Lara Whitely Binder UW Climate Impacts Group Penny Dalton Washington Sea Grant Climate Science in the Public Interest

Kara Cardinal, UW School of Marine and Environmental Affairs Pat Corcoran, Oregon Sea Grant Yvonne deReynier, NOAA Northwest Regional Office Eileen Herman, Washington Sea Grant Jennifer Kassakian Anderson, Washington Sea Grant (formerly) P. Sean McDonald, UW Program on the Environment Jonathan Phinney, NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center Carrie Pomeroy, California Sea Grant Mindi Sheer, NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center Amy Snover, UW Climate Impacts Group John Stein, NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center Emma Timmins-Schiffman, UW School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences

Marine waters along U.S. West coast are highly productive and support important fisheries. Commercial landings in OR, WA, and CA were valued at >$400 million in 2008 More than 120 communities are dependent on or engaged in Pacific fisheries Eight stocks/species in the West coast groundfish fishery are officially overfished and are subject to rebuilding efforts Increasing water temperature, ocean acidification, changing ocean currents, hypoxic zones, and sea-level rise could exacerbate fishery problems and impact healthy fisheries May 25-26, 2011 ◦ Seattle, WA Motivations for the “Assessing the Vulnerability of West Coast Fisheries to a Changing Climate” Workshop

Goals: 1.To test a modified rapid vulnerability assessment methodology based on methodologies initially used in Australia on four U.S. west coast fisheries (Pacific Whiting, Sablefish, Dungeness Crab, and Canary Rockfish) 2.To inform and engage a cross-section of the fisheries community on the topics of climate change, climate change impacts, and vulnerability assessment. In attendance: ~ 60 WA, OR, and CA scientists, managers, fishermen, processors May 25-26, 2011 ◦ Seattle, WA Goals for the “Assessing the Vulnerability of West Coast Fisheries to a Changing Climate” Workshop

Western Regional Collaboration Team National Sea Grant College Program Northwest Fisheries Center

Not to focus on the specifics of now the fisheries are vulnerable Focus on the process of doing a rapid vulnerability assessment and lessons learned

Adaptation of fishery-specific Johnson and Welch 2010, Chin et al 2010 methodologies Selected fisheries and species for the workshop Developed white papers based on literature review providing overview of species life history and fishery + preliminary evaluation and rating (low, medium, high) of exposure and sensitivity to climate change (both species and human dimensions) “Mental Models” interviews with sub-set of participants Breakout groups at workshop to review preliminary sensitivity and exposure ratings, and to identify and rate adaptive capacity attributes and vulnerability Final exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity scores compiled for overall vulnerability rating

Components of Vulnerability Vulnerability = Exposure + Sensitivity – Adaptive Capacity

Exposure Exposure - the degree to which a stock or fishery experiences changing climatic conditions Exposure Attributes Sea Surface Temperature Ocean acidification Ocean current changes Changes in upwelling Interannual and interdecadal cycles Sea level rise and wave height Changes in storm intensity

Sensitivity - the degree to which a stock or fishery changes in response to changing climatic conditions Sensitivity Attributes Changes in plankton productivity Changes in larval and adult growth, development, survival Changes in adult reproduction Changes in species ranges and distribution Changes in fishing risks and practices Changes in fishery infrastructure Economic dependence on fishing

Adaptive Capacity - the degree to which a stock or fishery can adjust to changing climatic conditions Adaptive Capacity Stock Status Reproductive potential Fishing pressure and practice Species Mobility Species Range (adults) Species Range (Juvenile) Pollution Ability to fish other stocks Management Flexibility Cultural dependence

Extent to which natural or social system is susceptible to sustained damage from climate variability and change and other interactive stressors

Qualitative ratings for exposure, sensitivity, and final results scored as follows: RatingAverage Score High3 Medium-High2.5 Medium2 Medium-Low1.5 Low1 In general: The closer you are to 3, the worse things are Qualitative ratings for adaptive capacity reversed (the closer you are to 1, the better things are)

Exposure Species Sensitivity Human D. Sensitivity Species Ad. Cap. Human D. Ad. Cap. Average Rating Rockfish Med- High Sablefish Med-Low Whiting Med-Low Crab Med

Lessons Learned: Applying the Methodology In one sense, successful: Help deconstruct climate change vulnerability more precisely, teasing out relationships among biological response, human use, fishery management Help in defining the relative significance of attributes Effective and constructive stakeholder engagement

Applying the Methodology (cont’d) On the other hand, lots of work needed.... Starting point of assessing vulnerability (e.g., rather than resilience) may bias process against identifying benefits (through choice of attributes, etc.) Required separation of attributes within and across categories seemed artificial – Systems are complex and interrelated. Hard to isolate attributes; some attributes affected others (e.g. larval survival and reproduction) – Wanted to evaluate life stages separately; attributes ratings differ with larvae vs adult stages

Applying the Methodology (cont’d) Challenge of different scale – many winners and losers in the same category. – geographic scale, fleet vs community vs individual Attributes characterized as “Changes in...” made it hard to evaluate – Some positive, some negative (lack of specificity about attributes) Qualitative rating difficult – Need better definition of high/med/low – Need way of weighting for confidence, significance of the attribute as a change agent, or other criteria

Difficult to fully integrate the human dimension (scale and data were an issue) Groups had different approaches for adjusting for uncertainty Downgrading of human dimensions sensitivity by most groups Should results be compared against one another?

NOAA Fisheries is adapting lessons learned from our effort into a rapid vulnerability assessment framework they are developing for application to all U.S. fisheries Partnering with NOAA on an international workshop on methods of assessing fisheries vulnerability to climate change Completing the workshop proceedings and finalizing white papers

“Climate change provides an unprecedented opportunity to challenge the conventional thinking and evaluate fisheries management with a fresh perspective and a longer-term view.” – Johnson and Welch 2010 For more information: Lara Whitely Binder UW Climate Impacts Group

Rockfish Exposure Exposure Attributes Attribute Rating Score Overall Exposure Rating Sea Surface TemperatureMedium2 Medium High 2.4 Ocean AcidificationHigh3 Ocean Current ChangesHigh3 Changes in UpwellingHigh3 Interannual and Interdecadal CyclesMedium2 Sea Level Rise and Wave HeightMedium2 Changes in Storm IntensityMedium2 No changes

Sensitivity Attributes Attribute Rating Score Overall Sensitivity Rating Stock Attributes: Rockfish Changes in plankton productivityHigh3 Medium-High: 2.6 (was 2.7) Changes in larval growth, development and survival High3 Changes is adult growth and developmentMedium 2 Changes in Adult ReproductionHigh 3 Changes in species ranges and distributionMedium2 Human Dimensions Attributes : Rockfish Changes in time and space of groundfish distribution Medium2 Medium-High: 2.4 Chanes in the availability of groundfishHigh3 Changes in fishing risks and practicesMedium2 Changes in fishery infrastructureHigh3 Economic dependence on fishingMedium2 Total Sensitivity Rating Medium-High (was 2.6)

Adaptive Capacity Attributes Attribute Rating ScoreOverall AC Rating Stock Status Low3 Medium-high 1.7 Reproductive potential High1 Fishing pressure and practice High1 Species Mobility High1 Species Range (adults) High1 Species Range (Juvenile) Medium2 Pollution High3

Adaptive Capacity Attributes Attribute Rating ScoreOverall AC Rating Dependence of West Coast shelf fisheries on canary rockfish during rebuilding Low3 Medium 2.2 Ability to fish other stocks Medium2 Management Flexibility Medium2 Cultural dependence (rural) Low3 Cultural dependence (urban) High1

Successes: Deconstruction of climate change vulnerability more precisely, teasing out relationships among biological response, human use, fishery management Help in defining the relative significance of attributes Effective and constructive stakeholder engagement Limitations: Initial assessment of vulnerability may bias against identification of benefits Required separation of attributes within and across categories somewhat artificial Spatial and social scale of assessment (e.g. fleet vs community vs individual) affects results Qualitative rating difficult to define, weight for significance, assess confidence intervals