What is the bycatch?" 



From April through November 2004, 

 Logothetis accompanied McCuiston twice a 

 week as he trawled in areas from the New River 

 to the South Carolina border, including Onslow, 

 Pender, New Hanover and Brunswick counties 

 and the Cape Fear River. 



McCuiston didn't trawl in all of these 

 areas throughout the entire season, partly due 

 to restrictions. DMF closed different areas at 

 different times to let juvenile shrimp and finfish 

 develop. But sometimes McCuiston avoided 



temperature, depth and tide phase. 



After hauling in the nets, McCuiston 

 and Logothetis separated the shrimp from the 

 bycatch, and Logothetis weighed all of the 

 shrimp and measured a subsample to record 

 their size. She then grouped the bycatch 

 according to species, weighed each group, 

 and measured the lengths of individuals from 

 different subsamples. 



"We looked at the total weight of the 

 shrimp compared to that of the bycatch and 

 then further categorized the bycatch based on 



separately, she and McCuiston found the catch 

 rates for bycatch were fairly similar across all 

 the months of the project. But shrimp catch 

 rates increased dramatically in July, she notes. 



"This is important because it shows that 

 the quantity of bycatch itself changes little 

 during the shrimp season. . .by contrast, the 

 quantity of the shrimp changes significantly," 

 says Logothetis. 



"When the shrimp are abundant, 

 generally the catch is more shrimp than 

 bycatch." 



a single-rig otter trawl 

 fishes fdr shrimp in 

 the Cape Fear River. 

 Denny McCuiston, 

 a commercial shrimper, 

 trawls in inside waters 

 and the Atlantic Ocean. 



McCuiston hauls in 

 his nets and raises the 

 doors of the trawl. 

 Elaine Logothetis and 

 McCuiston separate 

 shrimp from bycatch. 



certain areas simply because there weren't any 

 shrimp. 



"We were trying to mimic what typical 

 shrimpers would do — they are not going to 

 be in a place where there are no shrimp," says 

 Logothetis. 



McCuiston trawls for pink shrimp 

 (Peneaus duoranim) in the spring, brown shrimp 

 (Peneaus aztecas) in the summer and white 

 shrimp (Peneaus setifenis) in the fall. He uses a 

 single rig otter trawl — a long, cone-shaped net 

 with a wide-open mouth at the front that tapers 

 to a closed end or "tailbag." 



The trawl is dragged behind the boat, and 

 a chain near its mouth stirs up the bottom. Two 

 large, heavy, fiat wooden panels, or "doors," on 

 either side of the net hold it under water and keep 

 the mouth open. McCuiston's net also is fitted 

 with a turtle excluder device (TED) and bycatch 

 reduction device (BRD), as required by law. 



For each tow, Logothetis recorded 

 their location using a Global Positioning 

 System (GPS) unit, as well as water salinity, 



dominant species," explains Logothetis. 



Of the top 10 bycatch species determined 

 by weight, five were commercially or 

 recreationally important species: blue crab, 

 Atlantic croaker, gray trout, spot and summer 

 flounder. 



In addition to catch ratios, Logothetis 

 determined the catch per unit effort (CPUE) for 

 shrimp and bycatch. CPUE is the weight of a 

 species caught over a unit of time, such as two 

 kilograms of shrimp per 30 minutes. 



Overall, Logothetis concluded the catch 

 ratio and CPUE for shrimp were higher than for 

 bycatch. 



But she also found that more bycatch was 

 caught in the spring, during the pink and early 

 brown shrimp seasons. 



"The beginning and end of shrimp seasons 

 are when shrimpers are most likely to catch a 

 lot of finfish bycatch," says McCuiston. 



"The shrimp just are not as abundant 

 then," adds Logothetis. 



By looking at the shrimp and bycatch 



MANAGING THE RESOURCE 



Most states prohibit trawling in estuarine, 

 or inside, waters. But North Carolina's 

 distinctive coastline makes the state an 

 exception. 



At the northern end, the wide waters of 

 the Pamlico and Albemarle sounds stretch 

 nearly 100 miles from north to south and 

 — in some places — more than 25 miles from 

 east to west. Shrimp catch here is plentiful, 

 averaging 50 percent of the state's total shrimp 

 landings between 1999 and 2003, according 

 to DMF records. Only about a quarter of total 

 landings were from the Atlantic Ocean. 



But south of Onslow County, inside 

 waters are much narrower. Some areas 

 stretch only a few hundred feet across in 

 New Hanover and Brunswick counties. The 

 shrimp catch in southeastern inside waters is 

 limited, averaging slightly more than 7 percent 

 of North Carolina's total slirimp landings 

 between 1999 and 2003. 



Continued 



COASTWATCH 17 



