Long-term response of a fish community to environmental variability

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Environmental variability, differentially affecting the successive stages of fish ontogeny, is likely to have a strong effect in the structure of a fish community over the long term. However, trophic interactions that very much depend on the distribution of size among fish individuals may ameliorate environmental influences at the community level. We test the influence of environmental variability in a tropho-dynamic size-based model of the demersal fish community off Newfoundland. Our results indicate the community has a better capacity to cope with changes in environmental factors when they vary stochastically rather than when they follow a continuous and directional variation. When it is stochastic, environmental variability does not seem to have a negative impact on long-term community structure and dynamics.