Modeling distributional shifts in marine consumers

Waters in the Northeast US are warming rapidly in association with climate change, and a number of studies have demonstrated impacts on fish and invertebrates in this region. However, much less is know about impacts on cetaceans, which are important consumers in marine ecosystems. We are examining how different cetacean species have responded to climate-driven environmental variability in the Northeast US. Our recent work has indicated that odontocete communities have changed markedly as odontocete species have shifted poleward at rapid rates that exceed those of their prey species, suggesting that climate change may be decoupling predator-prey relationships. Ongoing work is assessing methods for rigorously quantifying changes to the at-sea distribution of odontocete species in the face of rapid climate change and examining implications for trophic interactions and marine food webs.