Newsletter of the STAGES Early Life History Section of the American Fisheries Society Volume 31, Number 1 Lee A. Fuiman, Editor February 2010 Inside this issue President’s Message ........... 1 “21st Century Larval Fish Biology: News from the Regions ....... 2 Responding to a Changing Environment” Section Officers ................... 2 is the theme of the 34th annual Larval Fish Conference to be held Upcoming Events ................ 5 in Santa Fe, New Mexico, May 30 - June 3, 2010. This year’s People ................................. 6 conference will be held at the Fort Marcy Hotel Suites in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA. The hotel is located amidst nine acres of natural Publications ......................... 8 and landscaped grounds and gardens and is just a four-block walk Editor’s Ramblings .............11 from the historic downtown Santa Fe Plaza. Co-organizers for the conference are Ione Hunt von Herbing, University of North Texas ([email protected]), and Joan Holt, Marine Science Institute, ELHS Back Then University of Texas at Austin ([email protected]). nd 5 years ago: 29th LFC held at Univer- Early registration closes March 22 and abstract submission sity Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. closes on March 24th, 2010; late registration ends on May 15th. 10 years ago: Section approves its Please see the Larval Fish Conference website for more details first subvention to support creation (www.larvalfishcon.org). of a new book. 15 years ago: Tom Miller gives the ELHS newsletter a new look and a ...continued on p. 5 new name: STAGES 20 years ago: Section membership climbs to 39 countries on six President’s Message continents. 25 years ago: ELHS newsletter I am really looking forward and juveniles are all fair game. The name publishes its very first photo, a to the Larval Fish Conference Larval Fish Conference is just simpler than shot of the Section’s Executive in May. First, the LFC is a the Non-Adult Stage Fish Conference or the Committee (Nancy Auer, Joan great meeting: small enough Early Life Stage Fish Conference. Also, the Holt, Bill Matthews, Bob Muth, Bob Hoyt, Neal Foster, and Fred to have a sense of community Fish in Larval Fish Conference is broadly Binkowski). and to allow plenty of defined. There have been sessions on larval 30 years ago: At the 4th annual Larval opportunity to meet and talk cephalopods and talks on the early life Fish Conference, Van Conner with other scientists, but large enough to stages of crabs and clams. Again, the LFC is reported first evidence for natural have a diverse array of interesting sessions just easier than the Larval Fish and Shellfish reproduction of grass carp in US. and presentations. The LFC is so unlike those Conference or the Larval Living Aquatic monstrous meetings where talks continue Resources Conference. So for those of you likes chocolates on an assembly line and you who feel limited by the name, understand are lucky to see someone twice even if you that the LFC is inclusive and covers a broad are sharing a room with them. array of taxa, stages, and disciplines. That Deadline for material Second, the focus of the LFC is unique said, I have been hearing rumors of a future to be included in the - well almost unique. The meeting doesn’t bid that hopes to organize a joint Larval next issue of Stages: revolve around a discipline. Rather it centers Fish Conference / Larval Biology Meeting on the unique challenges of studying the early sometime this decade. Maybe we will find May 1, 2010 life stages of fishes. The LFC encompasses out more at the Early Life History Section much more than the name implies. It is not Business Meeting. limited to larvae: reproduction, eggs, larvae ...continued on p. 11 Stages News from the Regions European Pacific Rim Region Region Audrey Geffen Iain Suthers From: Francisco Alemany, From: Lynnath Beckley, Larval ecology and Murdoch University recruitment group, Centro At Murdoch University in Fremantle, Oceanográfico de Baleares Western Australia, work has continued on larval fish assemblages associated del Instituto Español de with the Leeuwin Current and its eddies. Oceanografía, Spain sensors, and water samples at different Lynnath Beckley and co-authors have depth were obtained from a rosette of Our team works on ELH of a variety recently reviewed what is known about Niskin bottles for nutrients and chlorophylls of taxonomic groups; but at present is larval fishes off Western Australia as part determination. In addition, several plankton mainly focused on Atlantic Bluefin (ABT) of the proceedings of the Leeuwin Current hauls were carried out: oblique tows with and related species larval ecology. This Symposium (J Roy Soc WA 92:101-109). Bongo 60 nets fitted with 200 and 333 μm line of research was initiated in 2001 by meshes; Bongo 90 equipped with 500 μm David Holliday has completed his PhD a multidisciplinary group of the Spanish meshes sub-surface horizontal tows and which examined the cross-shelf transport Institute of Oceanography (IEO) (www. vertical micro-zooplankton tows by means and incorporation of larval fishes into an ieo.es), including ichthyoplanktologists, of Calvet nets. Part of ABT and other tuna evolving anticyclonic (warm-core) Leeuwin fisheries biologists, and chemical and (albacore, bullet tuna) larvae were sorted Current eddy. This research, supervised physical oceanographers from several IEO on board and preserved in liquid nitrogen by Lynnath and Dr Ming Feng (a physical labs. Within the framework of the TUNIBAL for nucleic acids and daily growth analysis oceanographer from CSIRO), was part project, whose immediate general object- to determine larval condition. Preliminary of a larger interdisciplinary biophysical ives were to determine the influence of investigation of Leeuwin Current eddies ...continued on p. 9 environmental factors on the location of which covered everything from physics ABT spawning areas and to characterize to fish! Larval fish assemblages from the environmental scenarios favoring shelf and offshore waters within the ABT larvae survival, five summer eddy field were sampled using neuston, hydrographic-planktonic surveys were bongo, and depth-stratified EZ nets, and carried out off the Balearic Islands, one these data were supported by concurrent of the main spawning areas of the ABT oceanographic measurements (CTD, eastern stock. Around 200 stations, ADCP, etc). The dynamic oceanography, located on the nodes of a 10 x 10 nautical particularly large-scale mixing, was mile regular grid, were sampled by year. reflected in the waters of the eddy as At each station a hydrographic profile well as the larval fish assemblages. The was performed by means of a Seabird onshore-offshore distributions of meso- 911 CTD, equipped with turbidity, pelagic and neritic fishes highlighted fluorimetry and dissolved oxygen ...continued on p. 3 Section Officers President Secretary Treasurer Jon Hare Ione Hunt von Herbing Elisabeth H. Laban NMFS, NE Fisheries Science Center North Texas University National Ocean Service Narragansett Laboratory Biological Sciences Department NOAA Beaufort Laboratory [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] President-Elect Secretary-Elect HELP US Susan Sogard Catriona Clemmesen UPDATE OUR NMFS, SW Fisheries Science Center Leibniz Institute of Marine Science RECORDS... Fisheries Ecology Division Kiel, Germany [email protected] [email protected] Verify your email and postal address with our Secretary. 2 AFS - Early Life History Section February 2010 Oregon, and will be presented again at the Western 2010 PICES Climate Change symposium in Japan in April. A manuscript has also been Region submitted to Fisheries Oceanography: Auth, T.D., Brodeur, R.D., Soulen, H.L., Ciannelli, L., and Peterson, W.T. (Submitted). An Dan Margulies investigation of the response of fish larvae to decadal changes in environmental forcing factors off the Oregon coast. From: Hatfield Marine Science 2) We have conducted monthly Center ichthyoplankton sampling along four A substantial amount of early life Pilar Olivar from Barcelona visiting the Murdoch transects in the NCC from May to history research had been conducted in Fremantle lab to assist with identification of larval September from 2004 to the present as part the northern California Current (NCC) in myctophids from the Leeuwin Current. Left to right of the Stock Assessment Improvement Plan the 1970s by Sally Richardson and her David Holliday, Pilar Olivar, Lynnath Beckley and (SAIP) project. The 489 ichthyoplankton collaborators and again in the 1980s by Natalie Millar. samples collected from 28 monthly cruises Miriam Doyle and colleagues at the Alaska between May and October/November vigorous cross-shelf transport processes. Fisheries Science Center (AFSC). After a during the six study years yielded 16,524 The occurrence of the larvae of near-shore lengthy hiatus, interest in early life history fish larvae comprising 60 taxa in 30 fishes such as Gobiidae and Tripterygiidae, has been renewed under a cooperative families. The dominant taxa, comprising in the eddy (200 nm offshore) indicated research program between the Northwest 94% of the total larvae collected, were: their incorporation into the poleward flowing Fisheries Science Center and Oregon State Engraulis mordax (northern anchovy), Leeuwin Current from lower latitudes north University researchers based at the Hatfield Sebastes spp. (rockfishes), Stenobrachius of the eddy field. Examination of the vertical Marine Science Center in Newport, Oregon. leucopsarus (northern lanternfish), distributions of