Ecosystem scenarios shape fishermen spatial behavior. The case of the Peruvian anchovy fishery in the Northern Humboldt Current System

A major goal in marine ecology is the understanding of the interactions between the dynamics of the different ecosystem components, from physics to top predators. While fishermen are among the main top predators at sea, almost none of the existing studies on ecology from physics to top predators contemplate fishermen as part of the system. The present work focuses on the coastal processes in the Northern Humboldt Current System, which encompasses both an intense climatic variability and the largest mono-specific fishery of the world. From concomitant satellite, acoustic survey and Vessel Monitoring System data (similar to 90,000 fishing trips) for a ten-year period (2000-2009), we quantify the associations between the dynamics of the spatial behavior of fishermen, environmental conditions and anchovy (Engraulis ringens) biomass and spatial distribution. Using multivariate statistical analyses we show that environmental and anchovy conditions do significantly shape fishermen spatial behavior and present evidences that environmental fluctuations smoothed out along trophic levels. We propose a retrospective analysis of the study period in the light of the ecosystem scenarios evidenced and we finally discuss the potential use of fishermen spatial behavior as ecosystem indicator. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.