Human Dimensions of Fisheries

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Human Dimensions ofFisheries Wildlife
Management

• Steve L. McMullin

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Natural resource management is   The
manipulation of organismal populations, their
habitats, and people to achieve specific human
objectives    
Habitat
Organisms
People
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Management of people has several dimensions. .
People
Social Dimension
Economic Dimension
Political Dimension
Legal Dimension
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What famous people say about human dimensions of
natural resource mgmt.

• To begin with, I had to know something about the
  people, the country and the trees. And of the
  three, the first was the most important.
• Gifford Pinchot

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Famous people (cont.)

• The problem of game management is not how we
  shall handle the deer the real problem is one of
  human management. Wildlife management is
  comparatively easy human management difficult.
• Aldo Leopold

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Famous people (cont.)

• Our most neglected and crucial research needs
  are those concerning human social behavior.
• Durward Allen

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What is Human Dimensions? The challenge of
understanding and clarifying stakeholders
perspectives on resource management programs
and issues, and systematically incorporating such
insight into decision making.   Decker and
Enck 1996   Stakeholder anyone who will be
affected by a management decision or action, or
who thinks he/she will be affected
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Who are stakeholders?
Stakeholders are people who stand to benefit from
or be negatively affected by management decisions
or actions.
-including those who believe they will be affected
-and those who dont know they will be affected
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Four Major Human Dimensions Concerns For Fish
Wildlife managers Decker and Enck (1996)

• Identify stakeholders
• Understand forces affecting stakeholder
  participation in fish wildlife related
  activities
• Involving stakeholders in management decision
  making
• Weighting disparate stakeholder input in
  management decisions

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Identifying and Understanding Stakeholders

• Probably the most important and critical HD need
  for successful management
• Who are the stakeholders?
• What are their attitudes opinions regarding
  conservation of fish and wildlife?

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Understanding Forces Affecting Participation

• Traditionally focused on participation in hunting
  fishing
• Nonconsumptive activities gaining greater
  importance
• Motivation, specialization, what constitutes a
  quality experience

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Involving stakeholders or obtaining input for
decision making

• Social science methods to gauge public opinion
• Assist managers in making decisions

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Weight disparate stakeholder input in making
decisions

• Stakeholders are diverse
• HD info should not be used to make resource
  management a process of counting votes
• Not a substitute for professional judgment and
  management in the public interest
• Need to understand your values those of the
  stakeholders

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Good biology is needed to set bounds on what is
possible, but biology alone does not tell us what
is best for the many stakeholders served by the
manager. Decker and Enck (1996)
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Case Study Montanas Bighorn River
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When You Think of Montana
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Perhaps You Think of Winter
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But Half of Montana is Prairie
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Yellowtail Dam created trout habitat
And hatchery trucks created a trout fishery
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A mixed fishery of brown trout and rainbow trout
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Including some trophy sized fish!
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Fishing pressure grew rapidly
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The character of the fishery changed
Percent of all anglers
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Higher use and changing users created a
controversy that had to be addressed
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Fish Population Monitoring
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We modeled effects of flows and regulations on
fish populations
What do these graphs suggest about potential
management strategies?
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What did we do?