High-value US West Coast stocks may migrate out of reach due to climate change

Recent NOAA research forecasts that three high-value groundfish species will migrate toward deeper offshore waters along the United States West Coast due to climate change in the near future, which will likely require fishery managers to adapt their strategies in response.NOAA’s study, “Species redistribution creates unequal outcomes for multispecies fisheries under projected climate change” was published in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances in August 2023. It shows that sablefish, dover sole, and shortspine thornyhead are projected to migrate to deeper offshore waters, posing challenges for fishers that may need to travel longer distances and fish at greater depths or shift their operations completely to target more accessible species.“Together, these are a large proportion of the groundfish caught off the West Coast, so they provide some indication of how things may change and the choices those changes present for the fishing community,” Northwest Fisheries Science ...