1998 

 OUR LIVING OCEANS 



Landings 

 (x 1,000 t) 



Abundance 

 survey index 

 (kg / tow) 



Landings 



Survey index 



- 60 



- 45 



- 30 







1950 1965 1970 1975 19 

 Year 



1990 



Figure 5 



Landings (■ 1,000 t) and relative abundance (stratified mean catch per tow in kg 

 from NEFSC bottonn trawl surveys) for principal groundfish and flounder stocks 

 off the U.S. northeast, 1960-97. 



Abundance 

 (kg/tow) 



70 

 60 

 50 

 40 

 30 

 20 



CPUE 

 (t/day) 



Year 



Figure 6 



Relative abundance (from stratified mean catch per tow in kg from NEFSC bot- 

 tom trawl surveys) and commercial trawler CPUE (catch per unit of effort, in 

 metric tons per day fished, standardized for vessel size) for principal groundfish 

 and flounder stocks off the U.S. northeast, 1963-97. 



recruitniL-iit declined stcadil)' diirint; the period. 

 Other important groundfish stocks .supporting the 

 fishery prior to the 1 960's included silver hake and 

 pollock, with small amounts ot red hake, white 

 hake, and others. Because of the modest harvest 

 rates on most stocks, recruitment overfishing did 

 not occur or was not persistent. When stocks de- 

 clined, the fleet moved to other species, or to dif- 

 ferent stocks of the same species (e.g. oft C^anada). 



Distant-Water Fleets (1960-76) 



The growth of distant-water foreign fishing off 

 the northeastern United States in the early 1960's 

 included fleets of factory-based trawlers from east- 

 ern Europe, Asia, and elsewhere. Scotiting vessels 

 for the Soviet fleets first ventured into New En- 

 eland waters in 1961. Fheir initial tarcet was At- 

 lantic herring, and the distant-water fleet caught 

 about 63,000 t that year. In subsequent years, her- 

 ring catches increased (peaking at 225,000 t in 

 1963), and other species were also targeted, in- 

 cluding silver and red hake, haddock, and Atlan- 

 tic mackerel. From 1460 to 196'), total ground- 

 fish landings increased from 200, 000 t to about 

 760,000 t (Figure 5), H.iddock landings reached 

 a record-high 1 S4,()00 t in I ')6S and declined rap- 

 idly thereafter. Between 1964 and 1967 total 

 groundfish landings were composed primarily of 

 silver hake, haddock, red hake, flounders, and cod. 



1 he intensified international fisher)' off the 

 northeastern United States prt)mpted the devel- 

 opment of systematic multispecies monitoring 

 surveys, which were initiated in the autumn of 

 1963. Stratified-random bottom-trawl surveys of 

 the continental shelf waters from Nova Scotia to 

 Hudson Canvon and later to Cape Hatteras, North 

 Carolina, have been conducted every autumn since 

 1963 and every spring since 1968. Abundance, 

 measured by these surveys, declined rapidly as vari- 

 ous components of the demersal and pelagic sys- 

 tems were pulse-fished' (Figures 5 and 6). Fhe par- 

 allel decline in groundfish abundance and land- 

 ings was rapid and severe between 1 966 and 1 970 

 (Figure 5). 



Beginning in 19'70, quota-based m.inagement 



'IniL-rmittcnt. high fishing ellcm. 



76 



