The NOAA IR serves as an archival repository of NOAA-published products including scientific findings, journal articles, guidelines, recommendations, or other information authored or co-authored by NOAA or funded partners.
As a repository, the NOAA IR retains documents in their original published format to ensure public access to scientific information.
i
An Ecological Characterization of Fish Assemblages in Mosquito Lagoon, Florida
-
2020
-
-
Source: Southeastern Naturalist, 19(3), 491
[PDF-1.23 MB]
Details:
-
Journal Title:Southeastern Naturalist
-
Personal Author:
-
NOAA Program & Office:
-
Description:- Coastal marine ecosystems are increasingly threatened by urbanization, land- based sources of pollution, and climate change. Changes in the environment due to these pressures could lead to shifts in community composition and dynamics. To address this is-sue, we sampled the fish assemblage of a coastal lagoon to assess species richness, rates of occurrence, and relative abundance. We caught 176,136 individuals representing 87 taxa. We compared our results to the last published survey of the study area conducted during the mid-1990s. Compared to historic data, there have been large shifts in percent occurrence in some economically important taxa, such as Lagodon rhomboides (Pinfish) increasing from 4% to 53% and Anchoa spp. (anchovies) increasing from 23% to 66%. These findings pos- sibly indicate changes in the fish assemblage, essential fish habitat, or environment over the past 2 decades. As environmental and anthropogenic stressors continue to impact this com-plex coastal ecosystem, continued monitoring will be critical to detecting and understanding changes in the fish community in Mosquito Lagoon. Introduction Estuarine habitats are some of the most productive and diverse marine systems. Many species use estuaries for foraging, reproduction, and as nursery habitat for part or all of their life stages (Gillanders 2002, Szedlmayer and Able 1996). Species’ distributions in estuaries are driven by differences in environmental conditions, available habitat, and biotic interactions (Blaber and Blaber 1980). In particular, coastal estuaries are at risk due to increasing urbanization, nutrient inputs, sea-level
-
Keywords:
-
Source:Southeastern Naturalist, 19(3), 491
-
DOI:
-
ISSN:1528-7092
-
Format:
-
Publisher:
-
Document Type:
-
Rights Information:Other
-
Compliance:Library
-
Main Document Checksum:
-
Download URL:
-
File Type:
