Fish Habitat Partnerships – Local, Regional, and National Collaboration to Conserve Aquatic Habitats

Fish Habitat Partnerships bring together diverse groups of public and private partners as well as local communities, to conserve fish habitats. Fish Habitat Partnerships support local and regional efforts to strategically plan and implement aquatic habitat conservation programs, contribute technical and financial support for conservation projects, support regional assessments of fish habitats, and maintain data systems to document and report on the status of aquatic systems at multiple scales. Speakers in this symposium will discuss Fish Habitat Partnership contributions to projects that result in measurable conservation outcomes for resident and migratory fish in freshwater, estuarine, and coastal fish habitats. Topics will include descriptions of the leadership role that Fish Habitat Partnerships play in collaboration among multiple organizations, and will highlight engagement of Native Hawaiian, tribal, and Alaska Native partners to conserve aquatic habitats and improve subsistence, recreational, and commercial fisheries.

Organizer: Gordon Smith, Hawaii Fish Habitat Partnership, [email protected]

Co-organizers: Daniel Wieferich, Heidi Keuler, Simen Kaalstad

Fishery-independent Surveys: Maximizing Capabilities and Adapting to a Changing World

Indices derived from fishery-independent survey data are crucial inputs to stock assessments that are used to provide fishery management advice. Demands on fishery-independent surveys have increased as the climate changes, industries evolve, assessments increasingly incorporate ecosystem data, and competing ocean uses introduce operational challenges. Resources for conducting surveys have frequently not kept pace with the need to characterize increasingly dynamic populations and ecosystems. Fortunately, technological advances, survey designs, and statistical and computational developments have made it possible to collect and integrate large volumes of data more efficiently than ever before. Leveraging these advances will allow for the maximization of the limited resources allocated for fishery-independent surveys while ensuring surveys are robust to both predictable and unpredictable challenges While we adapt, maintaining the integrity of time series that underpin stock assessments is paramount. Here, we showcase technological, statistical, and operational solutions to challenges in fishery-independent surveys across aquatic environments.

Organizer: Derek Bolser, National Marine Fisheries Service, [email protected]

Co-organizers: Stan Kotwicki, Catherine Foley

Fostering New Perspectives in Marine and Estuarine Science

Effective management and conservation of marine and estuarine fish, fisheries, and habitats alongside expanding coastal development and novel climate regimes calls for innovative technologies and more inclusive approaches. Greater understanding of how living marine resources, and the communities that rely on those resources, respond and adapt to unprecedented environmental variation, such as rising temperatures, increased frequency and intensity of marine heatwaves, ocean acidification, hypoxia events, and eutrophication, is fundamental to progress. Such a multifaceted challenge requires transdisciplinary collaborations and education as well as novel insights. Furthermore, citizen science programs co-produce knowledge and enhance collaborations and expands stakeholder engagement. This symposium focuses on collaborative research that advances our understanding and management of marine and estuarine fisheries and the habitats that support them and particularly encourages contributions by students and early career professionals.

Organizer: Jessica Miller, Oregon State University, [email protected]

Co-organizers: Paulinus Chigbu, Dionne Hoskins-Brown, Susan Piacenza

Freshwater Mollusks of Ecological and Cultural Importance

Freshwater mollusks (Classes Bivalvia and Gastropoda) are largely understudied and underserved but often have significant historical and cultural significance to indigenous groups and are recognized for their vital ecological services. Freshwater mollusks are declining at rates disproportionate to other organismal groups, but these declines are often due to unknown causes or factors environmental or biological. This symposium will provide a platform for biological, cultural, ecological, political, or socioeconomic aspects of freshwater mollusk research, restoration, and/or reintroduction. The goals of this symposium are to 1) reach a wider fisheries-focused audience with the plight of freshwater mollusks, 2) connect researchers, policymakers, indigenous groups, and other mollusk professionals for cross-species collaborations and knowledge exchange, and 3) produce a special section featuring new and emerging freshwater mollusk research.

Organizer: Alexa Maine, CTUIR, [email protected]

Growing Fisheries Research and Management Through Angler Engagement

Anglers play an important role in providing scientists and managers with valuable data about the state of our fisheries. As new methods of angler engagement become commonplace, such as the use of mobile apps to assist in reporting, anglers are becoming ever more important to fisheries research. This symposium will build off the success of similar symposia in over the past four years, highlighting a diversity of projects that have been successful at engaging anglers to achieve a research objective, a management objective, or some other meaningful fisheries goal. An important outcome of this symposium will be a better understanding of the best practices that are necessary to achieve long-term angler engagement. Consistent with our theme of engaging anglers, we are also exploring ways we can make these presentations more accessible to anglers, such as Facebook Live.

Organizer: Sean Simmons, Angler’s Atlas, [email protected]

Co-organizers: Julia Byrd, Matt Perkinson, Dayv Lowry

Harmonizing Offshore Wind Energy Development and Marine Fisheries Research

With the growing demand for clean and renewable energy, offshore wind has become an emerging sector in the United States. U.S. Executive Order 14057, under President Biden, set a goal of generating 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2030. Large-scale development would benefit the U.S. in greenhouse gas mitigation, but further research on the impacts on marine biodiversity and fisheries is needed. Offshore wind farm installation and operation may affect fish and marine mammal habitat and behavior as well as the resiliency of local fishing communities. Cables and structures may change the foraging, orientation, and migration of fish species. Turbine structures may alter the schooling behavior of recreational and commercially important species as well as fishing access. Development and changing economic landscapes can alter community structures. Further research on impacts on protected species, offshore aquaculture, fisheries, benthic environments, and local communities is needed as offshore wind development increases.

Organizer: Kayland Huckaby, UMES Sub-Unit, [email protected]

Co-organizers: Jamon Jordan, Savannah Clax, Tahirah Johnson, Juan Ramos, Veronica Malabanan Lucchese, Michelle Fernandez

Highlighting the Cutting Edge: Graduate and Early Career Research in Genomics

Conservation Genomics is a burgeoning field due to the rapid evolution and recent advancements of ‘omics’ technologies. The use of high-throughput and long-read sequencing methods is changing both what we can ask and how we ask it. This symposium highlights the cutting edge of genomics research in fisheries and aquatic sciences by profiling the current research of graduate students and early career professionals. These researchers, who represent the next generation of evolutionary and conservation scientists, are often using the latest in genomic sequencing and analytic methodologies to answer important questions about the conservation of marine and aquatic ecosystems in the face of global change, while also leading the field in new directions.

Organizer: Mary Peacock, University of Nevada Reno, [email protected]

Co-organizers: Jared Homola, Samantha Straus, Alana Luzzio

Husbandry, Health and Happy Fish:  Advances and Innovations in Aquaculture

Global aquaculture production continues to increase and is valued at nearly $7 billion in 2019 and grew by 2.7% in 2020 (FAO 2020).  Aquaculture has a highly important role in supplying a sustainable seafood source, thus taking the pressure from wild stocks, and is an important stock enhancement tool.  As a result, the marine and freshwater aquaculture field has evolved substantially in recent years driven by an interest in local food sources and commercial products, supports healthier aquatic habitats, and is used to rebuild stocks of threatened or endangered species.  This symposium will review recent advances, lessons learned and share success stories on the role of aquaculture and it’s the growth seen within the United States both in the freshwater and newly emerging marine environments.

Organizer: Pam Sponholtz, US Fish and Wildlife Service, [email protected]

Co-organizers:Matthew Wipf, Dan Mosier II, Jesse Trushenski, Shane Ramee, Paige Maskill

Inclusive Outreach and Education for Inspiring the Next Generation

The demographic makeup of the existing workforce is the legacy of hundreds of years of oppression, exclusion, and continued implicit reinforcement. Increasing diversity will not happen passively, but requires identifying and dismantling barriers in the system and transforming how we recruit and retain the next generation of fisheries scientists. This session will feature discussing outreach and education initiatives in academia and for the public with the intention of advancing diversity and inclusion in the fisheries profession. This session showcases successful long-term efforts as well as innovative and trial efforts, the process for developing inclusive outreach and education initiatives, and discussion of challenges and brainstorming solutions. Examples of potential proposals include discussing 1) outreach initiatives for diverse audiences, 2) revisions to the fisheries curriculum and teaching content, 3) workshops and training summaries for educators in improving equity, accessibility, and inclusivity.

Organizer: Emily Chen, UC Berkeley, [email protected]