Applying marine historical ecology to quantify long-term change in coastal ecosystems

应用海洋历史生态学量化沿海生态系统的长期变化

• 批准号: RGPIN-2017-06821
• 负责人: McKechnie, Iain
• 金额: $ 2.11万
• 依托单位: University of Victoria
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=743595
• 关键词: Applying; marine; historical; ecology; quantify

Ecological dynamics span nested scales of space and time, but determining the rate and consequences of ecological and environmental change can be difficult as studies are often spatially constrained and lack temporal depth. Over the past 300 years, anthropogenically driven shifts have occurred in the global oceans, influencing the distribution, abundance, and size structure of various marine organisms. The ecosystem consequences of these shifts have only recently been identified and thus the specific implications for management and conservation are still being evaluated. Concurrently, there has been increased recognition that archaeological data can extend historical ecosystem baselines in both time and space. Archaeological sites, and the animal remains preserved therein, represent archives of human and ecological history spanning millennia. As such, they have potential to reveal long-term ecological dynamics and change, and also to offer a direct line of inquiry into global bio-geochemical processes via environmental proxies of temperature, ocean acidification, and resource subsidies. My long-term research vision is to create a program centered on marine historical ecology' that employs archaeological data to: i) evaluate ecological hypotheses, ii) quantify long-term change in coastal ecosystems, and iii) broaden perspectives by informing contemporary management and conservation challenges. My HQP trainees and I will evaluate preindustrial Indigenous resource use represented by animal bones and shells in archaeological sites to identify the impact of persistent human predation on the long-term structure and dynamics of distributions, sizes, and abundances of marine species. By pursuing ecological research using archaeological data, we will provide general insight into the scale of ecosystem change transformed by centuries of industrial exploitation while also querying fundamental assumptions in ecological theory concerning long-term human influence on species interactions, specifically trophic cascades, tipping points, and climatic variability that can drive discontinuous phase shifts.To accomplish this vision, my short-term research goals are to mentor trainees in testing hypotheses related to five key questions in multiple regions of the British Columbia Coast. I will address these goals using two scales of analysis i) meta-analyses that integrate archaeological and ecological datasets across large spatial and temporal scales to identify change between ancient and modern marine ecosystems and ii) method development (applied at my established research sites and in the lab) to maximize biologically relevant information obtained from zooarchaeological data.

生态动力学涵盖了时空的嵌套尺度，但是由于研究通常在空间上受到限制并且缺乏时间深度，因此确定生态和环境变化的速度和后果可能很困难。在过去的300年中，全球海洋中发生了人为驱动的转移，影响了各种海洋生物的分布，丰度和大小结构。这些转变的生态系统后果直到最近才被确定，因此仍在评估对管理和保护的具体含义。同时，人们越来越认识到考古数据可以在时间和空间中扩展历史生态系统基准。考古遗址和动物保留在其中，代表了跨越数千年的人类和生态史的档案。因此，他们有可能揭示长期的生态动力学和变化，并且还可以通过温度，海洋酸化和资源补贴的环境来直接对全球生物地球化学过程进行直接调查。我的长期研究愿景是创建一个以海洋历史生态学为中心的计划”，该计划采用考古数据对：i）评估生态假设，ii）量化沿海生态系统的长期变化，以及iii）通过告知当代管理和保护挑战来扩大观点。我和我的HQP学员将评估由动物骨头和考古遗址中的动物骨骼和贝壳代表的工业前本土资源使用，以确定持续的人类捕食对海洋物种的长期结构和分布，大小和丰富性的长期结构和动态的影响。通过使用考古数据进行生态学研究，我们将提供对生态系统变化规模的一般见解，这些变化的规模经过数百年的工业剥削，同时还要查询生态理论中有关人类长期影响物种相互作用的基本假设，这些假设是对物种相互作用的长期影响，特别是营养的级联群体，特定的培训点，可以驱动这一愿景的远距离转移。与不列颠哥伦比亚省海岸多个地区的五个关键问题有关的假设。我将使用两个分析量表来解决这些目标。