Research in Living Resources

• Goals
• Accomplishments

Coordinator: James F. Kitchell, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Virtually nonexistent 30 years ago, the Great Lakes sport fishery today generates more than $4 billion in regional economic activity. The Great Lakes also support a small but active commercial fishery with an annual dockside catch valued at $270 million. The rebirth of these fisheries has resulted in the economic revival of many Great Lakes coastal communities. In Wisconsin, healthy fisheries prompted massive waterfront revitalization projects during the 1970s and 1980s in the Lake Michigan coastal communities of Kenosha, Port Washington, Sheboygan and Kewaunee.

Great Lakes fisheries still face myriad challenges, however. The fisheries could not exist without continuous control of the parasitic sea lamprey. Many native fish species have been lost, and the sport fishery now is largely dependent on hatchery-raised and stocked exotic species like coho and chinook salmon. The carrying capacity of the aquatic forage base is in question. Despite better controls, toxic contaminants like polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) continue to show up in some fish species. Recent declines in salmon catch rates and sporadic evidence of high mortality due to diseases raise the question of sustainability in these intensively managed systems. Balancing commercial and sport harvests remains a difficult policy issue. State and federal agencies must now deal with the conflict between growing public expectations and the poorly understood ecological constraints imposed by species interactions.

Great Lakes ecosystems are undergoing rapid and continuous change due in part to management actions that reduce nutrient and contaminant loading and those that alter biological communities. In addition, the invasion and management of exotic species can compromise long-term goals of restoring and rehabilitating native communities.

In order to best use our Great Lakes resources, we need to better understand how species interact within the ecosystem. The University of Wisconsin Sea Grant College Program will continue to be a leader in developing ecosystem perspectives for aquatic resource management.

 

The long-range goals of the Living Resources Subprogram are to:

• Understand the processes and mechanisms that structure biological communities and ecosystem interactions

• Account for variability in community populations and to develop ecosystem-based management options that can respond to or alter that variability

• Produce creative research applications that foster the development, sustainable use and wise allocation of marine and aquatic living resources.

 

Research priorities and emerging issues in the Living Resources Subprogram include:

• The role of nonindigenous species in the Great Lakes ecosystems, including analyses of aquatic invasions (e.g., what makes an ecosystem invasible, what characterizes successful invaders, how food webs incorporate exotic species)

• Interactions throughout Great Lakes food webs, particularly those within:
  • nearshore communities
  • non-commercial and non-game fish populations

• Characterization of the present allocation of forage fish species among predator species and the probable impacts of alternative management strategies on that distribution

• Development of sustainable ecosystem resources, including:
  • the role of habitat in fostering and maintaining biodiversity in the Great Lakes
  • the relative merits of artificial put-and-take fisheries versus naturally reproducing fisheries based on restoration/rehabilitation of native species
  • management options to ensure dependable, long-term benefits from Great Lakes resources.

 

This page created 1995
Last updated 21 September 2000 by Wittman
© University of Wisconsin Sea Grant Institute
designed by Tina Yao tlyao@seagrant.wisc.edu

http://www.seagrant.wisc.edu/Research/Living/research.html