Life histories determine divergent population trends for fishes under climate warming

Abstract

Most marine fish species express life-history changes across temperature gradients, such as faster growth, earlier maturation, and higher mortality at higher temperature. However, such climate-driven effects on life histories and population dynamics remain unassessed for most fishes. For 332 Indo-Pacific fishes, we show positive effects of temperature on body growth (but with decreasing asymptotic length), reproductive rates (including earlier age-atmaturation), and natural mortality for all species, with the effect strength varying among habitat-related species groups. Reef and demersal fishes are more sensitive to temperature changes than pelagic and bathydemersal fishes. Using a life table, we show that the combined changes of life histories upon increasing temperature tend to facilitate population growth for slow life-history populations, but reduce it for fast life-history ones. Within our data, lower proportions (25-30%) of slow life-history fishes but greater proportions of fast life-history fishes (42-60%) show declined population growth rates under 1°C warming. Together, these findings suggest prioritizing sustainable management for fast life-history species.

Optimum growth temperature declines with body size within fish species

“…Negative correlations between maximum size, asymptotic size, or size‐at‐age of old fish, and temperature have been found in commercially exploited fish species (Baudron et al, 2014; Ikpewe et al, 2020; van Rijn et al, 2017). However, other studies, including large‐scale experiments, controlled experiments and latitudinal studies, or observational data on unexploited species, have found no or less clear negative relationships between maximum size, growth of old fish, or mean size and temperature (Audzijonyte et al, 2020; Barneche et al, 2019; Denderen et al, 2020; van Dorst et al, 2019; Huss et al, 2019) and differences between species may be related to life‐history traits and depend on local environmental conditions (Denderen et al, 2020; Wang et al, 2020).…”

Optimum growth temperature declines with body size within fish species

“…Negative correlations between maximum size, asymptotic size or size-at-age of old fish and temperature have been found in commercially exploited fish species (Baudron et al, 2014;Ikpewe et al, 2020;van Rijn et al, 2017). However, other studies, including large scale experiments, controlled experiments and latitudinal studies or observational data on unexploited species, have found no or less clear negative relationships between maximum size, growth of old fish or mean size and temperature (Audzijonyte et al, 2020;Barneche et al, 2019;Denderen et al, 2020;Huss et al, 2019;van Dorst et al, 2019) and differences between species may be related to life history traits and depend on local environmental conditions (Denderen et al, 2020;Wang et al, 2020).…”

Within- and Trans-Generational Environmental Adaptation to Climate Change: Perspectives and New Challenges

“…Furthermore, organisms' life history traits represent how variable the environmental changes are in their habitat (Hovel et al, 2017;Chaparro-Pedraza and de Roos, 2019). Consequently, changes in the species geographic distribution and its realized niche induced by climate variability can impact these traits (de Roos and Persson, 2013;Wang et al, 2020;Chaudhary et al, 2021). For example, the reproductive strategies of the majority of species depend on environmental conditions (e.g., temperature, salinity, light:dark cycles, and food availability).…”

“…The effects of climate change can also affect species differentially based on their lifespan and generation time. For example, in comparison to taxa with short-generation times (benthopelagic and reef fishes; up to 5 years), accelerated development and life histories due to global warming can lead to lower mortality and higher fecundity earlier in life in taxa with long-generation times (elasmobranch, bathydemersal, demersal; over 10 years) (Wang et al, 2020). In addition, simulation models suggest that species that possess long lifespans, relative to the change in environmental conditions, may be more plastic in comparison to species with short lifespan (Ratikainien and Kokkoo, 2020).…”