Review of the<i>Exxon Valdez</i>Oil Spill Effects on Pink Salmon in Prince William Sound, Alaska

Brannon, Ernest L.; Collins, Keya M.; Cronin, Matthew A.; Moulton, Larry L.; Maki, AW; Parker, Keith R.

doi:10.1080/10641262.2011.643697

Cited by 10 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…For example, the PWS population of herring suffered a well-documented collapse in 1993, resulting in a closure of the commercial fishery, and to date, the population has not recovered [ 17 , 18 ]. Similarly, low returns of pink salmon to PWS also occurred in 1992 and 1993, [ 19 , 20 ], and Willette et al [ 21 ] proposed that Coghill Lake sockeye had been impacted by EVOS as juveniles in the nearshore environment. While the majority of studies investigating EVOS impacts have not found strong effects [ 12 , 22 ], a number of confounding hypotheses have been proposed for explaining observed changes in fish population dynamics; these include disease, variation in the ocean environment, changes in spawning habitat, changes in interactions between species, intraspecific density dependence, and increases in predation from higher trophic level species, such as marine birds and mammals [ 12 , 13 , 23 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluating signals of oil spill impacts, climate, and species interactions in Pacific herring and Pacific salmon populations in Prince William Sound and Copper River, Alaska

et al. 2017

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The Exxon Valdez oil spill occurred in March 1989 in Prince William Sound, Alaska, and was one of the worst environmental disasters on record in the United States. Despite long-term data collection over the nearly three decades since the spill, tremendous uncertainty remains as to how significantly the spill affected fishery resources. Pacific herring (Clupea pallasii) and some wild Pacific salmon populations (Oncorhynchus spp.) in Prince William Sound declined in the early 1990s, and have not returned to the population sizes observed in the 1980s. Discerning if, or how much of, this decline resulted from the oil spill has been difficult because a number of other physical and ecological drivers are confounded temporally with the spill; some of these drivers include environmental variability or changing climate regimes, increased production of hatchery salmon in the region, and increases in populations of potential predators. Using data pre- and post-spill, we applied time-series methods to evaluate support for whether and how herring and salmon productivity has been affected by each of five drivers: (1) density dependence, (2) the EVOS event, (3) changing environmental conditions, (4) interspecific competition on juvenile fish, and (5) predation and competition from adult fish or, in the case of herring, humpback whales. Our results showed support for intraspecific density-dependent effects in herring, sockeye, and Chinook salmon, with little overall support for an oil spill effect. Of the salmon species, the largest driver was the negative impact of adult pink salmon returns on sockeye salmon productivity. Herring productivity was most strongly affected by changing environmental conditions; specifically, freshwater discharge into the Gulf of Alaska was linked to a series of recruitment failures—before, during, and after EVOS. These results highlight the need to better understand long terms impacts of pink salmon on food webs, as well as the interactions between nearshore species and freshwater inputs, particularly as they relate to climate change and increasing water temperatures.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluating signals of oil spill impacts, climate, and species interactions in Pacific herring and Pacific salmon populations in Prince William Sound and Copper River, Alaska

et al. 2017

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“…Wertheimer et al (2001) posited that the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill could account for the divergent pattern of abundance in PWS wild pink salmon. However, recent estimates of the impact of the spill on PWS pink salmon are modest, and the populations have been considered fully recovered from spill impacts since 2002 (Quinn et al 2002;Brannon et al 2012;EVOSTC 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Measuring the net biological impact of fisheries enhancement: pink salmon hatcheries can increase yield, but with apparent costs to wild populations

Amoroso

Tillotson

Hilborn

2017

Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci.

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Hatchery production of juvenile fish for release into the wild has been practiced for well over a century in an effort to increase the number of salmon available to harvest. In this study, we evaluate the net impact of the largest such program in North America, the hatchery program for pink salmon (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha) in Prince William Sound (PWS), Alaska. At the same time the hatchery program was increasing in output, there was a major change in productivity in the North Pacific so that throughout Alaska pink salmon increased dramatically in abundance between the 1970s and the 2000s. Using other regions of Alaska as reference sites, we estimate that the PWS hatchery program has increased the total catch by an average of 17 million fish, of which 8 million have been allocated to pay hatchery operating expenses. We estimate that the maximum sustainable yield (MSY) of wild spawning fish in PWS has increased slightly (28%), while in regions of Alaska without pink salmon hatchery programs the MSY has tripled. Our results support the use of a precautionary approach to future large-scale stock enhancement efforts.

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“…On the contrary, Guo et al found that the oil spill caused abnormal chlorophyll concentration distributions which led to an outbreak of red tide [17]. The impact of oil spill on zooplankton is generally considered detrimental [18][19][20]. Gesteira and Dauvin noted that the benthic community structure could be altered by concentrations of petroleum hydrocarbons in sediment <50 ppm, and some species may be excluded at concentrations <10 ppm [21].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Assessment of Marine Ecosystem Damage from the Penglai 19-3 Oil Spill Accident

Han

Huang

Liu³

et al. 2021

JMSE

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Oil spills have immediate adverse effects on marine ecological functions. Accurate assessment of the damage caused by the oil spill is of great significance for the protection of marine ecosystems. In this study the observation data of Chaetoceros and shellfish before and after the Penglai 19-3 oil spill in the Bohai Sea were analyzed by the least-squares fitting method and radial basis function (RBF) interpolation. Besides, an oil transport model is provided which considers both the hydrodynamic mechanism and monitoring data to accurately simulate the spatial and temporal distribution of total petroleum hydrocarbons (TPH) in the Bohai Sea. It was found that the abundance of Chaetoceros and shellfish exposed to the oil spill decreased rapidly. The biomass loss of Chaetoceros and shellfish are 7.25×1014~7.28×1014 ind and 2.30×1012~2.51×1012 ind in the area with TPH over 50 mg/m3 during the observation period, respectively. This study highlights the evaluation of ecological resource loss caused by the oil spill, which is useful for the protection and restoration of the biological resources following the oil spill.

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Review of theExxon ValdezOil Spill Effects on Pink Salmon in Prince William Sound, Alaska

Cited by 10 publications

References 47 publications

Evaluating signals of oil spill impacts, climate, and species interactions in Pacific herring and Pacific salmon populations in Prince William Sound and Copper River, Alaska

Evaluating signals of oil spill impacts, climate, and species interactions in Pacific herring and Pacific salmon populations in Prince William Sound and Copper River, Alaska

Measuring the net biological impact of fisheries enhancement: pink salmon hatcheries can increase yield, but with apparent costs to wild populations

An Assessment of Marine Ecosystem Damage from the Penglai 19-3 Oil Spill Accident

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