Evidence for a broad-scale decline in giant Australian cuttlefish (Sepia apama) abundance from non-targeted survey data
Thomas A. A. Prowse A E , Bronwyn M. Gillanders A , Barry W. Brook A , Anthony J. Fowler B , Karina C. Hall C , Michael A. Steer B , Camille Mellin A D , N. Clisby A , Jason E. Tanner A B , Tim M. Ward B and Damien A. Fordham A
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A The Environment Institute and School of Earth and Environmental Science, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia.
B South Australian Research and Development Institute, PO Box 120, Henley Beach, SA 5022, Australia.
C National Marine Science Centre and Marine Ecology Research Centre, School of Environment, Science and Engineering, Southern Cross University, PO Box 4321, Coffs Harbour, NSW 2450, Australia.
D Australian Institute of Marine Science, PMB 3, Townsville MC, Townsville, Qld 4810, Australia.
E Corresponding author. Email: thomas.prowse@adelaide.edu.au
Marine and Freshwater Research 66(8) 692-700 https://doi.org/10.1071/MF14081
Submitted: 25 March 2014 Accepted: 19 September 2014 Published: 25 February 2015
Abstract
Little is known about the population trajectory and dynamics of many marine invertebrates because of a lack of robust observational data. The giant Australian cuttlefish (Sepia apama) is IUCN-listed as Near Threatened because the largest known breeding aggregation of this species in northern Spencer Gulf, South Australia, has declined markedly since the turn of the century. We used by-catch records from long-term trawl surveys to derive abundance data for S. apama and commercial cuttlefish harvest data as a measure of exploitation. Using Bayesian hierarchical models to account for zero-inflation and spatial dependence in these abundance counts, we demonstrated a high probability of broad-scale declines in the density of S. apama, particularly surrounding the primary aggregation site, which supports the recent closure of the entire S. apama fishery in northern Spencer Gulf. Historical harvest data were positively correlated with S. apama density estimated from the trawl surveys, suggesting that the commercial cuttlefish catch tracks the species abundance. Our results also indicated the possibility that the known S. apama breeding grounds might be supplemented by individuals that were spawned elsewhere in northern Spencer Gulf.
Additional keywords: Bayesian hierarchical model, Cephalopoda, commercial harvest, conditional autoregressive model, vector autoregression.
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