TY - JOUR
T1 - Prey-size plastics are invading larval fish nurseries
AU - Gove, Jamison M.
AU - Whitney, Jonathan L.
AU - McManus, Margaret A.
AU - Lecky, Joey
AU - Carvalho, Felipe C.
AU - Lynch, Jennifer M.
AU - Li, Jiwei
AU - Neubauer, Philipp
AU - Smith, Katharine A.
AU - Phipps, Jana E.
AU - Kobayashi, Donald R.
AU - Balagso, Karla B.
AU - Contreras, Emily A.
AU - Manuel, Mark E.
AU - Merrifield, Mark A.
AU - Polovina, Jeffrey J.
AU - Asner, Gregory P.
AU - Maynard, Jeffrey A.
AU - Williams, Gareth J.
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Dieter Tracey for graphics help with Fig. 1 and SI Appendix, Figs. S1 and S2 and Amanda K. Dillon for graphics support on Figs. 2 and 3. We thank Daniel Jennings-Kam, Andrew Osberg, Dalton Solbrig, and Lauren Zodl for their assistance with plankton sample sorting and Bruce Mundy for his assistance with larval fish identifications. We thank Anupam Misra, Lloyd Hihara, Jan Kealoha, Kayla Brignac, Wanda Weatherford, Bridget O’Donnell, and Suja Sukumaran for their assistance with microfiber identification. We also thank the three anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this manuscript. Finally, we thank the crew of the NOAA ship Oscar Elton Sette. This research was supported by NOAA’s West Hawai‘i Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (contribution no. 2019_4), NOAA’s Fisheries And The Environment program, and NOAA’s Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center.
Funding Information:
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. We thank Dieter Tracey for graphics help with Fig. 1 and SI Appendix, Figs. S1 and S2 and Amanda K. Dillon for graphics support on Figs. 2 and 3. We thank Daniel Jennings-Kam, Andrew Osberg, Dalton Solbrig, and Lauren Zodl for their assistance with plankton sample sorting and Bruce Mundy for his assistance with larval fish identifications. We thank Anupam Misra, Lloyd Hihara, Jan Kealoha, Kayla Brignac, Wanda Weatherford, Bridget O’Donnell, and Suja Sukumaran for their assistance with microfiber identification. We also thank the three anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this manuscript. Finally, we thank the crew of the NOAA ship Oscar Elton Sette. This research was supported by NOAA’s West Hawai‘i Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (contribution no. 2019_4), NOAA’s Fisheries And The Environment program, and NOAA’s Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
PY - 2019/11/26
Y1 - 2019/11/26
N2 - Life for many of the world’s marine fish begins at the ocean surface. Ocean conditions dictate food availability and govern survivorship, yet little is known about the habitat preferences of larval fish during this highly vulnerable life-history stage. Here we show that surface slicks, a ubiquitous coastal ocean convergence feature, are important nurseries for larval fish from many ocean habitats at ecosystem scales. Slicks had higher densities of marine phytoplankton (1.7-fold), zooplankton (larval fish prey; 3.7-fold), and larval fish (8.1-fold) than nearby ambient waters across our study region in Hawai‘i. Slicks contained larger, more well-developed individuals with competent swimming abilities compared to ambient waters, suggesting a physiological benefit to increased prey resources. Slicks also disproportionately accumulated prey-size plastics, resulting in a 60-fold higher ratio of plastics to larval fish prey than nearby waters. Dissections of hundreds of larval fish found that 8.6% of individuals in slicks had ingested plastics, a 2.3-fold higher occurrence than larval fish from ambient waters. Plastics were found in 7 of 8 families dissected, including swordfish (Xiphiidae), a commercially targeted species, and flying fish (Exocoetidae), a principal prey item for tuna and seabirds. Scaling up across an ∼1,000 km2 coastal ecosystem in Hawai‘i revealed slicks occupied only 8.3% of ocean surface habitat but contained 42.3% of all neustonic larval fish and 91.8% of all floating plastics. The ingestion of plastics by larval fish could reduce survivorship, compounding threats to fisheries productivity posed by overfishing, climate change, and habitat loss.
AB - Life for many of the world’s marine fish begins at the ocean surface. Ocean conditions dictate food availability and govern survivorship, yet little is known about the habitat preferences of larval fish during this highly vulnerable life-history stage. Here we show that surface slicks, a ubiquitous coastal ocean convergence feature, are important nurseries for larval fish from many ocean habitats at ecosystem scales. Slicks had higher densities of marine phytoplankton (1.7-fold), zooplankton (larval fish prey; 3.7-fold), and larval fish (8.1-fold) than nearby ambient waters across our study region in Hawai‘i. Slicks contained larger, more well-developed individuals with competent swimming abilities compared to ambient waters, suggesting a physiological benefit to increased prey resources. Slicks also disproportionately accumulated prey-size plastics, resulting in a 60-fold higher ratio of plastics to larval fish prey than nearby waters. Dissections of hundreds of larval fish found that 8.6% of individuals in slicks had ingested plastics, a 2.3-fold higher occurrence than larval fish from ambient waters. Plastics were found in 7 of 8 families dissected, including swordfish (Xiphiidae), a commercially targeted species, and flying fish (Exocoetidae), a principal prey item for tuna and seabirds. Scaling up across an ∼1,000 km2 coastal ecosystem in Hawai‘i revealed slicks occupied only 8.3% of ocean surface habitat but contained 42.3% of all neustonic larval fish and 91.8% of all floating plastics. The ingestion of plastics by larval fish could reduce survivorship, compounding threats to fisheries productivity posed by overfishing, climate change, and habitat loss.
KW - Larval fish
KW - Microplastics
KW - Nursery habitat
KW - Surface slicks
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85075530101&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85075530101&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1073/pnas.1907496116
DO - 10.1073/pnas.1907496116
M3 - Article
C2 - 31712423
AN - SCOPUS:85075530101
SN - 0027-8424
VL - 116
SP - 24143
EP - 24149
JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
IS - 48
ER -