Lecturer & Marsden Fast Start Research Fellow
Contact Details
Email:lucy.wing@otago.ac.nz
Academic Qualifications
BSc Hons, Edinburgh
PhD, University of Otago
Research Interests
- Food web structure and population connectivity for conservation of temperate marine systems
I am an ecologist who has used direct observations, field sampling and environmental chemistry to study marine processes. My research interests have focused on understanding how physical processes drive productivity and carbon flux in impacted versus pristine marine systems. These studies have employed stable isotopes as natural tags for food web structure determination. I have also investigated metapopulation dynamics and animal movements using trace elemental natural tags that I have developed for rock lobsters Jasus edwardsii. I am an NZOSH certified scientific diver and with this I have conducted extensive underwater visual censuses and videogrammetric surveys in remote areas for the assessment of rock lobster size structure, the structure of fish and invertebrate communities. In addition I have developed a strong skills base in multivariate statistical techniques for measuring change in these communities. I have applied this knowledge in the assessment of marine reserves in the Fiordland Marine Area for the conservation of intact ecosystems and biodiversity.
Research Projects
- Does bioaccumulation of iron by seabirds enhance productivity around sub-Antarctic islands?
This Marsden funded project (Principal Investigator: Stephen Wing) aims use biogeochemical markers to quantify the importance of seabirds in sustaining nearshore productivity around New Zealand's sub-Antarctic islands and Antarctica. - You can't go home again: forensic evidence for changes in ecosystem function following mainland extinction of pinnipeds.
This Marsden funded project (Principal Investigator: Lucy Wing (née Jack)) uses forensic analysis of a time-series of fur seal and sea lion bones from archaeological deposits to describe the structure of prehistoric marine food webs and to track changes in ecosystem structure, from the advent of human exploitation in New Zealand to the modern day.
Courses
MARI 202 Marine Invertebrate Ecology and Biology
MARI 301 Marine Ecology
MARI 401 Advanced Methods in Marine Science
Postgraduate Students
Alex Connolly - Thesis Title (MSc): Identifying shifts in the trophic positions of coastal fish species associated with an increasing human population.
Marta Guerra - Thesis Title (PhD):Habitat use and foraging ecology of a declining population of sperm whales at Kaikoura, New Zealand
Susan Wells - Thesis Title (MSc):How has the coastal marine ecosystem of Otago changed since human arrival in New Zealand?