Saving Seafood

OREGON: Researchers look for answers after humpback whale stranded on Oregon coast

November 21, 2025 — Experts are looking into the stranding of a young humpback whale who was euthanized Monday, nearly two days after it washed ashore north of Yachats, Oregon while entangled in crabbing gear.

Several research teams conducted a necropsy on Tuesday, and found the 26-foot-long male humpback had some lesions, no stomach contents, and the body was in overall fair condition.

Oregon State University’s Veterinary Diagnostic Lab took samples for further tests, and will release analysis once the results are in.

Read the full article at KCBY

Oregon State recognized with national engagement award for efforts to reduce whale entanglement

August 27, 2025 — A collaborative research and outreach effort led by Oregon State University to protect whales and sustain Oregon’s commercial Dungeness crab fishery has been recognized as one of four regional winners of the 2025 W.K. Kellogg Foundation Community Engagement Scholarship Award.

The Oregon whale entanglement project, a transdisciplinary team led by Leigh Torres, researcher in OSU’s Marine Mammal Institute and Oregon Sea Grant Extension marine mammals specialist, now advances to the national stage, where it will compete for the C. Peter Magrath Community Engagement Scholarship Award and a $20,000 grand prize to further its work.

This is the second consecutive year OSU has received a Kellogg regional award and the third time in the university’s history.

“We are beyond excited when faculty like Dr. Leigh Torres get national recognition for their engaged scholarship,” said Marina Denny, associate vice provost for engagement in the OSU Division of Extension and Engagement. “This honor reflects the strength of OSU’s partnerships with our Oregon coastal communities and our shared commitment to environmental stewardship and economic resilience.”

Read the full article at Oregon State University

Marine heatwaves impact maturation of black rockfish

July 24, 2025 — A newly released study by Oregon State University and NOAA Fisheries researchers shows that marine heat waves in increasing frequency are having an impact on the growth and maturation of black rockfish in Oregon and Washington.

“We do know that the occurrence of marine heatwaves is more often and more intense,” said Claire Rosemond, now a fisheries biologist at NOAA Fisheries’ Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Newport, Ore. “There are some monitored ocean indicators that can help us understand if the coming year would be warmer or cooler, but it is harder to predict how hot or how cold.”

Results of her dissertation while at OSU with fisheries biologist Melissa Head, also of the Northwest Fisheries Science Center, and Scott Heppell, a professor at OSU ‘s Department of Fisheries Wildlife and Conservation Sciences, were published on June 3 in the journal Ecological Applications.

The study investigated the impact of intense and less intense marine heatwaves on black rockfish reproduction and growth along the Pacific Coast between 2014 and 2021.
They found that while black rockfish exhibited elevated growth during intense marine heatwaves, their maturation was delayed. In fact, during intense marine heatwaves, maturation was postponed, reproductive success was lower by one third, and parasite prevalence in ovaries was nominally high.

Younger females were large at age during intense marine heatwaves, and throughout the last decade, growth rate coefficients were higher than what is typically expected for slower-growing fishes like rockfishes.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Pacific cod can’t rely on coastal safe havens for protection during marine heat waves, study finds

June 28, 2024 — During recent periods of unusually warm water in the Gulf of Alaska, young Pacific cod in near shore safe havens where they typically spend their adolescence did not experience the protective effects those areas typically provide, a new Oregon State University study found.

Instead, during marine heat waves in 2014–16 and 2019, young cod in these near shore “nurseries” around Kodiak Island in Alaska experienced significant changes in their abundance,  and diet, with researchers estimating that only the largest 15–25% of the island’s cod population survived the summer. Even after the high temperatures subsided, the cod have yet to return to pre-heat wave size and diet.

The findings, published today in the journal Scientific Reports, may have broader implications for marine fish populations worldwide, as marine heat waves become longer and more frequent with , the researchers said.

“These coastal habitats aren’t supporting fish in the same way that they used to as a result of marine heat waves,” said lead author Hillary Thalmann, a graduate student in OSU’s Department of Fisheries, Wildlife and Conservation Sciences. “That’s a novel finding, because we don’t always look at the nurseries as a place where size-selective mortality could be occurring rapidly.”

Read the full article at phys.org

US Department of Defense awards grant to project aiming to predict how climate change could lead to conflicts over fishing rights

October 22, 2023 — The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has awarded an Oregon State University (OSU) researcher USD 1.4 million (EUR 1.3 million) over three years to predict how fish stocks could shift due to climate change, specifically focusing on movements that have the potential to cause geopolitical tension.

The research aims to support world leaders in reducing the risk of future conflicts and, if tensions do rise, enhancing global preparedness for such instances.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

A New Tool May Help Crab Fishers Sidestep Dead Zones

March 9, 2022 — The crab pots are piled high at the fishing docks in Newport, Oregon. Stacks of tire-sized cages fill the parking lot, festooned with colorful buoys and grimy ropes. By this time in July, most commercial fishers have called it a year for Dungeness crab. But not Dave Bailey, the skipper of the 14-meter Morningstar II. The season won’t end for another month, and “demand for fresh, live crab never stops,” Bailey says with a squinting smile and fading Midwestern accent.

It’s a clear morning, and he leads me aboard a white-and-blue crab boat, built in 1967 and owned by Bailey since 1992. He skirts a giant metal tank that he hopes will soon hold a mob of leggy crustaceans and ducks his tall frame into a cluttered cabin, where an age-worn steering wheel gleams beneath the front windows and a fisherman’s prayer hangs on the wall: “Dear God, be good to me. Your sea is so great and my boat is so small.”

The churning Pacific is just one challenge Bailey and his fellow crabbers must face. Recent years have also brought outbreaks of domoic acid, which renders crab unsafe to eat, and increasing incidents of humpback whales getting tangled in crab gear. However, there’s another emerging problem that threatens not only Bailey’s livelihood but the very ecosystem that sustains it. I’ve come today to see a tool that could help crabbers manage.

On the counter in the kitchenette, amid bowls of instant noodles and tinned oysters, Bailey shows me a sturdy black tube, about 60 centimeters long, that fits neatly inside a crab pot. When submerged, the contraption measures oxygen levels in the water and, when retrieved, displays them on a separate box with a screen for Bailey to read. The box also beams the data back to scientists at Oregon State University (OSU).

Most marine animals don’t breathe air, but they need oxygen to live, absorbing it from the water as they swim, burrow, or cling to the seafloor. But lately, bouts of dangerously low oxygen levels—or hypoxia—have afflicted parts of the North American west coast, affecting critters from halibut to sea stars. These “dead zones” cause ecological disruption and economic pain for fishers like Bailey, who can’t sell crabs that have suffocated in their traps.

Read the full story at Smithsonian

 

Oregon State researchers create tool to help protect native fish from hybridizing with non-natives

March 8, 2022 — Oregon State University researchers have created a tool to assess the risk of hybridization among native and non-native fish, a development that could aid natural resource managers trying to protect threatened or endangered freshwater fish species.

The introduction of non-native species poses challenges to native species, including competition for resources and habitat, exposure to diseases carried by the introduced species and the risk of hybridization, which occurs naturally in wild populations as part of the evolutionary process.

The Oregon State research, just published in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Science, focused on two species: bull trout, a fish native to western North America that is protected under the Endangered Species Act; and brook trout, a native to eastern North America introduced in the West more than 100 years ago for recreational fishing purposes.

Bull trout were once abundant in Oregon, Washington, California, Nevada, Idaho and Montana but today are found in less than half of their historic range, and no longer exist in California. They are threatened by habitat degradation and fragmentation, blockage of migratory corridors, poor water quality, the effects of climate change and fisheries management practices, including the introduction of brook trout.

Read the full story from Oregon State University

Oregon State research uncovers key insight for restoration of globally important kelp forests

February 18, 2022 — Restoration efforts for kelp forests may be most effective in areas where the bedrock seafloor is highly contoured, research by Oregon State University suggests.

The findings, published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, are important because kelp, large algae with massive ecological and economic importance around the world, are under siege from environmental change and overgrazing by urchins.

The study, led by recent graduate Zachary Randell when he was an Oregon State doctoral student, shows that kelp forests in areas with ocean floor ruggedness – scientifically termed substrate complexity or surface rugosity – tend toward stability.

There were urchins in kelp forests growing in areas of high substrate complexity, but those urchins did not cause widespread destruction of kelp forests. One hypothesis is that substrate complexity retains “drift algae” – detached pieces of kelp and other algae – which urchins prefer to eat over live kelp, Randell said.

Read the full story at the Tillamook Headlight Herald

Researchers aim to turn seafood byproducts into source of nutrition

November 30, 2021 –A research project led by Oregon State University has the potential to reduce food waste by utilizing seafood byproducts as a cheap, high-quality source of protein.

Oregon State has received a $333,777 grant from the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research to study whether protein from byproducts such as fish heads, bones and skin left over after processing can be recovered and used as an ingredient in food or dietary supplements.

The seafood industry uses just 30% to 40% of what it harvests for human consumption, while the rest is either made into fishmeal or discarded in landfills.

“This research exemplifies a ‘no stone unturned’ approach to increasing global food and nutritional security through limiting food waste,” said Lucyna Kurtyka, the senior scientific program director with the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research.

Read the full story at the Daily Astorian

 

New guide to help evaluate marine protected areas

September 29, 2021 — A new “MPA Guide,” resulting from a collaboration of 42 authors led by Kirsten Grorud-Colvert of Oregon State University, aims to facilitate communication and common understanding about marine protected areas.

The guide was introduced in a paper in the 10 September issue of Science magazine, “The MPA Guide: A framework to achieve global goals for the ocean.” In it, the authors review the consistency, of MPAs and propose a framework by which levels of protection can be evaluated and improved.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource