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Jellyfish swarms affect littoral ecosystems, are unpleasant for bathers and jeopardize coastal socio-economic sectors. Anticipating the incidence of jellyfish swarms could be useful for implementing preventive management measures. Macroclimatic indices are good candidates for this type of anticipation since they are macro-ecologically related to oceanographic characteristics that affect marine species after a certain time lag. An increase of jellyfish swarms has been recently reported in the Mediterranean Sea. From 2005 to 2018, jellyfish swarms in the littoral of the province of Malaga (Spain, northwest coast of the Alboran Sea), mainly formed by the mauve stinger (Pelagia noctiluca), were frequent during summer. We recorded data on jellyfish swarm incidence in the province of Malaga from 2005 to 2018 using the reports in local newspapers, searches in Google Search Engine, and a citizen science application for mobile phones as information sources. With this information, we classified the period in years of low, medium and high incidence of jellyfish swarms. Then, we tested if the known effects of the Arctic Oscillation (AO) and North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) in winter on the sea surface temperature (SST) during the year, which in turn affects the proliferation of jellyfish, could explain the inter-annual variation in this incidence. Our hypothesis significantly explained the variation in the medium versus low incidence of jellyfish swarms, with medium incidence in the summers of higher SST. This suggests that medium incidence of jellyfish swarms was caused by the proliferation of jellyfish. This also suggests that years of medium incidence of jellyfish in the beach during summer could be anticipated by computing the average AO and NAO values of the previous winter. Years of high incidence of swarms could not be explained by this process. We speculate that they may be caused by a change in the distribution of the swarms rather than by proliferation. Jellyfish may be pushed from the pelagic western anticyclonic gyre of the Alboran Sea to the northern coast by eddies that are formed when, as recent literature has shown, this gyre is weakened by westerly winds and the Atlantic jet. Citizen science has contributed useful data to build macroecological models that may result in better management plans based on scientific data.
Oceans are complex systems and problems preventing a sustainable future require complex solutions. This can be achieved through innovative blends of natural and social sciences, with input from stakeholders. There is growing expectation that early career researchers (ECR), especially conservationists, should be more than natural scientists. ECR are expected to have skills in several domains, not all important to the quality of their work. Scientific skills range from knowledge of complex statistics to programming, and experience in different scientific fields. It is not only impossible to master all such tasks in a lifetime, much less as an ECR, but most importantly, attempting to do so means an ECR cannot master any single skill. This is especially true for minorities, non-native English speakers, and those who must juggle doing science with little or no funding, while having other jobs and family commitments. ECR are also expected to participate in activities that, while important for conservation, do not necessarily improve their scientific skills. These are social skills and range from policy engagement to science communication. This can contribute to developing mental health issues as it hinders having a healthy work-life balance. This expectation of engaging in extracurricular activities can overwhelm people with social anxiety and other difficulties with social interactions (e.g., people in the autism spectrum). Through collaborations, we can effectively draw on the more specialized skills of various people. Building an inclusive scientific community for ECR, therefore, calls for seeing diversity of skills, thoughts, and personality traits as its strength.
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