727 
Documenting the bycatch of harbor 
porpoises, Phocoena phocoena, 
in coastal gillnet fisheries from 
stranded carcasses 
Abstract .—We examined 107 har- 
bor porpoise ( Phocoena phocoena) car- 
casses recovered from beaches in Mary- 
land, Virginia, and North Carolina be- 
tween 1994 and 1996 for evidence of en- 
tanglement in fishing gear. Stranded 
porpoises ranged in length from 102 to 
128 cm, indicating that only juvenile 
porpoises are present in the nearshore 
waters of the Mid-Atlantic during win- 
ter. Of the 40 porpoises for which we 
could establish cause of death, 25 dis- 
played definitive evidence of entangle- 
ment in fishing gear. Evidence of en- 
tanglement consisted primarily of line 
marks from nets; in four cases we were 
able to determine specifically that por- 
poises had become entangled in mono- 
filament nets. These mortalities dem- 
onstrate the need for a directed ob- 
server program for coastal gillnet fish- 
eries in the Mid-Atlantic. 
Manuscript accepted 18 February 1998 
Fish. Bull. 96:727-734 (1998) 
Tara M. Cox 
Nicholas School of the Environment 
Duke University Marine Laboratory 
1 35 Duke Marine Lab Road 
Beaufort, North Carolina 285 1 6 
E-mail address: tmc4@acpub.duke.edu 
Andrew J. Read* 
Susan Barco** 
Joyce Evans*** 
Damon R Gannon* 
Heather M. Koop man* 
William A. McLellant 
Kimberly Murray* 
Large numbers of harbor porpoises 
( Phocoena phocoena ) are killed in 
United States and Canadian com- 
mercial fisheries each year. For ex- 
ample, between 1200 and 2900 har- 
bor porpoises were killed annually 
between 1990 and 1993 in the Gulf 
of Maine sink gillnet fishery (Brav- 
ington and Bisack, 1996). Porpoises 
from the Gulf of Maine population 
have also been killed in gillnet fish- 
eries in the Bay of Fundy, where an 
estimated 424 and 101 porpoises 
were taken in 1993 and 1994, re- 
spectively (Trippel et al., 1996). Ef- 
forts are currently underway to re- 
duce mortality in these fisheries by 
using a variety of mitigation strat- 
egies (Resolve 1 ). 
Harbor porpoises from the Gulf of 
Maine and Bay of Fundy are be- 
lieved to constitute a single popu- 
lation (Palka et al., 1996). The popu- 
lation disperses during winter and 
some individuals move south to the 
Mid- Atlantic region (defined here as 
from New York to North Carolina) 
John Nicolas'^ 
D. Ann Fabst* 
Charles W. PotterW 
W. Mark Swingle** 
Victoria G. ThayerhTt 
Kathleen M. Touhey tttt 
Andrew J. Westgate* 
(Polachek et al., 1995). Strandings 
of harbor porpoises have been docu- 
mented as far south as Florida 
* Nicholas School of the Environment, 
Duke University Marine Laboratory, 
135 Duke Marine Lab Road, Beaufort, 
North Carolina 28516. 
** Virginia Marine Science Museum, 717 
General Booth Rd., Virginia Beach, Vir- 
ginia 23451 
*** Maryland Department of Natural Re- 
sources, Fisheries Service, Cooperative 
Oxford Laboratory, 904 S. Morris St., Ox- 
ford, Maryland 21654-9724 
f University of North Carolina at Wil- 
mington, 601 S. College Rd., Wilming- 
ton, North Carolina 28403-3297 
t+ Northeast Fisheries Science Center, 
Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543 
tTT National Museum of Natural History, 
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 
DC, 20560 
ni " 1 ' National Marine Fisheries Service, 
Southeast Fisheries Science Center, 
Beaufort Laboratory, 101 Pivers Island 
Rd., Beaufort, North Carolina, 28516 
1 Resolve, Inc. 1996. Final draft of the 
Gulf of Maine/Bay of Fundy harbor por- 
poise take reduction team take reduction 
plan. A consensus document prepared 
by Resolve, Inc., Washington, DC, 33 p. 
