As a NOAA postdoctoral scientist, I am leveraging molecular approaches to advance our understanding of foraging patterns and trophic interactions of endangered marine top predators. Marine mammals are often keystone species, providing strong top-down controls on marine ecosystems. However, fundamental to understanding the mechanisms of such trophic interactions is elucidating species-specific foraging behaviors. For critically endangered Cook Inlet beluga whales, extreme turbidity of glacially-fed inland seas combined with the elusiveness of these mobile predators has limited the identification of prey and tracking of foraging behavior. However, eDNA metabarcoding provides a viable and effective survey technique where visual approaches are impossible to deploy.
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I am combining community science eDNA sampling and visual monitoring through the Alaska Beluga Monitoring Project to unlock beluga trophic ecology and directly inform conservation management plans for this culturally important and critically endangered population.Ultimately, this work leverages molecular approaches to characterize the trophic webs and unravel the mechanisms for how anthropogenic stress drives ecosystem dynamics.
This past year in 2021 we conducted a series of pilot eDNA survey projects around Cook Inlet in the Kenai River and Twentymile River to link beluga river utilization and changes in fish community assemblages. In the Kenai River, Dr. Debbie Boege Tobin and her stellar team of students and volunteers at the Kenai Peninsula College conducted monthly eDNA sampling over the past year to understand how Kenai fish communities change across seasons. In Twentymile river, we conduct high resolution sampling throughout the Fall to understand how the beluga are utilizing river habitats for foraging in relation to salmon runs and broader fish community. These eDNA samples combined with visual observations of Belugas, will allow us to compare changes in fish communities to beluga river utilization and compare the probability of occupancy between eDNA and visual approaches.
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