\ \ \ I I 1 r 



POSITIONS OF GILLNET STATIONS 



161° 160° 159° 



WEST LONGITUDE 



Figure 3. --Positions of gill -net sets made from the M/V Paragon 

 (upper panel) and catch rates per shackle (middle andlower 

 panels), July-August 1958. 



net so badly that 3 days were required to repair 

 it. Thus, allowing for the night when high winds 

 developed during the set, 31 out of 35, or about 

 89 percent, of the nights were suitable for fish- 

 ing with gill net from the Paragon . 



The dimensions of the shackles specified 

 in the contract were a minimum of 50 fathoms 

 (300 feet) in length, 5 fathoms(30 feet) in depth, 

 and 7-1/2 inches to 8-1/2 inches stretched mesh. 

 The actual selection of the size or sizes of nnesh 

 within that range was left to the discretion of 

 the contractor. As a guide in selecting the size, 

 he was provided with a summary of the 1955 and 

 1956 results, as well as those from earlier gill- 

 net experinnents of the North Pacific Fisheries 

 Exploration and Gear Research (Powell et al. 

 1952). The sizes selected were 13 shackles of 

 7-1/2-, 13 of 8-, and 14 of 8-1/2-inch mesh. 



The gill -net catches included 1, 617 alba- 

 core, representing an average catch of 0.6 fish 

 per shackle with extremes for individual sets of 

 and 5. 7 (fig. 2 and table 4). Other species 



taken in the net are also included in the tabulated 

 data. Their scientific names are given in 



table 2. 



IjOSS of albacore while hauling the net 

 was snnall (17 fish or 1.05 percent of the catch). 

 Sharks destroyed 94 fish or 5.8 percent. Some 

 of the destruction occurred during retrieving. 



The sizes of albacore taken by gill net 

 from the Paragon (table 9) were determined by 

 measuring the fork length of a 30-40 fish sample 

 from each catch. 



