Tiger Shark Migrations Altered by Climate Change - Infographic (IMAGE)
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In a new study, Neil Hammerschlag, Ph.D., and colleagues used multiple approaches to evaluate the effects of ocean warming on tiger shark movements in the Western North Atlantic. Over the past ~40 years, shark distributions have expanded poleward, paralleling rising temperatures. Moreover, satellite tracking of sharks over the past decade has revealed their annual migrations have extended farther poleward and arrival times to northern areas have also occurred earlier in the year during extremely warm periods, which has subsequently decreased their protections from fishing. Potential consequences of these climate-driven alterations include increasing shark vulnerability to fishing, disruption of predator-prey interactions and changes in encounter rates with humans. Hammerschlag, N., McDonnell, L. H., Rider, M. J., Street, G. M., Hazen, E. L., Natanson, L. J., McCandless, C. T., Boudreau, M. R., Gallagher, A. J., Pinsky, M. L., & Kirtman, B. (2022). Ocean warming alters the distributional range, migratory timing, and spatial protections of an apex predator, the tiger shark (Galeocerdo cuvier). Global Change Biology, 00, 1–16.
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Bianca Rangel
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