Publications
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Lake Ontario benthic prey fish assessment, 2016
Benthic prey fishes are a critical component of the Lake Ontario food web, serving as energy vectors from benthic invertebrates to native and introduced piscivores. Beginning in 1978, Lake Ontario benthic prey fishes were assessed using bottom trawls collected from the lake’s south shore (depth range: 8 – 150 m). Historically, the survey targeted the then dominant species, Slimy Sculpin, however
Authors
Brian C. Weidel, Maureen Walsh, Jeremy P. Holden, Michael J. Connerton
Status and trends in the Lake Superior fish community, 2016
In 2016, the Lake Superior fish community was sampled with daytime bottom trawls at 76 nearshore and 35 offshore stations. Spring and summer water temperatures in 2016 were warmer than average and considerably warmer than observed in 2014 and 2015. In the nearshore zone, a total of 17,449 individuals from 20 species or morphotypes were collected. Nearshore lakewide mean biomass was 2.2 kg/ha, whic
Authors
Mark Vinson, Lori M. Evrard, Owen T. Gorman, Daniel Yule
Fisheries research and monitoring activities of the Lake Erie Biological Station, 2016
We conducted a biomass-based assessment of the Lake Erie Western Basin fish community using data collected from 2013-2016 Western Basin (spring and autumn) bottom trawl surveys. Biomass of total catch per hectare has decreased 75 percent since 2013. Declines were observed across all functional groups, but most notable was the decline of Emerald Shiner, which decreased from 25.3 kg/ha in spring 201
Authors
Betsy L. Bodamer Scarbro, Richard T. Kraus, Patrick Kočovský, Christopher Vandergoot
Acoustic assessment of pelagic planktivores, 2016
Alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus) and Rainbow Smelt (Osmerus mordax) are the most abundant pelagic planktivores in Lake Ontario (Weidel et al 2017), and the most important prey for salmon and trout, making up greater than 90% of the diet of the top predator, Chinook salmon (Lantry 2001, Brandt 1986), and supporting a multimillion dollar sportfishery. Alewife are also important prey for warm water pre
Authors
Jeremy P. Holden, Michael J. Connerton, Brian C. Weidel
Social-ecological outcomes in recreational fisheries: The interaction of lakeshore development and stocking
Many ecosystems continue to experience rapid transformations due to processes like land use change and resource extraction. A systems approach to maintaining natural resources focuses on how interactions and feedbacks among components of complex social‐ecological systems generate social and ecological outcomes. In recreational fisheries, residential shoreline development and fish stocking are two
Authors
Jacob P. Ziegler, Elizabeth J. Golebie, Stuart E. Jones, Brian C. Weidel, Christopher T. Solomon
Nutrients, phytoplankton, zooplankton, and macrobenthos
Lower trophic levels support the prey fish on which most sport fish depend. Therefore, understanding the production potential of lower trophic levels is integral to the management of Lake Ontario’s fishery resources. Lower trophic-level productivity differs among offshore and nearshore waters. In the offshore, there is concern about the ability of the lake to support Alewife (Table 1) production d
Authors
Lars G. Rudstam, Kristen T. Holeck, James M. Watkins, Christopher Hotaling, Jana R. Lantry, Kelly L. Bowen, Mohi Munawar, Brian C. Weidel, Richard Barbiero, Frederick J. Luckey, Alice Dove, Timothy B. Johnson, Zy Biesinger
Sub-indicator: Prey fish
Prey fish communities across the Great Lakes continue to change, although the direction and magnitude of those changes are not consistent across the lakes. The metrics used to categorize prey fish status in this and previous periods are based on elements that are common among each of the lake’s Fish Community Objectives and include diversity and the relative role of native species in the prey fish
Authors
Brian C. Weidel, Erin Dunlop
Ciscoes (Coregonus, subgenus Leucichthys) of the Laurentian Great Lakes and Lake Nipigon
This study of the ciscoes (Coregonus, subgenus Leucichthys) of the Great Lakes and Lake Nipigon represents a furtherance through 2015 of field research initiated by Walter Koelz in 1917 and continued by Stanford Smith in the mid-1900s—a period spanning nearly a century. Like Koelz’s study, this work contains information on taxonomy, geographical distribution, ecology, and status of species (here c
Authors
Randy L. Eshenroder, Paul Vecsei, Owen T. Gorman, Daniel Yule, Thomas C. Pratt, Nicholas E. Mandrak, David B. Bunnell, Andrew M. Muir
Migratory-stage sea lamprey Petromyzon marinus stop responding to conspecific damage-released alarm cues after 4 h of continuous exposure in laboratory conditions
This study investigated the length of avoidance response of migratory-stage sea lamprey Petromyzon marinus exposed continuously to conspecific damage-released alarm cues for varying lengths of time in laboratory stream channels. Ten replicate groups of P. marinus, separated by sex, were exposed to either deionized water control or to P. marinus extract for 0, 2 or 4 h continuously. Petromyzon mari
Authors
Istvan Imre, Richard T. Di Rocco, Haley McClure, Nicholas S. Johnson, Grant E. Brown
Evidence for partial overlap of male olfactory cues in lampreys
Animals rely on a mosaic of complex information to find and evaluate mates. Pheromones, often comprised of multiple components, are considered to be particularly important for species-recognition in many species. While the evolution of species-specific pheromone blends is well-described in many insects, very few vertebrate pheromones have been studied in a macro-evolutionary context. Here, we repo
Authors
Tyler J. Buchinger, Ke Li, Mar Huertas, Cindy F. Baker, Liang Jia, Michael C. Hayes, Weiming Li, Nicholas S. Johnson
Graphical function mapping as a new way to explore cause-and-effect chains
Graphical function mapping provides a simple method for improving communication within interdisciplinary research teams and between scientists and nonscientists. This article introduces graphical function mapping using two examples and discusses its usefulness. Function mapping projects the outcome of one function into another to show the combined effect. Using this mathematical property in a simp
Authors
Mary Anne Evans