Colin Shea

Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission | ffwcc · Fish and Wildlife Research Institute

Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's Wildlife Assistance Biologists (WABs) receive calls from the public experiencing a wildlife conflict and provide guidance on how to coexist with native wildlife. This analysis considered how the number of calls and nature of calls received by WABs were impacted by COVID‐19 pandemic protective meas...

To conserve or restore juvenile fish habitat, resource managers, restoration practitioners, and engineers need fine-scale information to understand what conditions they need to preserve or what specifications are needed to create new habitat. The objective of this study was to develop statistical models using a dataset of 18 coastal ponds in Southw...

Worldwide, coastal wetlands are threatened by disrupted hydrology, urbanization, and sea-level rise. In southwest Florida, coastal wetlands include tidal creeks and coastal ponds, which are the primary habitats used by juvenile Tarpon, Megalops atlanticus , an important sport fish. Coastal ponds can occur near uplands and are ephemerally connected...

Genetic rescue—an increase in population fitness following the introduction of new alleles—has been proven to ameliorate inbreeding depression in small, isolated populations, yet is rarely applied as a conservation tool. A lingering question regarding genetic rescue in wildlife conservation is how long beneficial effects persist in admixed populati...

The timing of American horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus) spawning behavior along the coast of Florida (United States) is generally associated with the highest tides during the spring and fall lunar cycles. All Florida estuaries support horseshoe crab populations, but tidal characteristics vary markedly among locations, which may influence the tim...

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Before collapsing, bay scallops (Argopecten irradians) supported commercial fisheries in Florida but, following decades of restoration efforts and management actions, still support a recreational fishery. Settlement was monitored along the west coast of Florida from 1992 through 2018, using collector traps. The primary environmental variables retai...

Spotted seatrout, a popular recreational sport fish in the southeastern United States, are affected by freshwater flow conditions and the availability of estuarine habitat. However, the relative influence of these factors, particularly on early life stages of seatrout, remains uncertain. We used generalized linear models to quantify relationships b...

Objective Since 2010, three spatially disjunct reef fish video surveys have provided fishery‐independent data critical to the assessment and management of reef fishes in the Gulf of Mexico. Although analytical approaches have recently been developed to integrate data from these surveys into a single measure of relative abundance and size compositio...

Subtropical Florida blue crabs, Callinectes sapidus, exhibit differing life history traits compared to their temperate counterparts, likely influencing symbiont infection dynamics. Little information exists for Florida C. sapidus symbiont profiles, their distribution among various habitats, and influence on crab condition. Using histopathology, gen...

Objective: Cutaneous ulcerative skin lesions in a complex of invasive Gulf of Mexico lionfish (Red Lionfish Pterois volitans, Devil Firefish P. miles, and the hybrid Red Lionfish × Devil Firefish) became epizootic beginning in mid-August 2017. Herein, we provide the first pathological descriptions of these lesions and summarize our analyses to elu...

Understanding the spatiotemporal dynamics of trophic structures, or trophodynamics, is important for assessing the overall condition and function of estuarine ecosystems. We examined spatial and seasonal trophodynamics of nekton assemblages across the seascape of a subtropical estuary (Charlotte Harbor, FL, USA) using historical nekton data from an...

Herbivorous reef fishes control algal growth and are critical for maintaining reef health. Grazing effects vary due to community composition, so a diverse herbivore community is important for preventing phase shifts from coral to algal-dominated reefs. However, herbivore communities and grazing effects vary spatially, resulting in non-uniform distr...

Oyster reefs are among the most threatened habitats in the world having suffered cosmopolitan decline, and studies evaluating reef construction materials and designs are critical to their successful restoration and management. Current restoration practice commonly employs the use of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plastic materials to contain oyst...

In 1995, eight female pumas from Texas (Puma concolor stanleyana) were introduced into five areas in South Florida to remediate morphological and biomedical correlates of inbreeding depression that threatened the long-term survival of Florida panthers (P. c. coryi). Initial analysis of the results of this genetic introgression initiative has highli...

The Indian River Lagoon (IRL), located on the east coast of Florida, is a complex estuarine ecosystem that is negatively affected by recurring harmful algal blooms (HABs) from distinct taxonomic/functional groups. Enhanced monitoring was established to facilitate rapid quantification of three recurrent bloom taxa, Aureoumbra lagunensis, Pyrodinium...

Knowledge of juvenile recruitment (defined here as the quantitative addition of early benthic life stages to a local population) is important for conserving heavily harvested species and their critical habitats. Stone crabs (genus Menippe) are commercially and ecologically important throughout the Gulf of Mexico nearshore waters off Florida, but ve...

Since 2014, stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD) has led to large-scale mortality of over 20 coral species throughout the Florida Reef Tract. In 2019, in-water disease intervention strategies were implemented to treat affected corals. Two treatment strategies were employed: (1) topical application of an amoxicillin paste directly to disease marg...

Birds that breed in early-successional shrubland habitats are declining throughout North America. The Florida scrub-jay Aphelocoma coerulescens depends on Florida scrub, a shrubland plant community endemic to peninsular Florida, USA. The Florida scrub-jay is nonmigratory, federally listed as threatened, globally listed as Vulnerable, and experienci...

Many species of interest to management and conservation remain data-limited, and the data that are available are often unable to produce statistically reliable population trends. We examined 10 years of juvenile reef fish catch data from two gear-specific, fishery-independent surveys in the eastern Gulf of Mexico to assess our ability 1) to charact...

Corals throughout the Caribbean have experienced major declines since the 1970s. In response, many agencies have focused their conservation and restoration efforts on outplanting nursery-grown coral fragments onto degraded reefs. Predation on newly outplanted corals can be an important but often unmonitored factor contributing to the declining heal...

Marine fish movement plays a critical role in ecosystem functioning and is increasingly studied with acoustic telemetry. Traditionally, this research has focused on single species and small spatial scales. However, integrated tracking networks, such as the Integrated Tracking of Aquatic Animals in the Gulf of Mexico (iTAG) network, are building the...

Marine fish movement plays a critical role in ecosystem functioning and is increasingly studied with acoustic telemetry. Traditionally, this research has focused on single species and small spatial scales. However, integrated tracking networks, such as the Integrated Tracking of Aquatic Animals in the Gulf of Mexico (iTAG) network, are building the...

A leading human-related threat to the Florida manatee Trichechus manatus latirostris is collisions with watercraft, which account for 20-25% of reported mortalities. Quantitative threat assessments do not include information on all known manatee-watercraft interactions. These interactions often result in sublethal wounding, usually leaving multiple...

Along the Florida reef tract, stony-coral-tissue-loss disease (SCTLD) has caused extensive mortality of more than 20 scleractinian coral species. The pathogen is unknown, but its epizoology indicates that the disease, facilitated by water currents, has progressed linearly along the tract, affecting reefs at the scale of hundreds of kilometers. To i...

Coral reef cnidarians often host crustaceans in multi-level symbioses that may cause reef-wide impacts, especially through anemoneshrimp cleaner interactions with fish clients. Despite the ubiquity and importance of these interactions, patterns of temporal and spatial variation in crustacean association with sea anemones remain largely unknown. We...

Mortality from being struck by a motorized watercraft is considerable for many aquatic vertebrates around the world, including sea turtles. We studied stranded (i.e., dead, sick, or injured) sea turtles found in Florida, USA, during 1986–2014 and identified those with sharp force or blunt force injuries indicative of a vessel strike. About a third...

Accurate estimates of reproductive potential are a key component of any stock assessment. Multiple factors influencing the variability in batch fecundity of stone crabs Menippe spp. across the Florida fishery were quantified with a negative binomial regression model. Stone crabs were collected bimonthly from Cedar Key, Tampa Bay, Pavilion Key, and...

Many marine fish form spawning aggregations (FSAs) and exhibit meta-population stock structure, affecting reproductive resilience and the optimal spatial scale of management. Red drum use a known FSA site off Tampa Bay (TB FSA site) and another presumed FSA site off Charlotte Harbor (CH FSA site). We studied these sites for 3 years (2012–2014) to a...

Context: Designing effective long-term monitoring strategies is essential for managing wildlife populations. Implementing a cost-effective, practical monitoring program is especially challenging for widespread but locally rare species. Early successional habitat preferred by the New England cottontail (NEC) has become increasingly rare and fragment...

Plasticity in life-history traits and behaviors allows organisms to track spatial environmental variation, such as that resulting from a latitudinal gradient. In estuaries, hydrological patterns can vary greatly with latitude, causing variable habitat use patterns across a species' range. For Common Snook (Centropomus undecimalis) a large euryhalin...

Physical damage by motor vessels is a widespread problem for seagrass meadows, with hull and propeller strikes accounting for thousands of acres of impaired habitat in Florida, USA, alone. Because the excavations can become topographically unstable, and because re‐colonization and succession of seagrasses can require decades to reach climax, Thalas...

Understanding trophodynamics of estuarine and marine ecosystems is important in developing food-web models prevalent in ecosystem-based approaches to fisheries management, as well as assessing ecosystem condition and function. Few studies have examined seasonal and spatial trophodynamics of nekton assemblages in shallow subtropical waters on estuar...

Understanding trophodynamics of estuarine and marine ecosystems is important in developing food-web models prevalent in ecosystem-based approaches to fisheries management, as well as assessing ecosystem condition and function. Few studies have examined seasonal and spatial trophodynamics of nekton assemblages in shallow subtropical waters on estuar...

• In the agricultural landscape of the Midwestern USA, waterways are highly altered. Oxbows are among the few remaining off‐channel habitats associated with streams, supporting fish assemblages that include the endangered Topeka shiners Notropis topeka in portions of their remaining range. Oxbow restorations seek to increase the number and quality...

Freshwater mussels (Unionidae) are among the most imperiled groups of organisms in the world and the lack of information regarding species distributions, life history characteristics, and ecological and biological requirements may limit the protection of remaining mussel populations. We examined the influence of hydrologic factors on the occurrence...

Smalltooth sawfish Pristis pectinata use southwest Florida nurseries during at least their first 2 to 3 yr, and understanding region-specific habitat use patterns is important for effective management. Research occurred in 2 nurseries within the Charlotte Harbor estuarine system: the Caloosahatchee River, a highly human-altered nursery, and a more...

Predicting discard mortality of species from fishery operations is essential for developing accurate stock assessments and determining sustainable fishery practices. The Florida stone crab, Menippe mercenaria, is a highly exploited fishery resource in which only the claws are harvested and declawed legal-size and both intact ovigerous females and u...

Sixteen darter species, including the federally endangered Boulder Darter Etheostoma wapiti , are known to occur in the Elk River, a large, flow‐regulated tributary of the Tennessee River, Tennessee–Alabama. Since the construction of Tims Ford Dam (TFD) in 1970, habitat modification caused by cold, hypolimnetic water releases and peak‐demand hydrop...

Based on five years of demographic monitoring of wild Acropora palmata along the Florida Reef Tract, the strongest predictors of monthly colony survival were factors related to season, year, region, and initial skeletal area. While colony survival was generally lowest in Biscayne National Park and the Lower Florida Keys, colonies throughout the Flo...

Fishery biologists are increasingly recognizing the importance of considering the dynamic nature of streams when developing streamflow policies. Such approaches require information on how flow regimes influence the physical environment and how those factors, in turn, affect species-specific demographic rates. A more cost-effective alternative could...

Little consideration has been given to environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling strategies for rare species. The certainty of species detection relies on understanding false positive and false negative error rates. We used artificial ponds together with logistic regression models to assess the detection of African jewelfish eDNA at varying fish densities...

During the past 100 years, most large rivers in North America have been altered for flood control, hydropower, navigation or water supply development. Although these activities clearly provide important human services, their associated environmental disturbances can profoundly affect stream-dwelling organisms. We used dynamic multi-species occupanc...

Assessing the population status and dynamics of species is an important component of monitoring efforts aimed at improving understanding of relationships between freshwater mussels (Bivalvia: Unionidae) and their environment. Most freshwater mussel population assessments are conducted using raw count (density, abundance) or presence/absence data bu...

Since the construction of Tims Ford Dam (TFD) in 1970, the Elk River in Tennessee and Alabama has experienced substantial changes in downstream hydrothermal and hydrological conditions. These changes have inhibited the ability of some native species to persist in affected reaches, including the federally endangered Boulder Darter Etheostoma wapiti....

Efforts to conserve stream and river biota could benefit from tools that allow managers to evaluate landscape-scale changes in species distributions in response to water management decisions. We present a framework and methods for integrating hydrology, geographic context and metapopulation processes to simulate effects of changes in streamflow on...

Background/Question/Methods Regional conservation strategies to address climate change effects on native biota should benefit from a good understanding of which species are most likely to be affected, and where on the landscape the greatest effects are likely to occur. To that end, we are working within the USGS Southeast Regional Assessment Proj...

The southeastern United States has experienced severe, recurrent drought, rapid human population growth, and increasing agricultural irrigation during recent decades, resulting in greater demand for the water resources. During the same time period, freshwater mussels (Unioniformes) in the region have experienced substantial population declines. Con...

Surveys of freshwater mussel populations are used frequently to inform conservation decisions by providing information about the status and distribution of species. It is generally accepted that not all mussels or species are collected during surveys, and incomplete detection of individuals and species can bias data and can affect inferences. Howev...

Current approaches to assessing the potential effects of river regulation and water use on stream fish communities are based on physical habitat simulation and are not feasible for estimating these effects over large spatial scales. We developed a channel classification for streams in the lower Flint River basin, Georgia, based on gross channel mor...

River regulation and development are the foremost problems threatening lotic fishes and other aquatic biota in the United States. The operation of hydroelectric facilities can influence both habitat availability and environmental stability in downstream reaches. We evaluated the relative influence of habitat complexity and environmental stability o...

River regulation and development are the foremost problems threatening fishes and other aquatic biota in the Southeastern US. The operation of hydroelectric facilities can influence both habitat availability and environmental stability in downstream areas. I evaluated the relative influence of habitat structure and environmental stability on fish a...