Using the “mean temperature of the catch” to assess fish community responses to warming in a temperate lake

Abstract This contribution applies the “mean temperature of catch” (MTC) concept Cheung et al. ( Nature 497:365–368, 2013) to fish catch data for Lake Peipsi, Estonia/Russia, covering years 1931 2019. The preferred each ten target species was obtained from literature, and combined with species-specific obtain MTC values year. analysis time series thus a segmented regression yielded two trend lines, one horizontal at 14.5 °C (1931–1986), other (1987–2019) ascending slope 0.85 °C·decade −1 . Overall, model explains over half variance set (multiple R 2 = 0.53; adjusted 0.51). surface water temperatures correlate MTC, even though weakly (r 0.30), when considering 2-year lag. community shallow Peipsi reacts more strongly changes than marine ecosystems so far studied using MTC.