As more and more commercial fishers compete for fewer and fewer fish, ecologists are beginning to explore the impact. What happens when all or most of the big fish are caught? Does the rest of the ecosystem somehow compensate?
As we do each week, Kevin Zelnio, Razib Khan, and I have chosen a journal article to discuss in podcast form. We make sure it’s an article that we or someone else has covered on their blog, so ideally, you’ll read the blog post first to get a general understanding of the research, then listen to our podcast to hear our impressions. Here’s the article we’re discussing this week:
Shackell, N., Frank, K., Fisher, J., Petrie, B., & Leggett, W. (2009). Decline in top predator body size and changing climate alter trophic structure in an oceanic ecosystem Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 277 (1686), 1353-1360 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2009.1020
The article was blogged by Daniel Bassett on Fish Schooled:
Prey populations explode as predators get smaller
Since this remains an experimental project, we’d appreciate any feedback you can offer on the podcast.
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