Fish Conservation with Foresight

Map of the San Francisco Estuary with a California inset map. There are photos of 4 locations listed in the caption overlayed on the map.
Wetlands of focus in this study are located in major regions of the San Francisco Estuary, including Lower South Bay (Alviso Marsh), San Pablo Bay (Petaluma and Napa-Sonoma Marshes), Suisun Bay (Suisun Marsh), and the Sacramento San Joaquin Delta (Cache-Lindsay slough complex). Circles are approximate indicators of sampling locations. Photo credits: Alviso marsh - Levi Lewis; Petaluma and Napa Sonoma marsh - Dylan K. Stompe; Suisun Marsh - Amber Manfree; Cache-Lindsay Slough Complex - Teejay O'rear.

Project Description

The "Fish Conservation with Foresight" incubator aims to help improve our current understanding of wetland fish dynamics across the San Francisco Estuary. The results will provide a broad, estuary-wide understanding of how wetland fish communities are likely to respond to environmental variability and ecosystem management. By taking a cross-regional approach, the team will be able to examine how impacts play out differently across the estuary and how communities of fish may shift within and across regions with future impacts. By revealing which species may be sensitive to future impacts from climate change and resource management, the team hopes to draw attention to conservation and restoration needs before they are urgent. 

The team will take a multi-modeling approach to:

  1. Analyze fish monitoring data from major regions of the estuary and compare fish abundances, biomass, diversity, and community structure of wetland fish communities among these habitats. This comparison will deepen the understanding of wetland functionality for fishes throughout the estuary.
  2. Quantify spatial and taxon-specific habitat suitability conditions for key wetland fishes using multi-model inference to establish how communities respond to environmental change at regional scales and how water conditions alter habitat suitability for key species. 
 
Team Members
Caroline Newell University of California, Davis – Center for Watershed Sciences
Mikaela Provost University of California, Davis – Department of Wildlife, Fish, & Conservation Biology
Levi Lewis University of California, Davis
John Durand University of California, Davis – Center for Watershed Sciences
James Hobbs California Department of Fish & Wildlife
Project Dates

March 2023 – December 2024

News Release

https://watershed.ucdavis.edu/news/new-synthesis-incubator-fish-conservation-with-foresight