Rapid restructuring of the odontocete community in an ocean warming hotspot.

ABSTRACT: Cetaceans are important consumers in marine ecosystems, but few studies have quantified their climate responses. The rapid, directional warming occurring in the Northeast United States (NEUS) provides a unique opportunity to assess climate impacts on cetaceans. We used stranding data to examine changes to the distribution and relative abundance of odontocetes from 1996 to 2020 in both the NEUS and the Southeast United States (SEUS), which is not warming. We conducted simulations to determine the number of stranding events needed to detect a distributional shift for each species given the speed of the shift and the spatial variability in strandings. We compared observed shifts to climate velocity. Smaller sample sizes were needed to detect more rapid poleward shifts, particularly for specie

SUBMITTER: Thorne LH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9804436 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature