TABLE 1. — Daily purse seine vessel landings 

 of Atlantic menhaden, landings for which 

 catch information was obtained, and percent 

 coverage, by season, 1955-59. 



season. Since logbook coverage was incom- 

 plete, the number of sets made each month 

 in a given unit area by all vessels from a 

 given plant was estimated by the formula; 



E = n / c \ 



L. 



where: E = estimated number of sets in a 

 given unit area 

 n = tabulated number of sets in that 

 unit area 



c = number of daily landings by all 

 vessels' 



i = number of daily landings by those 

 vessels from which effort data 

 were obtained 



Vessels from different plants often fished in 

 the same unit areas during a month; there- 

 fore, the estimated numbers of sets in each 

 unit area by vessels from the different plants 

 were summed to obtain the monthly total for 

 the unit area. 



Seasonal totals were obtained by summing 

 the monthly unit area totals. These also were 



' Equating each vessel landing with a day's fishing is 

 c»nsidered justified, since catches normally are landed 

 at the end of each day's fishing. 



summed by larger geographical areas. Four 

 such areas were used; these were described 

 by June and Reintjes (1959) in their summary 

 of the biostatistical data on catch (fig. 1) and 

 are as follows: 



South Atlantic Area : Waters between Cape 

 Canaveral, Fla. and a line running due east from 

 False Cape, Va, (lat. 36°35' N. and long. 75°53* W.). 



Chesapeake Bay Area ; Chesapeake Bay proper and 

 coastal waters outside the Bay lying between False 

 Cape and Great Machipongo Inlet, Va. (lat. 37°22' N. 

 and long 75°43' W.). 



Middle Atlantic Area : Waters north of great 

 Machipongo Inlet, Va, to a line running due south 

 of Moriches Inlet (lat. 40°46' N. and long. 72°) I' W.) 

 on the southern coast of Long Island, N. Y. 



North Atlantic Area : Waters along the southern 

 coast of Long Island, east of a line due south of 

 Moriches Inlet, Long Island Sound, and waters north- 

 ward. 



RESULTS 



Number of Purse Seine Sets by Season , 

 Month, and Area 



The number of purse seine sets in the in- 

 dividual season (table 2) varied between 26,522 

 (1958) and 35,725 (1959). A 20-percent in- 

 crease occurred from 1955 to 1956 and a 5- 

 percent increase from 1956 to 1957; but in 1958 

 there was a 24-percent decrease, followed by 

 a 35-percent increase in 1959. 



There were similarities in the monthly dis- 

 tribution of sets among seasons. There was 

 no fishing in February in any season; in two 

 of the five seasons, some fishing occurred in 

 March; and, in four seasons, a relatively 

 small amount occurred in April. In each 

 season, the number of sets increased during 

 the summer and, in four of the five seasons, 

 reached a maximum in July. From June 

 through September, the number of sets re- 

 mained relatively constant from season to 

 season and accounted for between 81 and 84 

 percent of the seasonal total. Fishing de- 

 creased through the fall months and termi- 

 nated in the following January. In four of the 

 five seasons, however, the number of sets in 

 December exceeded that in November. 



