Model simulations to determine optimal fishing effort and season duration for a tropical shrimp fishery

Kuwait's shrimp fishery presents typical tropical shrimp fishery characteristics with highly variable recruitment, fast growth and strong seasonal patterns. Both the General Production Model and Age-structured Model were chosen to assess the stock status of the Kuwait's shrimp fishery. The estimated Maximum Sustainable Yield(MSY) was 2 518 metric ton(t) with a corresponding fishing eff orts( f MSY) 7 265 standard boat-days from the General Production Model. Similar results from the Age-structured Model were 1 936 t and 6 449 boat-days respectively. Comparing these results with the average annual shrimp landings(1 772 t) and average fishing eff ort(9 710 boat-days) in the past 10 years, we concluded that the fishery was overfished. Model simulations to show the changes of recruitment, biomass and possible catch under different fishing eff ort scenarios indicated possible stock collapse if the fishing eff ort continually increase. But both shrimp recruitment and biomass will increase if the current fishing eff ort is reduced. Model simulations also showed a possible increase of MSY by delaying the opening or by closing the season earlier. Based on these results, recommendations to improve the management of Kuwait's shrimp fishery are presented.

Modeling a habitat suitability index for the eastern fall cohort of Ommastrephes bartramii in the central North Pacific Ocean

The eastern fall cohort of the neon flying squid, Ommastrephes bartramii, has been commercially exploited by the Chinese squid jigging fleet in the central North Pacific Ocean since the late 1990s. To understand and identify their optimal habitat, we have developed a habitat suitability index （HSI） model using two potential important environmental variables -- sea surface temperature （SST） and sea surface height anomaly （SSHA） -- and fishery data from the main fishing ground （165°-180°E） during June and July of 1999-2003. A geometric mean model （GMM）, minimum model （MM） and arithmetic weighted model （AWM） with different weights were compared and the best HSI model was selected using Akaike＇s information criterion （AIC）. The performance of the developed HSI model was evaluated using fishery data for 2004. This study suggests that the highest catch per unit effort （CPUE） and fishing effort are closely related to SST and SSHA. The best SST- and SSHA-based suitability index （SI） regression models were SISST-based = 0.7SIeffort-SST ＋ 0.3 SICPUE-SST, and SISSHA-based =0.5Sleffort-SSHA ＋ 0.5SICPUE-SSHA, respectively, showing that fishing effort is more important than CPUE in the estimation of SI. The best HSI model was the AWM, defined as HSI=0.3SISSHA-based＋ 0.7SISSHA-based, indicating that SSHA is more important than SST in estimating the HSI of squid. In 2004, monthly HSI values greater than 0.6 coincided with the distribution of productive fishing ground and high CPUE in June and July, suggesting that the models perform well. The proposed model provides an important tool in our efforts to develop forecasting capacity of squid spatial dynamics.

Mapping the fishing intensity in the coastal waters off Guangdong province, China through AIS data

Fishing activities result in a depletion of fish resources and an increase in bycatch probability of non-target species,which are thought to be the cause of the recent demographic change experienced by coastal cetaceans in waters off Guangdong province,China.However,fishing intensity and its spatiotemporal pattern remain poorly examined in this region.Here,random daily tracks from 100 fishing vessels were used to estimate fishing operations in the coastal waters off Guangdong province.The performance of two methods was tested with Automatic Identification System(AIS)data collected in the Pearl River Delta region(PRD).This assessment found that the Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise(DBSCAN)could falsely identify port regions as fishing grounds,while the speed-based method provided a more accurate estimate of fishing grounds with less computational effort.Subsequently,the spatiotemporal pattern of fishing intensity in the coastal waters off the entire Guangdong province was examined with the speed-based method.Our results showed that 87.75%of the coastal fishing activities occurred in waters<40 m in depth.The method detected two spatially heterogeneous fishing grounds extending from the PRD to either the west or east sides of Guangdong province.In the west fishing ground,43.4%of fishing vessels operated in the waters off Yangjiang city;while in the east fishing ground,fishing activities were more evenly distributed.The present study suggests that the AIS is able to provide high-resolution data to monitor the development of fishing activities,which may be useful for informing marine resource management and spatial planning.