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Provision of a Technical Assessment: Role for Spatial Management

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Provision of a Technical Assessment: Role for Spatial Management OCEANS AND ATMOSPHER E FLAGSHIP Provision of a technical assessment: role for spatial management strategies in mitigating the potential direct and indirect effects of fishing by large mid-water trawl vessels in the small pelagic fishery on protected species (PRN 1314-0450) Toby Patterson 1, Rich Hilary 1, John Arnould 2, Mary-Anne Lea 3, Mark Hindell 3 1CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere Flagship, Castray Esplanade, Hobart TAS 7000. 2School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Deakin University, Melbourne Burwood Campus, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, VIC 3125 3Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania, Castray Esplanade, Hobart TAS 7000 Copyright and disclaimer © 2014 CSIRO To the extent permitted by law, all rights are reserved and no part of this publication covered by copyright may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means except with the written permission of CSIRO. Important disclaimer CSIRO advises that the information contained in this publication comprises general statements based on scientific research. The reader is advised and needs to be aware that such information may be incomplete or unable to be used in any specific situation. No reliance or actions must therefore be made on that information without seeking prior expert professional, scientific and technical advice. To the extent permitted by law, CSIRO (including its employees and consultants) excludes all liability to any person for any consequences, including but not limited to all losses, damages, costs, expenses and any other compensation, arising directly or indirectly from using this publication (in part or in whole) and any information or material contained in it. Contents Executive summary.......................................................................................................................................... viii 1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 11 1.1 Scope of the report and terms of reference ............................................................................. 12 2 An overview of the biology and population status of CPFMP ............................................................ 14 2.1 Australian fur seal ( Arctocephalus pusillus doriferus ) ............................................................... 14 2.2 New Zealand Fur seal ( Arctocephalus forsteri ) ......................................................................... 15 2.3 Short tailed shearwater ( Puffinus tenuirostris ) ......................................................................... 17 2.4 Little penguin ( Eudyptula minor ) .............................................................................................. 18 2.5 Australasian gannet ( Morus serrator ) ....................................................................................... 19 2.6 Australasian sea lion ( Neophoca cinerea ) ................................................................................. 20 3 Global examples of spatial management ............................................................................................ 23 3.1 Reactive management .............................................................................................................. 23 3.2 Precautionary management ..................................................................................................... 28 4 Methods for at-sea distribution and spatial consumption models .................................................... 34 4.1 Preprocessing of telemetry data............................................................................................... 34 4.2 Behavioral switching models .................................................................................................... 34 4.3 Foraging range predictor data collation ................................................................................... 35 4.4 At sea-distribution modelling ................................................................................................... 35 4.5 Proximity Models ...................................................................................................................... 35 4.6 Generalized additive models (GAMs) ....................................................................................... 36 4.7 Goodness of model fit ............................................................................................................... 37 4.8 Accounting for uncertainty in the spatial models ..................................................................... 37 5 Spatial model results ........................................................................................................................... 38 5.1 Summary of Bass Strait tracking data used in spatial case studies .......................................... 38 5.2 Habitat summaries .................................................................................................................... 46 5.3 Behavioral switching model results .......................................................................................... 50 5.4 Proportion of foraging effort at distances from the colony ..................................................... 60 5.5 At sea distribution model results .............................................................................................. 62 5.6 GAM Diagnostics ....................................................................................................................... 73 6 Diet and consumption results ............................................................................................................. 74 6.1 Diet data collation ..................................................................................................................... 74 6.2 Biomass consumption calculations ........................................................................................... 77 6.3 Caveats and biological uncertainties associated with diet and consumption characterization .................................................................................................................................. 78 7 Population Consumption models ........................................................................................................ 79 7.1 Predation response function .................................................................................................... 80 7.2 Uncertainty calculations ........................................................................................................... 81 8 Consumption model results ................................................................................................................ 83 8.1 Non-spatial consumption estimates ......................................................................................... 83 Technical Assessment (PRN 1314-0450) | i 8.2 Example of spatial consumption by area estimation ................................................................ 85 9 Characterization of predator vulnerability ......................................................................................... 87 10 Potential spatial management measures to reduce the risk of local depletion of prey species by fishing 89 11 Future Research and monitoring needs .............................................................................................. 92 11.1 Recommendations for monitoring and further data collection: .............................................. 92 11.2 Management Strategy Evaluation ............................................................................................ 94 12 Discussion ............................................................................................................................................ 98 13 Summary of findings and recommendations .................................................................................... 101 14 Bibliography ...................................................................................................................................... 104 Appendix 1 Colony abundance size and distribution ..................................................................................... 113 Appendix 2 Diet data ...................................................................................................................................... 114 Appendix 2A Diet data from various studies of SPF predators ......................................................... 114 Appendix 2B Listings of percent biomass consumption data ........................................................... 114 Appendix 3 Details of hidden Markov models for ARS categorization........................................................... 117 Appendix 4 Posterior simulation from GAMs ................................................................................................. 118 ii | Technical Assessment (PRN 1314-0450) Figures Figure 1. The distribution of Australian fur seal colonies in Australia. Each dot represents a breeding colony, with the size of the dot scales so the area of the symbol is proportional to the number of pups produced. Non-breeding haul-outs are not illustrated. Waters less than 500 m deep are shown in pale blue. .................................................................................................................................................................. 15 Figure 2. The distribution of New Zealand fur seal colonies in Australia.
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