Genetic and life-history changes associated with fisheries-induced population collapse.

ABSTRACT: Over the recent years, growing number of studies suggests that intensive size-selective fishing can cause evolutionary changes in life-history traits in the harvested population, which can have drastic negative effects on populations, ecosystems and fisheries. However, most studies to date have overlooked the potential role of immigration of fish with different phenotypes as an alternative plausible mechanism behind observed phenotypic trends. Here, we investigated the evolutionary consequences of intensive fishing simultaneously at phenotypic and molecular level in Eurasian perch (Perca fluviatilis L.) population in the Baltic Sea over a 24-year period. We detected marked changes in size- and age-distributions and increase in juvenile growth rate. We also observed reduction of age

SUBMITTER: Pukk L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5779128 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature