Characterizing the impact of recovering sea otters on commercially important crabs in California estuaries

Author:

Grimes TM1,Tinker MT2,Hughes BB3,Boyer KE4,Needles L5,Beheshti K2,Lewison RL1

Affiliation:

1. Department of Biology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182, USA

2. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95060, USA

3. Department of Biology, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA 94928, USA

4. Estuary & Ocean Science Center, San Francisco State University, Tiburon, CA 94920, USA

5. Center for Coastal Marine Sciences, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, CA 93407, USA

Abstract

Protective legislation and management have led to an increase in California’s sea otter Enhydra lutris nereis population. While sea otter recovery has been linked to ecosystem benefits, sea otter predation may negatively affect commercially valuable species. Understanding the potential influence of sea otters is of particular importance as their range expands into estuaries that function as nurseries for commercially valuable species like Dungeness crab Metacarcinus magister. We consider how sea otter predation has affected the abundance and size of juvenile Dungeness crab in Elkhorn Slough, California, USA, and analyzed cancrid crab abundance and size across 4 California estuaries with and without sea otters to understand how biotic and abiotic factors contribute to observed variation in crab size and abundance. We compared trends in southern sea otters relative to Dungeness crab landings in California to assess whether increasing sea otter abundance have negatively impacted landings. In Elkhorn Slough, juvenile Dungeness crab abundance and size have declined since 2012, coinciding with sea otter population growth. However, the impact of sea otters on juvenile Dungeness crab size was habitat-specific and only significant in unvegetated habitat. Across estuaries, we found that cancrid crab abundance and size were negatively associated with sea otter presence. While abiotic factors varied among estuaries, these factors explained little of the observed variation in crab abundance or size. Although we found evidence that sea otters can have localized effects on cancrid crab populations within estuaries, we found no evidence that southern sea otters, at recent population sizes, have negatively impacted Dungeness crab landings in California from 2000-2014.

Publisher

Inter-Research Science Center

Subject

Ecology,Aquatic Science,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics

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