Measuring Fish Species Richness for Conservation Action Planning

The Nature Conservancy, together with a broad network of regional scientists, is implementing a conservation action planning (CAP) process to develop strategies for restoration and conservation of Great Lakes biodiversity.  Integral to this process is the definition of focal conservation targets, key ecological attributes and indicators for each target, and acceptable ranges of variation for each indicator.  A potentially important indicator of Great Lakes nearshore zone health is native fish species richness; however, representative measures and acceptable ranges of variation for this indicator are lacking.  Data on nearshore fish species are collected using different methods throughout the Great Lakes, and historical data have not been assessed for evaluation of a baseline richness indicator.  We combined a relatively long-term but recent data series (1996-2011) on nearshore fish species with historical accounts to develop a series of species richness indicators that can be used in the CAP process.  While developed using Lake Michigan data, these indicators should be applicable across the Great Lakes.