Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Shrinking of fishes exacerbates impacts of global ocean changes on marine ecosystems

Abstract

Changes in temperature, oxygen content and other ocean biogeochemical properties directly affect the ecophysiology of marine water-breathing organisms1,2,3. Previous studies suggest that the most prominent biological responses are changes in distribution4,5,6, phenology7,8 and productivity9. Both theory and empirical observations also support the hypothesis that warming and reduced oxygen will reduce body size of marine fishes10,11,12. However, the extent to which such changes would exacerbate the impacts of climate and ocean changes on global marine ecosystems remains unexplored. Here, we employ a model to examine the integrated biological responses of over 600 species of marine fishes due to changes in distribution, abundance and body size. The model has an explicit representation of ecophysiology, dispersal, distribution, and population dynamics3. We show that assemblage-averaged maximum body weight is expected to shrink by 14–24% globally from 2000 to 2050 under a high-emission scenario. About half of this shrinkage is due to change in distribution and abundance, the remainder to changes in physiology. The tropical and intermediate latitudinal areas will be heavily impacted, with an average reduction of more than 20%. Our results provide a new dimension to understanding the integrated impacts of climate change on marine ecosystems.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Projected changes in ocean conditions and the expected biological responses of fish communities in terms of distribution and body size.
Figure 2: Predicted mean assemblage maximum body weight (g) and its changes from 2000 to 2050 (20-year average) under the SRES A2 scenario.
Figure 3: Change in individual-level maximum body size of fishes in different ocean basins from 2000 (averages of 1991–2010) to 2050 (averages of 2041–2060).
Figure 4: Comparison of relationship between maximum body size () and habitat temperature predicted from the growth model presented in this study (filled dots, solid line) and observations (open dots, broken line).

References

  1. Pörtner, H-O. Oxygen- and capacity-limitation of thermal tolerance: A matrix for integrating climate-related stressor effects in marine ecosystems. J. Exp. Biol. 213, 881–893 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Pauly, D. Gasping Fish and Panting Squids: Oxygen, Temperature and the Growth of Water-Breathing Animals (International Ecology Institute, 2010).

    Google Scholar 

  3. Cheung, W. W. L., Dunne, J., Sarmiento, J. L. & Pauly, D. Integrating ecophysiology and plankton dynamics into projected maximum fisheries catch potential under climate change in the Northeast Atlantic. ICES J. Mar. Sci. 68, 1008–1018 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Perry, A. L., Low, P. J., Ellis, J. R. & Reynolds, J. D. Climate change and distribution shifts in marine fishes. Science 308, 1912–1915 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Dulvy, N. K. et al. Climate change and deepening of the North Sea fish assemblage: A biotic indicator of warming seas. J. Appl. Ecol. 45, 1029–1039 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Cheung, W. W. L. et al. Projecting global marine biodiversity impacts under climate change scenarios. Fish Fisheries 10, 235–251 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Edwards, M. & Richardson, A. J. Impact of climate change on marine pelagic phenology and trophic mismatch. Nature 430, 881–884 (2004).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Genner, M. J. et al. Temperature-driven phenological changes within a marine larval fish assemblage. J. Plankton Res. 32, 699–708 (2010).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Cheung, W. W. L. et al. Large-scale redistribution of maximum fisheries catch potential in the global ocean under climate change. Glob. Change Biol. 16, 24–35 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Daufresne, M., Lengfellner, K. & Sommer, U. Global warming benefits the small in aquatic ecosystems. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 106, 12788–12793 (2009).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Baudron, A. R., Needle, C. L. & Marshall, C. T. Implications of a warming North Sea for the growth of haddock Melanogrammus aeglefinus. J. Fish Biol. 78, 1874–1889 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Sheridan, J. A. & Bickford, D. Shrinking body size as an ecological response to climate change. Nature Clim. Change 1, 401–406 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Sunday, J. M., Bates, A. E. & Dulvy, N. K. Global analysis of thermal tolerance and latitude in ectotherms. Proc. R. Soc. B 278, 1823–1830 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Verberk, W. C. E. P. & Bilton, D. T. Can oxygen set thermal limits in an insect and drive gigantism? PLoS ONE 6, e22610 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Von Bertalanffy, L. Theoretische Biologie—Zweiter Band: Stoffwechsel, Wachstum (A. Francke, 1951).

    Google Scholar 

  16. Cheung, W. W. L., Close, C., Lam, V., Watson, R. & Pauly, D. Application of macroecological theory to predict effects of climate change on global fisheries potential. Mar. Ecol. Prog. Ser. 365, 187–197 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Frölicher, T. L., Joos, F., Plattner, G. K., Steinacher, M. & Doney, S. C. Natural variability and anthropogenic trends in oceanic oxygen in a coupled carbon cycle in a coupled carbon cycle–climate model ensemble. Glob. Biogeochem. Cycles 23, GB1003 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Jeppesen, E. et al. Impacts of climate warming on lake fish community structure and potential effects on ecosystem function. Hydrobiologia 646, 73–90 (2010).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Harley, C. D. G. Climate change, keystone predation, and biodiversity loss. Science 334, 1124–1127 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  20. Barnes, C., Maxwell, D., Reuman, D. C. & Jennings, S. Global patterns in predator–prey size relationships reveal size dependency of trophic transfer efficiency. Ecology 91, 222–232 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Floeter, J. & Temming, A. Explaining diet composition of North Sea cod (Gadus morhua): Prey size preference vs. prey availability. Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 60, 140–150 (2003).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Pauly, D. A mechanism for the juvenile-to-adult transition in fishes. ICES J. Mar. Sci. 41, 280–284 (1984).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Pauly, D. On the interrelationships between natural mortality, growth parameters and mean environmental temperature in 175 fish stocks. ICES J. Mar. Sci. 39, 175–192 (1980).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Palomares, M. L. D. & Pauly, D. Predicting food consumption of fish populations as functions of mortality, food type, morphometrics, temperature and salinity. Mar. Freshwat. Res. 49, 447–453 (1998).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  25. Jennings, S., Kaiser, M. J. & Reynold, J. D. Marine Fisheries Ecology (Blackwell, 2001).

    Google Scholar 

  26. Dillon, M. E., Wang, G. & Huey, R. B. Global metabolic impacts of recent climate warming. Nature 467, 704–706 (2010).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  27. Crain, C. M., Kroeker, K. & Halpern, B. S. Interactive and cumulative effects of multiple human stressors in marine systems. Ecol. Lett. 11, 1304–1315 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Taylor, C. C. Cod growth and temperature. ICES J. Mar. Sci. 23, 366–370 (1958).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Wohlschlag, D. E. in Biology of the Antarctic Seas (ed. Lee, M. O.) 33–62 (Anatarctic Research Series 1, American Geophysics Union, 1964).

    Google Scholar 

  30. Henry, K. A. Atlantic Menhaden (Brevoortia tyrannus). Resource and Fishery–Analysis of Decline. Technical Report NMFS SSRF-642 (NOAA, 1971).

Download references

Acknowledgements

The contribution by W.W.L.C. is supported by the National Geographic Society and the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Sciences (CEFAS). D.P. and R.W. are supported by the Pew Charitable Trust through the Sea Around Us project. J.L.S. and T.L.F. are supported by the Carbon Mitigation Initiative (CMI) project at Princeton University, sponsored by BP. We thank L. Bopp for providing outputs from the IPSL-CM4-LOOP model.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Contributions

W.W.L.C. and D.P. designed the study. W.W.L.C. conducted the analysis and wrote the manuscript. J.L.S., J.D. and T.L.F. provided and prepared the outputs from the Earth System Models. R.W. provided the global catch data. V.W.Y.L. prepared the current species distributions. M.L.D.P. extracted the distributional and growth parameters from FishBase. All authors reviewed and commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to William W. L. Cheung.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Information (PDF 2633 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Cheung, W., Sarmiento, J., Dunne, J. et al. Shrinking of fishes exacerbates impacts of global ocean changes on marine ecosystems. Nature Clim Change 3, 254–258 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1691

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1691

This article is cited by

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing