Integration of scientific and local expertise to develop risk assessments for nearshore species at different spatial scales

The U.S West Coast states currently set harvest caps to manage fishery stocks in state waters based on federal stock assessments that combine data from larger areas of the coast. Local catch and stock condition information are not well incorporated into coastwide assessment models to reflect smaller-scale processes that are often important to local fisheries, and some nearshore species have not been assessed. This can lead to a mismatch of local resource status and catch limits. We gathered local information on nearshore fishes in Oregon, USA, to contribute to a multi-scale Productivity and Susceptibility Analysis (PSA), an expert opinion-based model that combines information about the productivity of a stock with its susceptibility to fishing activities, habitat degradation, and other factors. The Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) has developed PSAs for federally managed stocks on a coastwide scale, largely to provide initial information on the relative vulnerabilities of many data-poor species. Our research sought local expertise on questions related to susceptibility to develop a PSA for nearshore species at smaller spatial scales in Oregon, USA. We combined published biological data for ten nearshore species with information obtained from fishermen during a series of outreach meetings and an online survey. We found that our PSA results generally matched those generated for West Coast stocks, but with somewhat lower vulnerability scores provided by the local data. We also found some key differences among survey regions and between the coastwide vulnerability ratings and smaller spatial scale ratings, reflecting the influence that local user-based information can have on the results of the model. While PSA provides only general information on vulnerability and stock status, it can be useful to identify important local differences in stock susceptibility to fishing or other impacts that may be lost when stocks are monitored and managed at larger scales.