Research Publications
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Sean Cox is a fisheries scientist focusing on aquatic conservation and management of human impacts on aquatic ecosystems. His research develops and applies quantitative fisheries stock assessment methods and field research to address issues in the management of commercial and recreational fisheries. Current research themes include (i) design and evaluation of management procedures for commercial groundfish, herring, and salmon fisheries, (ii) design, evaluation, and application of visual survey methods for assessment of Pacific salmon, rockfish, and marine invertebrates, and (iii) spatial population dynamics of inshore rockfish and implications for marine protected area design. All theme areas involve the extensive use of mathematical and statistical modelling techniques.
Sean works closely with federal and provincial fisheries management agencies and he has served as a consultant providing training and support for aquatic resource management programs in Canada and the USA. Some of his publications
include:
Holt, K.R., R.M. Peterman, and S.P. Cox. 2011. Trade-offs between monitoring objectives and monitoring effort when classifying regional conservation status of Pacific salmon populations. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 68:880-897 with supplement
Cleary, J. S., Cox, S. P., and Schweigert, J. F. 2010. Performance evaluation of harvest control rules for Pacific herring in British Columbia, Canada. In press in ICES Journal of Marine Science, 67:2005-2011.
Holt, K.R., Cox, S.P., and J. Sawada. 2009. In-season forecasting of coho salmon marine survival via coded wire tag recoveries. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 29: 1165-1182.
Cox, S.P. and Kronlund, A.R. 2008. Practical stakeholder driven harvest policies for British Columbia groundfish fisheries. Fisheries Research. (available online doi:10.1016/j.fishres.2008.05.006).
Holt, K.R. and Cox, S.P. 2008. Evaluation of visual survey programs for monitoring coho salmon escapement in relation to conservation guidelines. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 64: 1770-1780.
Hirner, J.L. and S.P. Cox. 2007. Effects of rainbow trout on amphibian density and growth in productive recreational fishing lakes of British Columbia. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 65: 212-226.
Parkinson, E.A., Post, J.R., and S.P. Cox. 2004. Linking harvesting effort dynamics to recruitment dynamics in a multi-stock, spatially-structured fishery. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 61:1658-1670.
Cox, S.P. and Kitchell, J.F. 2004. The Lake Superior Ecosystem, 1929-1998: simulating alternative hypotheses for lake herring recruitment failure. Bulletin of Marine Science 74: 671-684.
Kitchell, J.F., Kaplan, I.C., Cox, S.P., Martell, S. J. D., Esssington, T.E., Boggs, C.H., and C. J. Walters. 2004. Ecological and economic components of alternative fishing methods to reduce by-catch of marlin in a tropical pelagic ecosystem. Bulletin of Marine Science 74: 607-620.
Cox, S.P., Sawada, J., and W. de la Mare. 2003. In-season forecasting of North Coast coho salmon marine survival: a decision analytic method and retrospective analysis. Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat Res. Doc. 2003/063.
Beard, T.D., Rasmussen, P.W., Cox, S.P., and S.R. Carpenter. 2003. Evaluation of a management system for a mixed walleye spearing and angling fishery in northern Wisconsin. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 23: 481-491.
Beard, T.D., Cox, S.P., and S.R. Carpenter. 2003. Impacts of daily bag limit reductions on angler effort in Wisconsin walleye lakes. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 23: 1283-1293.
Cox, S.P., Walters, C.J., and J.R. Post. 2003. A model-based evaluation of active management of recreational fishing effort. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 23: 1294-1302.
Harvey, C. J., Cox, S. P., Essington, T. E., Hansson, S., and Kitchell, J. F. 2003. An ecosystem model of food web and fisheries interactions in the Baltic Sea. ICES Journal of Marine Science, 60: 939–950. ***#1 Most Downloaded Article in ICES J. Mar. Sci. 2003 ***
Cox, S.P., T. E. Essington, J. F. Kitchell, S. J.D. Martell, C. J. Walters, C. Boggs, and I. Kaplan. 2002. Reconstructing ecosystem dynamics in the Central Pacific Ocean, 1952-1998. I. Estimating population biomass and recruitment of tunas and billfishes. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 59: 1724-1735.
Cox, S.P., T. E. Essington, J. F. Kitchell, S. J.D. Martell, C. J. Walters, C. Boggs, and I. Kaplan. 2002. Reconstructing ecosystem dynamics in the Central Pacific Ocean, 1952-1998. II. A preliminary assessment of the trophic impacts of fishing and effects on tuna dynamics. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 59: 1736-1747.
Cox, S.P., Beard, T.D. and Walters, C.J. 2002. Harvest control in open-access sport fisheries: hot rod or asleep at the reel? Bulletin of Marine Science 70(2): 749-761.
Cox, S. P., and Walters, C.J. 2002. Modeling exploitation in recreational fisheries and implications for effort management on British Columbia rainbow trout lakes. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 22:21-34.
Cox, S. P and Walters, C.J. 2002. Maintaining quality in recreational fisheries: how success breeds failure in the management of open-access fisheries. Pages 107 – 119 in T.J. Pitcher and C. Hollingworth, editors. Recreational fisheries: Ecological, Economic, and Social Evaluation. Blackwell Science, Oxford, UK.
Post, J. R., Sullivan, M., Cox, S. P., Lester, N.P., Walters, C.J., Parkinson, E.A., Paul, A.J., Jackson, L. and Shuter, B.J. 2002. Canada’s recreational fisheries: the invisible collapse? Fisheries 27: 6-17.
Kitchell, J.F., Cox, S.P., Harvey, C.J., Johnson, T.B., Mason, D.M., Schoen, K.K., Aydin, K., Bronte, C., Ebener, M., Hansen, M., Hoff, M., Schram, S., Schreiner, D., Walters, C.J. 2000. Sustainability of the Lake Superior fish community: interactions in a food web context. Ecosystems 3: 545-560.
Cox, S. P. and Hinch, S.G. 1997. Changes in size at maturity of Fraser River sockeye salmon (1952-1993) and associations with temperature. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 54: 1159-1165.
- Fourth William and Lenore Mote Syposium in Fisheries Ecology, Sarasota, FL. November 2002
- American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO), Victoria, BC. June 2002
- 3rd World Conference on Recreational Fishing, Darwin, Australia. May 2002
- Upper Midwest Fish and Wildlife Conference, Minneapolis, MN. December 2000