FISH RESEARCH

Principle Investigator:

Les Kaufman, Ph.D.
Professor of Biology
Boston University Marine Program
and
Senior Principle Investigator
Marine Management Area Science
Conservation International

Collaborators:

Bill Precht, Rich Aronson, Ken Deslarzes, and others

Background:

Les Kaufman is a marine ecologist and conservation biologist. Most of his work, these days, is on the ecological effects and effectiveness of marine management areas (MMAs).  To Les, an MMA is essentially a marine conservation zoning scheme, and may include blocks under various management regimes or degrees and types of protection.  He regards this as an experiment. 

Les' work is dedicated to conducting and perfecting monitoring and hypothesis testing on this experiment to track management regime effects, incorporating those results into models to aid decision making, and communicating these results with the wider community as an essential element of adaptive management.  He uses a lot of image analysis,  naturally occurring stable isotopes, and acoustic telemetry.  He also do some theoretical work on spatial effects, macroevolution, and morphological plasticity and, of course, teaches for a paycheck.

Research Focus:

Larval input and tropic dynamics of the ichthyofauna of the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary

Research Summary:

At the FGBNMS, Les' work is mostly focused on fishes.  He is the designated fish guy on the long-term monitoring team, and is very interested in looking at changes in fish community composition and function over time.   For function, he hopes to be doing more stable isotope work in the future to address questions about food web structure and possible mass flow ties between the natural reefs and oil rig communities.   He also hopes to examine the population structure of some fishes out at FGBNMS in the context of the larger western Atlantic. 

Les' work at FGBNMS fits well with his other ongoing studies in other areas: (1) research on management regime effects in Stellwagen Bank and Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuaries, and (2) related but somewhat more extensive studies of management effects at four nodes in a global observatory for such work established through Conservation International under their Marine Management Area Science Program.  The initial MMAS nodes are on the Abrolhos Shelf (Brazil), tropical eastern Pacific (Coiba, Panama and Galapagos), Belize, and Fiji.

Benefits:

The FGBNMS was an eye-opener for Les.  A stomach-opener too.   The sanctuary presents he and his collaborators with a unique scientific opportunity. Les considers the FGBNMS one of the most remarkable and intact high latitude reefs in the world--and also an immense responsibility.  He believes it is important to help safeguard and document America's best surviving Atlantic coral reef in less than 40m depth.  The fact that it is surrounded by oil drilling platforms "adds notes of spice and opportunity to the palette."