incompatible uses, including green energy, shipping, communications, mining, military exclusion zones, and conservation regions. These other uses generally have fixed boundaries. The distribution of fished species moves in relation to warming of shelf waters, presenting challenges to both federal regional fishery management councils and industry alike. There is need for continued engagement between user groups with respectful use of guiding science and legal structure to ensure …

Morphological And Mitochondrial Dna Analyses Of Oysters In The Northern Bay Of Bengal, Bangladesh, Mohammed S. N. Chowdhury, Kimberly S. Reece, Sourav S. Joy, Loren D. Coen, Aad C. Smaal

VIMS Articles

The geographic boundaries of many important habitat-building shallow estuarine oyster (Family Ostreidae) species are poorly understood, especially in subtropical and tropical waters. These keystone species often have extensive historical and extant ranges, in part because of their ability to adapt to diverse environmental conditions and the transfer and introduction of a few species worldwide for aquaculture production. In addition, oysters exhibit morphological plasticity additionally confounding species identification and taxonomy. Molecular techniques have led to significant improvements in oyster systematics and taxonomy but have not been applied to oysters from many tropical regions, including the coastal areas of the Indian Ocean …

The Extent Of Seasonally Suitable Habitats May Limit Forage Fish Production In A Temperate Estuary, Mary C. Fabrizio, Troy D. Tuckey, Aaron J. Bever, Michael L. Macwilliams

VIMS Articles

The sustained production of sufficient forage is critical to advancing ecosystem-based management, yet factors that affect local abundances and habitat conditions necessary to support aggregate forage production remain largely unexplored. We quantified suitable habitat in the Chesapeake Bay and its tidal tributaries for four key forage fishes: juvenile spotted hake Urophycis regia, juvenile spot Leiostomus xanthurus, juvenile weakfish Cynoscion regalis, and bay anchovy Anchoa mitchilli. We used information from monthly fisheries surveys from 2000 to 2016 coupled with hindcasts from a spatially interpolated model of dissolved oxygen and a 3-D hydrodynamic model of the Chesapeake Bay …

Environmentally-Determined Production Frontiers And Lease Utilization In Virginia's Eastern Oyster Aquaculture Industry, Jennifer Beckensteiner, Andrew M. Scheld, Pierre St-Laurent, Marjorie A.M. Friedrichs, David M. Kaplan

VIMS Articles

During the last decade, oyster aquaculture has rebounded in Virginia and has been associated with an increase in subaqueous leased area. Production levels remain historically low, however, and many leases are thought to be underutilized. This study uses a novel approach leveraging high-resolution environmental data to evaluate lease utilization and identify constraints on aquaculture development. Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) and Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) were used to define environmentally-determined production frontiers, i.e. production possibilities based on empirical observations of aquaculture production, available space, and environmental conditions. Both methods estimated Lease Capacity Utilization (LCU, from 0 to 1) for leases producing …

The Effects Of Scallop Dredge Fishing Practices On Physical, Behavioral, And Physiological Stress In Discarded Yellowtail Flounder, Windowpane, And Fourspot Flounder, Brooke N. Anderson, Amelia Weissman, John Mandelman, David B. Rudders, James A. Sulikowski

VIMS Articles

The Atlantic sea scallop Placopecten magellanicus dredge fishery is one of the most lucrative commercial fishing industries in the northeastern United States, and fish bycatch can comprise up to ~42% of the total catch. Benthic species, such as flatfish, are particularly susceptible to unintended capture in scallop dredge gear, and mitigating bycatch and associated mortality has been mandated a priority for fisheries management. Based on this management need, the present study evaluated the physical, physiological, and behavioral stress responses of Yellowtail Flounder Limanda ferruginea, Windowpane Scophthalmus aquosus, and Fourspot Flounder Paralichthys oblongus to capture in the scallop dredge …

Evaluating Optimal Removal Of Derelict Blue Crab Pots In Virginia, Us, Andrew M. Scheld, Donna M. Bilkovic, Kirk J. Havens

VIMS Articles

Derelict fishing gear is a growing concern in many fisheries and coastal communities. Pots and traps are prevalent forms of derelict fishing gear with numerous documented harmful effects. In the Chesapeake Bay, US, a large blue crab (Callinectes sapidus) pot fishery produces high levels of derelict gear. From 2008 to 2014, 34,408 derelict pots were removed from blue crab fishing areas in Virginia. This research first evaluates whether observed increases in catch rates occurring contemporaneously with the removal program were the result of derelict gear removals. An econometric production model is then used to estimate marginal removal benefits …

Investigation Of Red-Cockaded Woodpeckers In Virginia: Year 2020 Report, B. D. Watts, C. Hines, L. Duval, B. J. Paxton

CCB Technical Reports

The Virginia population of red-cockaded woodpeckers is the northernmost throughout the species range and has been in eminent danger of extinction for more than 30 years. The Piney Grove Preserve represents a nucleus for recovery in the state and the focus of a multi-organizational partnership designed to increase the population to a sustainable level. The partnership has executed a program of aggressive habitat management, cavity-tree management and woodpecker population monitoring and management that has resulted in a quadrupling of the breeding population since the early 2000s. During the 2020 breeding season, Piney Grove Preserve supported 15 potential breeding groups (including …

Penaeid Shrimp In Chesapeake Bay: Population Growth And Black Gill Disease Syndrome, Troy D. Tuckey, Jillian L. Swinford, Mary C. Fabrizio, Hamish J. Small, Jeffrey D. Shields

VIMS Articles

Since 1991, the number of penaeid shrimp occurring in Virginia waters of Chesapeake Bay has steadily increased, prompting an interest in developing a fishery. Although development of a shrimp fishery in the Chesapeake Bay region could bring economic benefits, the fishery may be hampered by the presence of a disease syndrome known as shrimp black gill (sBG). The objectives of our study were to (1) describe the spatial distribution and abundance patterns of shrimp in Chesapeake Bay, (2) relate relative abundance of shrimp to habitat characteristics, and (3) determine the presence and seasonality of sBG to better understand disease dynamics …

A Subtropical Nudibranch, Polycera Hummi (Abbott 1952), Described For The First Time From Virginia, Wissan A. Jawad, Stacy A. Kruger-Hadfield, Paige G. Ross

VIMS Articles

We collected an individual Polycera hummi, a subtropical nudibranch, in association with a green macroalga Ulva sp. from an intertidal oyster reef in Burtons Bay, Wachapreague, VA. The established range of P. hummi is based solely on a handful of records from Mississippi and Florida in the Gulf of Mexico and the Carolinas in the Atlantic Ocean. This finding marks the highest latitude that this species has been found, 350 km north of its previously established range from Mississippi to Beaufort, NC. We observed the individual actively navigate the Ulva thallus which had encrusting bryozoans (unidentified genus) and arborescent …

Perspectives From The Water: Utilizing Fisher’S Observations To Inform Sne/ Ma Windowpane Science And Managemen, Richard J. Bell, M. Conor Mcmanus, Jason Mcnamee, James Gartland, Ben Galuardi, Chris Mcguire

VIMS Articles

Within fisheries, stakeholders often have varying viewpoints regarding natural marine resources, and use different sets information to evaluate their condition. Evaluating a resource with different sets of information can lead to different conclusions. Windowpane flounder (Scophthalmus aquosus) are a managed finfish species in the northwest Atlantic whose regulations have the potential to limit harvest opportunities for target species. We analyzed commercial trip and catch information from video data to understand local densities of windowpane flounder in conjunction with fisheries independent surveys. Video monitoring data from three Rhode Island commercial fisher’s vessels and fisheries independent trawl survey data were analyzed to …

Saved By The Shell: Oyster Reefs Can Shield Juvenile Blue Crabs Callinectes Sapidus, Katherine S. Longmire, Rochelle D. Seitz, Alison Smith, Romuald N. Lipcius

VIMS Articles

Juvenile blue crabs Callinectes sapidus use seagrass and other structured habitats as refuges from predation. Oyster reef habitats provide structural complexity that may offer refuge, but the value of these habitats for juvenile blue crabs has not been examined. We quantified survival of juvenile C. sapidus in structured oyster reef habitat versus unstructured soft-bottom habitat. In a field tethering experiment in the York River, lower Chesapeake Bay (USA), juvenile C.sapidus (10−50 mm carapace width [CW]) were tethered in sand (n = 40) or oyster reef (n = 39)habitats at subtidal sites 1−2 m deep. An underwater camera system was used …

Methods For Identifying Species Complexes Using A Novel Suite Of Multivariate Approaches And Multiple Data Sources: A Case Study With Gulf Of Alaska Rockfish, Kristen L. Omori, Cindy A. Tribuzo, Elizabeth A. Babcock, John M. Hoenig

VIMS Articles

International and national laws governing the management of living marine resources generally require specification of harvest limits. To assist with the management of data-limited species, stocks are often grouped into complexes and assessed and managed as a single unit. The species that comprise a complex should have similar life history, susceptibility to the fishing gear, and spatial distribution, such that common management measures will likely lead to sustainable harvest of all species in the complex. However, forming complexes to meet these standards is difficult due to the lack of basic biological or fisheries data to inform estimates of biological vulnerability …

Effect Of Environmental History On The Physiology And Acute Stress Response Of The Eastern Oyster Crassostrea Virginica, Jill Ashey, Emily B. Rivest

VIMS Articles

Environmental history (regimes of water quality to which an organism has been exposed in the past) may influence how the physiology of eastern oysters Crassostrea virginica responds to future environmental conditions caused by climate change. Previous research has examined environmental history in a 1-dimensional framework, failing to capture environmental history complexity through space and time. In this study, we examined environmental history as a multi-faceted parameter, incorporating abiotic water quality components, such as temperature, pH, and salinity, that differ among locations. We also assessed how different lengths of environmental histories, defined as proximal and distal, affected oyster physiology and stress …

A Taxonomic Review Of The Family Trachipteridae (Lampridiformes), With An Emphasis On Taxa Distributed In The Western Pacific Ocean, Jennifer Martin, Eric J. Hilton

VIMS Articles

The family Trachipteridae—the Ribbonfishes, Dealfishes, and their relatives—has a circumglobal distribution, with at least 10 species in three genera (Zu Walters & Fitch 1960, Desmodema Walters & Fitch 1960, and Trachipterus Goüan 1770) that are characterized by elongate, extremely laterally compressed bodies, large eyes, absence of ribs, spines on lateral-line scales, greatly protrusible mouths, and a lack of pelvic fins in adults. They are also known for the drastic morphological changes that occur during ontogeny. Trachipterids are poorly represented in collections due to the fragile nature of their bodies. Most studies of the Trachipteridae have been limited by the …

Sperm Repository For A Breeding Program Of The Eastern Oyster Crassostrea Virginica: Sample Collection, Processing, Cryopreservation, And Data Management Plan, H. Yang, Y. Huo, J. C. Yee, S. Rickard, W. C. Walton, E. Saillant

VIMS Articles

The Eastern oyster Crassostrea virginica (Family Ostreidae) is one of the most important fishery and aquaculture species in the U.S. and is a keystone species for coastal reefs. A breeding program was initiated in 2019 to support the fast‐growing aquaculture industry culturing this species in the Gulf of Mexico. Oysters from 17 wild populations in embayment along the U.S. Gulf of Mexico coast from southwest Florida to the Matagorda Bay, Texas were used as broodstock for the program to maximize genetic diversity in the base population. A sperm repository of the broodstock was established to support the breeding project. The …