French et al.: Strong relationship between catch of Hippoglossus hippoglossus and availability of habitat for juveniles 
123 
ject to international fishing pressures, making them 
vulnerable to overexploitation. Our maps of suitable 
habitat can be used by management in the develop¬ 
ment of user rights in territorial waters and the estab¬ 
lishment of catch limits or no-take areas. For now, we 
provide a significant step forward in the characteriza¬ 
tion of spatial patterns of Atlantic halibut productivity 
in the Northwest Atlantic, and a contribution to future 
international discussions and management of the grow¬ 
ing fishery for this species. 
Acknowledgments 
This research was supported by the Department of 
Fisheries and Oceans, Canada, and funded by the In¬ 
ternational Governance Strategy. We thank P. Greyson, 
M. Koen-Alonso, Z. Wang, and S. Coffen-Smout for ex¬ 
tracting and providing data, and K. Frank, C. Stortini, 
and three anonymous reviewers for insightful and use¬ 
ful comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. 
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