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Many marine mammal predators, particularly pinnipeds, have increased in abundance in recent decades, generating new challenges for balancing human uses with recovery goals via ecosystem-based management. We used a spatio-temporal bioenergetics model of the Northeast Pacific Ocean to quantify how predation by three species of pinnipeds and killer whales (Orcinus orca) on Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) has changed since the 1970s along the west coast of North America, and compare these estimates to salmon fisheries. We find that from 1975 to 2015, biomass of Chinook salmon consumed by pinnipeds and killer whales increased from 6,100 to 15,200 metric tons (from 5 to 31.5 million individual salmon). Though there is variation across the regions in our model, overall, killer whales consume the largest biomass of Chinook salmon, but harbor seals (Phoca vitulina) consume the largest number of individuals. The decrease in adult Chinook salmon harvest from 1975-2015 was 16,400 to 9,600 metric tons. Thus, Chinook salmon removals (harvest + consumption) increased in the past 40 years despite catch reductions by fisheries, due to consumption by recovering pinnipeds and endangered killer whales. Long-term management strategies for Chinook salmon will need to consider potential conflicts between rebounding predators or endangered predators and prey.

Species distribution models (SDMs) are important statistical tools for obtaining ecological insight into species-habitat relationships and providing advice for natural resource management. Many SDMs have been developed over the past decades, with a focus on space- and more recently, time-dependence. However, most of these studies have been on terrestrial species and applications to marine species have been limited. In this study, we used three large spatio-temporal data sources (habitat maps, survey-based fish density estimates, and fishery catch data) and a novel space-time model to study how the distribution of fishing may affect the seasonal dynamics of a commercially important fish species (Pacific Dover sole, Microstomus pacificus) off the west coast of the USA. Dover sole showed a large scale change in seasonal and annual distribution of biomass, and its distribution shifted from mid-depth zones to inshore or deeper waters during late summer/early fall. In many cases, the scale of fishery removal was small compared to these broader changes in biomass, suggesting that seasonal dynamics were primarily driven by movement and not by fishing. The increasing availability of appropriate data and space-time modeling software should facilitate extending this work to many other species, particularly those in marine ecosystems, and help tease apart the role of growth, natural mortality, recruitment, movement, and fishing on spatial patterns of species distribution in marine systems.