Environmental conditions are important influences on the recruitment of North Pacific albacore tuna, Thunnus alalunga

Abstract

The effects of changing climate on numerous commercially and ecologically important fish species including the South Pacific albacore tuna, Thunnus alalunga have been documented over the past decades. The objective of this study was to explore and elucidate the relationship of environmental variables with the stock parameters of albacore tuna. The relationship of the North Pacific albacore tuna recruitment (R), female spawning stock biomass (SSB) and recruits per spawning biomass (RPS) from 1970 to 2012 with the environmental factors of sea surface temperature (SST), Pacific decadal oscillation (PDO) and El Niño southern oscillation (ENSO) was construed. SST and PDO were used as independent variables with SSB to construct stock reproduction models for R and RPS as they showed most significant relationship with the dependent variables. Model selections were based on Akaike Information Criterion (AIC) with the condition of significant parameter estimates at p<0.05. Models with single independent variables of SST, PDO and ENSO were also constructed to illuminate their individual effect on albacore R and RPS. From the results it can be stated that SST and PDO resulted in the most significant models for reproducing North Pacific albacore tuna R and RPS time series.