Management Research Needs 



Fishing Mortality in Sea Turtle Stocks (Andre M. 

 Landry, Jr.) 



Introduction 



Current sea turtle management policies must take into 

 account biological, socioeconomic, cultural and political factors 

 which impact these stocks and their survival. Exploitation of 

 sea turtles for subsistence and commerce is of primary concern to 

 policy makers (Hopkins and Richardson 1984) because of the 

 potential for endangerment and extinction of these stocks created 

 by overharvesting, whether by directed fisheries or incidental 

 take. Both directed and incidental harvests of sea turtles 

 continue today — often at alarming rates and upon stocks near 

 extinction (Frazer 1987) . Although stopping exploitation of sea 

 turtles is a long range ideal of many conservation strategies, 

 today's management policies realistically can only strive to 

 return these stocks to their former abundance while permitting 

 controlled harvest for the socioeconomic welfare of human 

 generations to come. 



Continuation of directed and/or incidental sea turtle 

 harvest necessitates sound conservation policies developed from 

 research on impacts of fishing-induced mortality (or what is 

 referred to in mortality analysis as F) and the overriding 

 results these losses have on population recovery and viability. 

 Management research needed to characterize fishing mortality is 

 extremely varied in its approach and often difficult to conduct. 

 Nevertheless, the future of many sea turtle stocks depends upon 

 management recommendations developed from this research. This 

 paper identifies management research needs as they apply to sea 

 turtle harvest and suggests ways in which these needs can be met. 



Management Research Assumptions 



An underlying theme of the managment research approach 

 presented herein is conservation of those wild stocks which 

 collectively constitute a species through simple, conservative 

 and low risk techniques. This approach is mandated by our 

 inadequate knowledge of these stocks, their long migrations 

 across international boundaries and the associated jurisdictional 

 concerns which result and the exceedingly long maturation time 

 characteristic of sea turtle stocks (Ehrenfeld 1982) . Long life 

 history cycles of sea turtles, wherein species such as the 

 loggerhead (Caretta caretta) may take 15 to 30 years to reach 

 sexual maturity, constitute a complex management problem because 

 stock recovery and/or response time to management measures is so 

 long. As an example, very effective and intensive efforts by 

 Mexico since the mid 1960s to eliminate Kemp's ridley 

 ( Lepidochelys kempi ) egg harvest at the Rancho Nuevo nesting 



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