Symposium Summary: Simulation Models as Decision-Support Tools for Fisheries Conservation Planning

Unlike the “real world,” simulation models provide experimental systems where the outcomes of various assumptions can be examined to help inform management decisions. Given the multiple-objective nature of fisheries management, quantitative fish population and environmental simulations have become more commonly used to help cumulate the effects of multiple management actions and environmental stressors and provide comparisons between alternative management strategies. Our symposium provided a forum for simulation models being applied in a diverse range of fisheries applications, including feedbacks between anglers and sportfish in Nebraska reservoirs, human-induced drivers of Pacific salmon populations, the effect of dam passage and delay on alosine stocks, estimating habitat needs of juvenile salmonids, environmental drivers of Longfin Smelt abundance, and an ecosystem-level approach to evaluating the health of Australian fisheries. Our symposium was capped by a presentation from Kenneth Rose, who presented an approach for best practices in selecting, implementing, interpreting, and reporting of fish modeling designed to assess the effects of restoration actions on fish populations. Rose’s presentation demonstrated that while simulation models are regularly being called upon to help inform restoration actions in a diverse array of applications, a focus on model planning and development will pay back in more effective and efficient management decisions in the long run. — Paul Bergman, Cramer Fish Sciences, [email protected] Read the symposium abstracts here.