Hypothesis
Over 1995-2020, warming surface water and low deep-water oxygen would steadily shrink suitable striped bass habitat in Lake Texoma, and that shrinking habitat would show up as a smaller population and poorer body condition.
What failed
Suitable habitat volume fell within each summer but showed no significant linear decline across the 26 years, and no significant linear relationship was found between habitat volume and either the striped bass population or fish body condition.
Broken assumption
A summer temperature-oxygen squeeze necessarily translates into long-term habitat loss and population decline for reservoir striped bass.
Why
The authors' leading explanation is that the reservoir's striped bass may be adapted to seasonal stratification; they also list other biophysical and statistical reasons the effect might have gone undetected.
From the published paper: Whiteis et al. Ecology and Evolution, 2026. ↗CC BY