Centennial Story 11: Vera Agostini (PhD, 2005)

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I came to the PhD program at the School of Aquatic and Fishery Science from Rome, Italy, my birthplace. After a handful of years teaching on schooners with the Sea Education Association, and starting to learn the tricks of the trade as a visiting scientist with the Fisheries Department of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, I decided it was time to get some good grounding in fishery science. I was a bit hesitant at the start, as I found the only course I took on fisheries management during my MS degree very boring, but a desire to engage in science that had some real world application moved me to take the leap and start a PhD at UW.

Vera Agostini

I was lucky to join Bob Francis’ lab, as he had attracted a group of bright and fun scientists (John Field, PhD 2004; Rishi Sharma, PhD QERM 1998; Sarah Gaichas, PhD 2016; Jodie Little now Toft, PhD 2009; Lorenzo Ciannelli, PhD 2002; Are Strom, PhD 2003; Kerim Aydin, PhD 2000), who were there in the pursuit of answers to questions related to climate change impacts and ecosystem dynamics. The Francis Lab never had a shortage of stimulating conversations, good humour, faithful camaraderie, and political debate. Bob, our fearless leader, pushed us all to think outside the box. He skilfully fostered a spirit of inquiry in us that, to this day, I still very much appreciate. I was lucky to also find many good friends and colleagues in the rest of the SAFS community (Alex Zerbini, PhD 2006; Jo Smith, PhD 2008; Nathalie Hamel, PhD 2009; Juan Valero, MS 2002, PhD 2011; Noble Hendrix, MS, 2000, PhD 2003; Ivonne Ortiz, MS 2002, PhD 2007; and John Mickett in Oceanography, just to name a few) and to have access to the wider SAFS, NOAA-NMFS community (Warren Wooster; Anne Hollowed, PhD 1990; Ray Hilborn; Andre Punt; Julia Parrish; Dave Fluharty). All of them, in one way or another, thoughtfully supported my research and development. My dissertation focused on understanding the response of Pacific Hake and Pacific Sardine to climate variability, and teasing out the implications for management of these two species.

After completing my PhD, I took another leap and joined the world of conservation, doing my post-doc with Ellen Pikitch at the Pew Institute for Ocean Science. Then I joined The Nature Conservancy’s Global Marine Team. There, I found myself carrying the flag of fisheries, with my work focused on trying to bridge the gap between what sometimes seemed like unnecessarily distant communities, fisheries and conservation. I happily learned about conservation and resource management in, and travelled to, distant areas of the world, engaged in projects on, and strategy development for, mainly tropical areas. Areas of focus included: multi-objective priority setting, marine spatial planning, and climate adaptation of coastal communities.

After 10 happy years with The Nature Conservancy, I decided it was time for another leap. Recently, I again joined the Fisheries Department of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Rome, Italy— this time as its deputy director. Among a few other things, I am back helping to bridge the gap between fisheries and conservation, but this time from the other side.

Just like my study species, I have clearly been a great migrator, living in and adapting to distant places such as Seattle, Miami and Rome. I still fondly remember and keep in touch with many of my friends and colleagues of the SAFS community. Only as the years progressed and I

became engaged with other research communities, I realized how lucky I was as a student at SAFS. The support we received from the faculty, the exposure to the NMFS labs in Seattle, and the sense of community that SAFS fostered between faculty and students alike are unique and were critical to my development. I still miss that, and sometimes get a glimpse of it—through even a brief communication with SAFS colleagues and friends—that I know will remain for a lifetime.

 

Deciding how to best save toads from a deadly fungal disease

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The deadly fungal disease Bd (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis) is a major cause of the wave of recent extinctions of frogs and toads, but it is difficult to decide how to best save amphibian populations from its ravages. Now a new framework has been developed that helps managers decide which actions are the most beneficial. A combination of a model of multiple boreal toad breeding sites, and expert judgment, was used to assess 35 possible actions that either preserve habitat, reduce Bd prevalence, or reintroduce boreal toads to areas where they no longer exist. The resulting strategy balanced toad survival against cost, and was predicted to reduce toad decline from 53% over 50 years to 21%. The paper, coauthored by SAFS professor Sarah Converse, appears in Conservation Letters.

Centennial Story 10: Sara Adlerstein-Gonzalez (MS, 1987; PhD, 1992)

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My years at the University of Washington are among the best in my life; I was not the best student, but I must have been the happiest! I joined the MS program with a Chilean government scholarship, poised to obtain expertise in stock assessment and to go back to my job at the Undersecretary of Fisheries. But life took me in different directions. I wanted to study abroad because with a biology degree and a thesis on phytoplankton taxonomy, I found myself needing to develop analytical expertise to inform management; and there were no appropriate programs in Chile. However, I also needed to find a good place for my sons (then aged 7 and 10). I heard Lobo Orensanz (PhD, 1989) and Vince Gallucci talk at a conference and added the Center for Quantitative Sciences to my search list. When I visited Seattle, I knew it was going to be our next home. I left Chile in spring 1983 and landed in Seattle on a glorious fall day where I found a family of students: among them Lobo, Ana Parma (PhD, 1989), Raul Palacios (MS, 1987; PhD, 1994), Fred Felleman (MS, 1986), Sonia Guarda (MS, 1985), John Hedgepeth (PhD, 1994), and later Miguel Pascual (PhD, 1993), Miriam Fernandez (PhD, 1994) and Jim Ianelli (PhD, 1993).

Sara at Flemming Creek with students during her Restoration Ecology class last year

The School and UW provided such exciting opportunities. At the start as a foreign student, there were challenges and many funny moments. Ana and I were classmates in Vince’s population dynamics class in my first quarter, and we became known for laughing at his jokes with a 5- minute delay when Sonia would translate for us. The Sand Point housing and the city were an ideal place to live, and many of the wonderful people I met became friends for life. For my thesis, I developed a method to age a Chilean commercially important mollusk species, using shell daily increments and also implemented a growth model. Vince was my MS advisor; he suggested I worked on my thesis during the summer in Friday Harbor.  My kids loved living in the huts, fishing at the pier and exploring new worlds under the microscope. Friday Harbor was also where I met Edgar Meyhofer, later a Zoology PhD student, and now my husband.

After graduating, I continued into the PhD program under Bob Francis, with Ray Hilborn as a committee member.  My dissertation was on dynamics of Pacific hake and a Kudoa parasite. I shared an office with Jim Lanelli and Rick Brodeur (PhD, 1990). I loved the school-wide seminars with pizza and beer, which allowed me to talk to faculty and other experts in a relaxed atmosphere. Working with Bob led to collaborations at NOAA and other agencies. Also, Bob encouraged me to be a whole person. I am a visual artist and he a jazz musician, so we both understood creativity. I can say that while at SAFS, I also flourished as an artist. Close to graduation, Don McCaughran hired me at the International Pacific Halibut Commission to do work on halibut bycatch. It was a pleasure to work with Bob Trumble, and share an office with my friend Ana. But soon it was time to leave and get established in Germany, my husband’s country of citizenship.

I worked for six years at the Institute of Fisheries at the University of Hamburg, before coming back to the US. I kept my connections with SAFS while in Europe through research on MPAs with Ray and Raquel Goni (MS, 1998) at the Oceanographic Institute in Baleares. It was great to have grants, collaborate with colleagues from many countries, and even represent Germany in ICES working groups. By the time I was able to speak German fluently (not perfectly) and make people laugh, my husband started talking about a job at the University of Michigan (UM).

We moved to Michigan in 2001, and I joined the School of Natural Resources & Environment faculty (now School for Environment and Sustainability). At UM, I have been able to find and create opportunities to incorporate the arts in my job. My research has focused mostly on the Great Lakes, where fisheries and habitat deterioration are bringing species to extinction, invasive species and climate change are ruling lake dynamics, and the preferred management tool is fish stocking (native and exotic). Here, my fascination with understanding nature got transformed into a sense of mission to protect nature and work towards a more just world. I want to inspire new generations and am channeling most of my energy through

teaching, outreach, and engagement by creating courses and other opportunities that bridge environmental sciences and the arts. I have discovered that the greatest source of satisfaction comes from the privilege to teach, which I consider an act of love.

The experience during my years at SAFS shaped me in so many ways. I am grateful, and I look forward to going back and contributing to the 100-year celebration. It will be full circle, as Bob Francis encouraged me to be, a whole person.

Sara Alderstein, Wayne Getz, Raquel Coni and Ana Parma (Resource Modelling Conf Vancouver)

Better estimates of fish status with spatial fish models

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Fisheries stock assessments commonly ignore space when assessing the status of small pelagic fish species like herring, anchovy, and sardines, because including multiple areas adds a large of number of parameters to the models. Results from a new simulation framework based on herring in Haida Gwaii, British Columbia, now suggest that stock assessment estimates of spawning fish is improved when the models matched the true underlying changes in fish across areas, and therefore that future stock assessments should always include spatial structure when the fish population can be assigned to subpopulations. The work by SAFS director André Punt and 20 coauthors appears in the journal Fisheries Research.

Tracking the pulse of the Earth’s fresh waters

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To detect floods and protect fish and other stream critters, warning systems are needed that track river flow. But while these stream gage monitoring systems have been restored to historical levels in the U.S., they are declining globally. A new study highlights trends in stream gage numbers, and pinpoints areas in the U.S. that need additional monitoring because of a combination of floods, droughts, and risk to biodiversity. The paper by Albert Ruhi (SESYNC), SAFS MS student Matthis Messager, and SAFS professor Julian Olden, appears in Nature Sustainability.

Areas with high numbers of fish species and with a high risk of low numbers of stream gages.
Decline in the number of stream gages worldwide that report to an open access database.

Predators amplify fluctuations in the numbers of small schooling fish

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Forage fish are small and densely schooling fish like herring and sardines, that hang out in the open water and become the perfect food for predatory fish, marine mammals, and birds. One key feature of their population numbers is that they have dramatic boom and bust cycles because of ocean conditions, fishing, and highly variable recruitment (numbers of baby fish produced each year). Now, new research shows that increased predation exacerbates the bust part of these cycles, and decreased predation allows for recovery. In addition, variability in predation and ocean conditions has a larger effect than the influence of fishing on forage fish populations, highlighting the key role that natural predators play in regulating the abundance of forage fish. The new paper was written by SAFS postdoc Nis Jacobsen and SAFS professor Tim Essington and appears in the journal Fish and Fisheries.

New study reveals why some fisheries are formally assessed and others are not

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Catch limits are set for fisheries in the U.S. based on formal fisheries stock assessments: complex models that seek to explain all the available data and make forecasts, similar to the methods used for weather forecasts. However, because there is a shortage of both data and trained scientists, not all fisheries can be assessed every year. A new study finds that assessments are conducted on 59% of fisheries within fisheries management plans, but only 13% of fisheries outside management plans. Since assessments are more common for large-volume and high-priced fisheries, though, almost all (77-100%) of the catch in the regions examined came from assessed fisheries. Projections of the rate at which fisheries are assessed for the first time, suggest that continued but slower increases in the proportion assessed should be expected in the future, unless funding for training of stock assessment scientists is increased. The new work was conducted by Philipp Neubauer, SAFS research scientist Michael Melnychuk, and NOAA scientists James Thorson, Rick Methot and Kristan Blackhart, and appears in the journal PLoS One.

(a) Total number of fisheries in each of four U.S. regions; (b) proportion of fisheries that are assessed in each region; and (c) proportion of catches in each region coming from assessed fisheries.

Freshwater critters rely much less on food originating on land than previously thought

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Zooplankton, the living tiny animals in water, are an important component of freshwater food webs, sustaining many freshwater fisheries. It has long been thought that a substantial portion of zooplankton diets come originally from land-based ecosystems, for example from nutrients leaching out of plant matter falling into the water, rather than being based entirely from freshwater sources. Now, a bias has been demonstrated in a key hydrogen-based method used to estimate the land portion of zooplankton diets. This method relies in the ratio of different isotopes of hydrogen that contain either one neutron (1H) or two neutrons (2H, called deuterium), and land-based plants preferentially get rid of the lighter 1H when they transpire water. Most analyses of diet using tracers like these are based on the axiom that “you are what you eat”. However, stable isotope analyses using deuterium are more correctly based on the axiom that “you are what you eat, and drink and swim in”. A critical part of the calculation is an assumption that only 16% of hydrogen in zooplankton cells comes from water, but the new study shows that actually 27% of hydrogen in zooplankton cells comes from water. The net effect of the improved estimates of this critical parameter is that the estimated contribution of land-based matter in zooplankton diets drops from nearly one-third to near-zero. The new paper was authored by three University of Washington professors: Michael Brett from Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Gordon Holtgrieve and Daniel Schindler from the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, and is published in the journal Ecology.

Where were the salmon going, and how many should we catch?

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Adult salmon are well known to return to the lake or stream where they hatched, to spawn another generation of salmon. In many places, fisheries catch them in the ocean on the way back to spawning, but before it is possible to assign them to a particular population from a stream or lake. A new model now shows a way forward to disentangling catches that come from multiple salmon populations, using genetics and analysis of scales. The new method combines recent DNA samples with historical DNA obtained from fish scales stored for decades in archives, to assign catches to their natal regions, supplementing more extensive data collected from fish scales that are used to estimate the number of years each salmon spent in freshwater and the ocean. The model is applied to sockeye salmon catches in Bristol Bay, Alaska, which hosts the world’s most largest salmon fishery, but is threatened by a massive proposed mine. The model finds that salmon spending more years at sea before returning, are also more likely to be caught in the fishery, and that there are sometimes large interception rates of salmon heading for one river system but that are caught near the mouth of another river system. The new run reconstruction model estimates large differences in the run sizes of some populations that were formerly thought to be caught in higher or lower numbers. The results will feed back into management estimates of maximum sustainable catch for each Bristol Bay fishing district. A paper describing the method appears in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, and is authored by former SAFS graduate students Curry Cunningham and Matt Smith, and SAFS professors Trevor Branch, Lisa Seeb, Jim Seeb, and Ray Hilborn, together with Tyler Dann of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

Major Bristol Bay sockeye river systems, and associated salmon fisheries
Tens of millions of sockeye salmon are caught each year in Bristol Bay. The new model estimates the proportion of each major river system that were caught in the different fishing districts.

Career advice for scientists from Prof. Tom Quinn

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In a retrospective look back on his career, SAFS professor Tom Quinn reflects on the experiences that have shaped his outlook and his philosophy on science, teaching, and mentoring. His experiences have included driving past defunct vulture-topped nuclear reactors, and waking up with bear prints on the outside of the window above his bed in his cabin in Alaska, together with many years working in the field on the long-term studies (since the 1950s) at the University of Washington’s Bristol Bay field program focused on salmon. The field site and the salmon runs themselves, which are the largest sockeye salmon runs in the world, are now threatened by the planned development of a massive mine in the region. Prof Quinn advocates specializing in a topic (such as salmon and trout), and then using that topic to explore broader implications for ecology, behavior, and evolution. He highlights the virtues of long-term field programs, because “there is no such thing as an average year” (Don Rogers), while admitting the frustrations of looking for continued funding when funders are always seeking the new and exciting instead of supporting long-running programs. Ironically, he points out that the two worst things an ecologist can do are to start a long-term field program (because the costs and risks are high but the rewards take a long time to materialize), and to stop one (because of their immense value once underway). Prof Quinn has received numerous teaching and mentoring awards, and highlights that faculty “should be willing to give their best ideas away to their graduate students” (Ronald Merrill), and be aware that different students appreciate different mentoring styles. The full paper is available at the ICES Journal of Marine Science.