Underwater video surveillance of American lobsters (Homarus americanus) to understand saturation levels in lobster traps

Clark, Abigail S.; Jury, Steven H.; Goldstein, Jason S.; Langley, Thomas G.; Watson, Winsor H.

doi:10.7755/fb.116.2.5

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 7 publications

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“…The possibility that European lobster catch rates in commercial fisheries are affected by a density-dependent factor is difficult to detect and compensate for routinely; this can distort the relationship between fishing effort and fishing mortality, which strongly influences the possibility of stock collapse when effort is high . These biases warrant further study using a combination of fishery data and fishery-independent survey methods, such as visual surveillance including the use of remote surveillance (Bloom et al, 2019), capture-mark-recapture (Clark, Jury, Goldstein, Langley, & Watson, 2018;Øresland, Oxby, & Oxby, 2018;Skerritt, Fitzsimmons, Polunin, Berney, & Hardy, 2012) or electronic tagging (Lees et al, 2018;Skerritt et al, 2015), as well as supporting studies of the encounter rate and capture process.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Inter‐ and intra‐specific interactions affecting crustacean trap fisheries—Implications for management

Skerritt

Bannister

Polunin

et al. 2020

Fisheries Management Eco

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The UK coastal trap fisheries target two key species, European lobster Homarus gammarus (L.) and brown crab Cancer pagurus L. Their stock status is assessed periodically using size‐based, yield‐per‐recruit analysis. Fishery trends are described using landings and, where available, effort data to estimate catch per unit of effort (CPUE), nominally proportional to abundance. Despite being caught together, assessments assume that concurrent capture of these species does not distort their individual CPUE estimates. Here, an in situ experiment tested impacts of inter‐specific and intra‐specific interactions by pre‐loading baited traps with different species and observing subsequent catches. Pre‐loaded European lobster significantly reduced brown crab catches, whereas, other species produced no such effects. The findings highlight the likely inconsistency of using CPUE as an index of abundance if landings data originate from a mixed‐species fishery in which species interactions and targeting behaviour of fishers are unknown or un‐quantified.

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