Steller Sea Lions, Herring and the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill
Tuesday, May 9th at 7:00 PM
By Richard E. Thorne, PWSSC
Meet at the Forest Service conference room upstairs.
There are currently two competing models for the herring collapse. The difference is critical. If the collapse began in 1989, coincident with EVOS, then there is a strong argument that the oil spill was an important factor in the collapse. This talk presents recent evidence that Steller sea lion abundance in Prince William Sound is strongly correlated with herring biomass and began to decline immediately after the oil spill. Thus the pattern of Steller sea lion decline in PWS provides additional evidence that the herring collapse began shortly after EVOS, rather than four years later.
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