{"title":"The Structures of the Demersal Fish Communities of New Bedford and Gloucester Harbors, Two Massachusetts Urban Estuaries","authors":"P. Geoghegan, M. Murphy, A. R. Wilbur","doi":"10.1656/045.030.0206","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract - We sampled the inshore fish communities of New Bedford and Gloucester harbors synoptically using identical gear for 12 months during 1998–1999. Although the 2 harbors are only 110 km apart, they are separated by Cape Cod, which is the transition between the southern New England (New Bedford) and the Gulf of Maine (Gloucester) biogeographic regions. The 2 fish communities were 69% dissimilar from each other using the Bray–Curtis dissimilarity index (B–C). Stenotomus chrysops (Scup) composed 80% of the catch in New Bedford Harbor, did not occur in Gloucester Harbor, and contributed 7.40% to the total dissimilarity between the harbors. B–C identified 2 seasonal groups in the New Bedford Harbor fish community: May–October and November–April. Leucoraja spp. (skates) comprised the most numerous taxon captured in Gloucester Harbor, accounting for 24.90% of the total catch followed by Pseudopleuronectes americanus (Winter Flounder; 24.16%), and Gadus morhua (Atlantic Cod; 22.52%). These taxa contributed 7.23%, 3.88%, and 6.16% respectively to the total dissimilarity between harbors. B–C identified 4 seasonal groups in Gloucester Harbor: January, February and March, April and May, and June–December. These data provide an important description of the fish communities in the 2 harbors in different biogeographic regions at the end of the 20th century. We expect differences between the communities to decrease with increasing water temperature due to climate change.","PeriodicalId":49742,"journal":{"name":"Northeastern Naturalist","volume":"30 1","pages":"186 - 211"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5000,"publicationDate":"2023-06-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Northeastern Naturalist","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1656/045.030.0206","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Abstract - We sampled the inshore fish communities of New Bedford and Gloucester harbors synoptically using identical gear for 12 months during 1998–1999. Although the 2 harbors are only 110 km apart, they are separated by Cape Cod, which is the transition between the southern New England (New Bedford) and the Gulf of Maine (Gloucester) biogeographic regions. The 2 fish communities were 69% dissimilar from each other using the Bray–Curtis dissimilarity index (B–C). Stenotomus chrysops (Scup) composed 80% of the catch in New Bedford Harbor, did not occur in Gloucester Harbor, and contributed 7.40% to the total dissimilarity between the harbors. B–C identified 2 seasonal groups in the New Bedford Harbor fish community: May–October and November–April. Leucoraja spp. (skates) comprised the most numerous taxon captured in Gloucester Harbor, accounting for 24.90% of the total catch followed by Pseudopleuronectes americanus (Winter Flounder; 24.16%), and Gadus morhua (Atlantic Cod; 22.52%). These taxa contributed 7.23%, 3.88%, and 6.16% respectively to the total dissimilarity between harbors. B–C identified 4 seasonal groups in Gloucester Harbor: January, February and March, April and May, and June–December. These data provide an important description of the fish communities in the 2 harbors in different biogeographic regions at the end of the 20th century. We expect differences between the communities to decrease with increasing water temperature due to climate change.
期刊介绍:
The Northeastern Naturalist covers all aspects of the natural history sciences of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine organisms and the environments of the northeastern portion of North America, roughly bounded from Virginia to Missouri, north to Minnesota and Nunavut, east to Newfoundland, and south back to Virginia. Manuscripts based on field studies outside of this region that provide information on species within this region may be considered at the Editor’s discretion.
The journal welcomes manuscripts based on observations and research focused on the biology of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine organisms and communities as it relates to their life histories and their function within, use of, and adaptation to the environment and the habitats in which they are found, as well as on the ecology and conservation of species and habitats. Such studies may encompass measurements, surveys, and/or experiments in the field, under lab conditions, or utilizing museum and herbarium specimens. Subject areas include, but are not limited to, anatomy, behavior, biogeography, biology, conservation, evolution, ecology, genetics, parasitology, physiology, population biology, and taxonomy. Strict lab, modeling, and simulation studies on natural history aspects of the region, without any field component, will be considered for publication as long as the research has direct and clear significance to field naturalists and the manuscript discusses these implications.