September 13, 2013 — Climate change has resulted in shifts in where and at what depths many marine species are found. These shifts have not been uniform, and sometimes have occurred at different rates and in different ways than expected. The leading explanation for these changes has been biological differences among species, but a new study suggests that the local climatic conditions are more likely causing these shifts.
In a study published September 13 in the journal Science, researchers from the U.S. and Canada suggest that climate velocity – the rate and direction that climate shifts in a particular region or landscape – explains observed shifts in distribution far better than biological or species characteristics.
The team compiled four decades of data from research vessel surveys of fish and invertebrates conducted around the continental shelves of North America by NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries) and Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO).
The surveys were conducted across nine regions, including the Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf, Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of Alaska and Eastern Bering Sea, and off Canada’s Atlantic coast. Covering approximately 3.3 million square kilometers (just over 2 million square miles), these areas were sampled using research vessel bottom trawl surveys that collected 60,394 samples between 1968 and 2011. The surveys captured 128 million organisms from 580 populations of 360 species or species groups, collectively called taxa.
Read the full release from the NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center