Environmental Factors and Natural Resource Stock: Atlantic Herring Case

Herring is an important stock as bait for lobster fisheries and a component of the food web of the Northwest Atlantic Ocean. However, herring is very vulnerable to environmental variables such as temperature, food supply, and to the type of sediment on the bottom floor. Egg and larval stage herring are hypothesized to be very sensitive to low temperatures. This paper will analyze the correlation between temperature and two year-old recruitment stock, using satellite sea surface temperature (SST) data and stock size data from Northeast Fishery Science Center. Temperature is measured for specific areas that are defined as Essential Fish Habitat (EFH) designated habitat for Atlantic herring eggs. The preliminary results suggest that including environmental factors is necessary to understand the cycle of fluctuating stock and is a necessary variable in the production model for a fishery.