Using the Ecopath with Ecosim Modeling Approach to Understand the Effects of Watershed-based Management Actions in Coastal Ecosystems

ABSTRACTResource managers are often tasked with identifying and assessing the potential impacts of management actions on the biotic communities under their care. When the management activities directly influence a single species of interest, managers can turn to a variety of models to aid in their understanding of potential changes to that population. However, as ecosystem-based managementbecomes more widely accepted, managers will have to understand how proposed actions will impact entire biotic communities, through both direct and indirect mechanisms. Thus, there is a need for ecosystem modelsthat account for both trophic and non-trophic interactions, and that can be relatively easily used to assess a variety of management scenarios. We reviewed the available literature regarding incorporation of eutrophication and other anthropogenic impacts into Ecopath with Ecosim(EwE), one of the more widely used trophic ecosystem modelingframeworks. We found that a number of mechanisms of varying complexity hav...