Citation: Chu, C., Holbrook, B., Sandstrom, S. and M.S. Poesch. (2024) Cold water fish sampling in small standing waters. In Standard Methods for Sampling North American Freshwater Fishes (2nd edition), Merrcado, S. and K. Pope (eds.), American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, MY.
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Abstract:
Canada is a country rich in natural resources. Given the importance of both resource extraction to Canada’s economy and freshwater fishes, I synthesize available information to assess Canada’s ability to monitor the impacts of tailings ponds to freshwater fishes. Using widely available data, I found that current monitoring activities can only assess large effects to freshwater fishes. These results suggest that environmental monitoring may fall victim to the ‘shifting baseline syndrome’, where contemporary changes to freshwater ecosystems are compared to relatively recent time periods after which impacts may have already occurred. I then use the example of recent tailing pond failures in western Canada, among the worst in North American history, to describe the inherent risk of tailings pond structures. Unlike oil tanker spills, the rates of tailing spills have significantly increased in the past few decades, the majority from faulty infrastructure. With over one billion cubic meters of tailings held in containment systems covering 110 km 2 in the oil sands region, I use the Obed and Mount Polley as a cautionary tale of the risk of failing pond infrastructure. Finally, I provide a contemporary perspective on how to improve the monitoring of Canada’s tailings ponds. I highlight the need for consistency in regulatory and monitoring approaches, the need for an engaged citizenry, and the use of fisheries
professionals, as means of improving environmental monitoring activities.
Citation: M. S. Poesch. (2023) Assessing the Potential Risks of Tailing Ponds Failures to Aquatic Ecosystems in Canada. In Perspectives in Canadian Fisheries, Cooke, S. , Hasler, C., Mandrak, N.E.M. and J. Imhof (eds.). American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, MD, USA
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Abstract:
Maintaining the viability and sustainability of freshwater fisheries lies at the heart of the intersection between fisheries science, management, and policy. In response to changing biotic and abiotic drivers, fisheries science has advanced considerably in recent years, becoming more integrative, multi-disciplinary, and diverse. We have not only gained a better understanding of fish, ecosystems, and fisheries, but have started to bridge the gap between science, management, and policy. Despite notable successes of fisheries science and management in Canada, our fisheries face a number of threats, including climate change, invasive species, habitat degradation, regulated rivers and water demands, and overexploitation. How we address these threats will be determined in part by the way we value knowledge from diverse sources. With such uncertainty on the horizon, there is value in taking a philosophical view of the future of freshwater fisheries in Canada. Our objective is to provide an overview of risk factors relevant to Canadian freshwater fisheries from the perspectives of a diverse team of primarily early-career fisheries scientists. We integrate our prognostications to provide an outlook for the future of freshwater fisheries science, management, and policy in Canada.
Citation: Donaldson, M., Eliason, E., Jeffries, K., Poesch, M.S., Drake, D.A.R., Braun, D., Hasler, C., Nguyen, V., Raby, G., Lennox, R., Swanson, H., Favaro, B., Bower, S. and S.J. Cooke. (2023) Early career perspectives on the future of freshwater fisheries science, management and policy in Canada. In Perspectives in Canadian Fisheries, Cooke, S. (ed.). American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, MD, USA.
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Abstract:
Climate change is impacting freshwater fishes, and their habitats around the world. In Canada, there are 213 fish species that use freshwater habitat throughout all or some of their life cycle. These ecosystems and fishes are critically important to Canadians. Climate-related changes in habitats are impacting the ecological and biological processes of fishes, including their distributions, demography, phenology, evolution, and assemblage dynamics, as well as the availability of fisheries resources in different lakes and rivers of Canada. The available evidence suggests that the direction of these effects (positive, neutral, or negative) are dependent upon the interplay among the magnitude of changes, and the traits and ecology of the species that are experiencing those changes. Many avenues of research are still needed; ranging from understanding the genetic adaptive potential of individual species, understanding thermal bottlenecks for species and adaptation measures, and understanding how climate change interacts with other stresses to affect the status of fishes and fisheries. The most direct way to combat climate change is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to protect and restore natural carbon sinks, both through broad-scale institutional and societal change. However, complementary adaptation actions that include legislation, policies, management, regulation, research, restoration, translocation, and stewardship are starting to be implemented in different jurisdictions across Canada. The collective uptake of these actions will ensure the sustainability of freshwater ecosystems, fishes, and fisheries for the future.
Citation: Chu, C., de Kerckhove, D. T., Guzzo, M. and M. S. Poesch. (2023) Climate change and its impacts on freshwater fish and fisheries in Canada. In Perspectives in Canadian Fisheries, Cooke, S. , Hasler, C., Mandrak, N.E.M. and J. Imhof (eds.). American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, MD, USA.
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Abstract:
Community ecologists face the challenge of summarizing considerable amounts of information regarding species distributions and environmental conditions. Often, this challenge is met through the use of multivariate statistical approaches. Stream fish community ecologists, much like the broader ecological community, appear to favor the use of ordination methods over clustering approaches. One potential reason is due to the development of various tools to help us determine the interpretability or “significance” of ordination axes, whereas ecologists appear unfamiliar with the comparable tools available for examining cluster analysis. We use fish abundance data from two river systems to demonstrate several of these approaches. We demonstrate how the methods may be used to determine the relative strength of groups of sampling locations and species assemblages relative to the background variability. We contrast the methods to demonstrate their relative merits, both advantages and disadvantages, in studies commonly conducted by stream ecologists.
Citation: Jackson, D.A., Walker, S.C., and M.S. Poesch. (2010) Cluster analysis of fish community data: “New” tools for Determining Meaningful Groupings of Sites and Species Assemblages. pp. 503-527 In Gido K. and Jackson D.A. (eds.) Community Ecology of Stream Fishes: Concepts, Approaches & Techniques, AFS, Bethesda, MD.
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