ottom line: Population regulation isn't a fixed property—it's contingent on ecological context.
Want to dive deeper? 📖 Paper: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Big thanks to my coauthor @CraigOsenberg and everyone who shared their data! 🙏 (8/8)

Why does this matter?
Understanding density-dependence is crucial for:
🔹 Managing fisheries
🔹 Conserving endangered species
🔹 Predicting how populations respond to disturbance (hello, climate change)
But we can't predict what we don't understand. (7/8)

Here's the kicker: Most studies don't report the environmental details we need to understand WHY results vary so much.
It's like trying to predict weather without knowing temperature, pressure, or humidity. We need better reporting! 📊 (6/8)

Species that naturally occur at LOW densities showed STRONGER density-dependence. This makes sense—if you're not adapted to crowding, adding neighbors hits harder.
Think: introvert at a packed party 😅 (5/8)

The same species showed wildly different responses depending on:

Predator density
Shelter availability
Habitat complexity
Even the SIZE of fish when the study started

Location, location, location! (4/8)

When predators were present, density-dependent mortality was ~15× stronger than without them. Why? At high densities, fish compete for hiding spots—and those left exposed become snacks. (3/8)

For decades, ecologists have known that when fish populations get crowded, mortality often increases—a key mechanism regulating populations.
But here's what surprised us: the STRENGTH of this effect varied by 1000-fold, even within the same species! 🤯 (2/8)

This plays out in real West Coast fisheries—Pacific hake, petrale sole, sablefish—where assessments update every 1-4 years. Climate-ready doesn't mean win-win. It means being transparent with communities about whether we're prioritizing conservation or catch.

We modeled fish populations under climate change and found consistent trade-offs. When productivity declined, adaptive management kept populations 42% larger but reduced harvest. When it increased, adaptive rules boosted harvest >100% but populations ran 40% smaller.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HTj...

Take-home: Indonesia’s reefs may be showing more resilience than expected, but cover alone doesn’t capture species shifts, functional change, or hidden vulnerability.

3/ The “shifted baseline” point is key: most data begin after the 1998 global bleaching event. What looks “stable” may already reflect reefs that declined before monitoring began.

2/ This stability is surprising given repeated mass bleaching and local disturbances.
So what’s going on? The authors suggest 4 possibilities:
• shifted baselines (post-1998 data dominate)
• averaging masks local losses & gains
• sampling biases
• true resilience of Indonesian reefs