MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Falkland Islands news from the Fishery Department
THIS is the first report on fisheries activity which will be published monthly by the Fisheries Department. Statistics for March 2006
The total catch of all commercial species in March 2006 was 47,944 tonnes. It is the highest catch in March for the last three years, mainly due to a long-awaited improved performance in the Illex squid fishery. A total of 90 licenses were valid in March, including 43 licenses for jigging vessels fishing for Illex.
Unfortunately, the joint UK-Argentine pre-recruit survey of Illex did not happen this year, so no direct estimation of Illex stocks is available. However, as was noted in Penguin News in February, a set of indirect indicators suggested that the Illex abundance should be substantial this year.
First, it is well-known that squid of the so-called South Patagonian Stock (SPS), which represents the bulk of the Falkland Illex fishery, migrate southwards from their nursery grounds located in the northern part of the Argentinean Shelf through the high seas region (45-47°S) in January-February.
Thus, a good fishery in January-February based on small and immature SPS squid would indicate their high abundance. Indeed, good catches of Illex (15-20 mt/day both for trawlers and jiggers) occurred in the last week of February, showing that the Illex abundance of SPS this year is quite high.
Second, it is also known that distribution of the SPS squid on the Patagonian Shelf depends on environmental conditions. Appearance of Illex on the Falklands part of the Shelf usually correlates with the presence of warm inflows of the shelf water from the Argentinean EEZ. Squid then aggregate in the vicinity of the confluence between the warm inflows with cold waters of the Falklands Current.
This is exactly the situation which occurred this year (Figure). At the beginning of March, the early migrating SPS squid moved further south from the High Seas, and aggregated in the northern part of the FICZ. Since March 11, these aggregations were discovered and fished by the jigging fleet. The fishery was stable until the end of the month, with impressive mean catches of 37 mt per vessel/night. In the last week of the month, catches peaked at up to 50-55 mt/night.
Even with the relatively small number of fishing jiggers, 32-34 vessels every day with the rest transhipping in Berkeley Sound, the total catch for the month reached 27,000 mt. Squid sizes were normal for this time of the year (24-26 cm mantle length).
Two to three trawlers remained on the High Seas fishing for Illex. They also had high catches, especially during the first and third weeks of the month (25-30 mt/day), indicating that the abundance of the late migrating SPS squid should also be high this year. Together with favourable oceanography, it seems that there should be good prospects for the Illex fishery in the following months.
Loligo In March, the whole Loligo fleet (16 vessels) fished exclusively in the southern part of the Loligo box around the Beauchene Island.
There was excellent performance in the fishery which started in the last week of February and continued in March, with the mean daily CPUEs peaking up as high as 54 mt/day in the first week of the month.
Since then, catches have gradually decreased down to 20 mt/day towards the end of the month. The total catch of Loligo in March reached 13,716 mt, which was the third highest March catch of this squid since 1991.
In the summer of 2005-06, oceanographic conditions on the Falkland Shelf were back to normal, with water temperatures being 1-1.5°C lower than in the warm years of 2004-05.
This caused a delay (in comparison to 2004-05) in migrations of these squid to their feeding grounds, as well as slowing down growth rates. On average, this year squid were about 1.5-2 cm smaller than in the last two years at about 9-10 cm mantle length.
Current estimations of the 2006 biomass using fishery data show thatthe initial biomass of squid at the beginning of the season was about 40,000 tonnes.
The projected value of spawning stock biomass by the beginning of the spawning season of the first cohort (end of May) is currently around 20,000 mt, indicating thatthe conservation target for the first cohort will be met.
Finfish One large surimi trawler targeted southern blue whiting in the south-western part of the FICZ.
Catches were quite unstable, ranging from 20 to 190 tonnes per day. The average monthly catch per day (73 mt/day) was quite similar to those observed in March in previous years.
Catches of hoki were low being comparable only with rather poor catches in March of 2001 and 2003.
Most of the finfish trawlers preferred to target more abundant Illex. Catches of hakes, kingclip and redcod were about two to four times higher than the March catches of the last three years.
The catch of toothfish at 249 mt was the record catch for March in the last decade. A large proportion of this catch was taken by a Korean potter, which has operated on charter to Consolidated Fisheries Ltd whilst the CFL Gambler has undergone a period of refit and repairs.
The vessel used a different technique (pot traps instead of the much more commonly used hooks on a longline), which proved to be much more efficient to catch toothfish. It also has the benefit of reducing interactions with seabirds.
The latest volume of the Fishery Statistics (vol. 10) will be available from the Fisheries Department in April, and once published may be downloaded in PDF format from the website www.fis.com/falklandfish
By Dr Sasha Arkhipkin for Penguin News.
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