November 17, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The North Pacific Fisheries Management Council’s Groundfish Plan Team recommended an allowable biological catch (ABC) for 2018 of Pacific cod in the Eastern Bering Sea of 172,000 mt down from this year’s ABC of 239,000 mt.
The actual catch limits will be determined by the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council in early December.
Reasons for the downturn in ABC were:
* a 46% drop from 2016 to 2017 in the EBS shelf trawl survey abundance, or numbers of fish — the biggest drop in history.
* A 37% drop in EBS biomass (weight) from 2016 to 2017 — also the biggest in history.
There is good news for P-cod elsewhere near the Bering Sea, though. In the Aleutians, which supports a much smaller P-cod fishery, survey biomass is on a general upward trend — 15% each year since 2012.
There, the recommended ABC for this year increased to 22,700 mt from last year’s 21,500 mt.
And in the northern Bering Sea — there is serious consideration that stocks of P-cod and pollock that would normally be in the EBS may be spending more time during the summer in the northern areas.
The Northern Bering Sea survey indices show the relative change in biomass there from 2010 to 2017 as an increase of 907%. Relative change in abundance (numbers of fish) during that time is up 1421%. NBS biomass in 2017 is equal to 83% of the biomass change in the Eastern Bering Sea.
The Plan Team posed a question at the end of the presentation: “Given that the cause of the decline in EBS survey biomass is unknown, but that one plausible hypothesis is that a substantial portion of the biomass simply moved to the NBS survey area while remaining part of the same spawning population as the fish in the EBS survey area, does the given model impose drastic reductions in ABC that have a significant probability of later being shown to have been unnecessary?”
As of November 4 the catch of PCod in BSAI was 186,800 mt.
Pollock changes ahead
Pollock stocks look healthy enough for the Plan Team to recommend an ABC at 2.592 million mt in 2018 and 2.467 million mt in 2019. This reflects slight decrease in biomass from the ABC previously set for 2017 of 2.8 million mt, with a forecasted 2.9 million mt for 2018.
The current TAC for pollock in BSAI is 1.345 million mt. a slight increase over 2016’s TAC of 1.34 million mt.
The key factors scientists are looking at for Bering Sea pollock are:
* A potential decline described as being “expected, quite quickly”
* Is there a shift in distribution? The ecosystem survey in the northern Bering Sea this summer found increases in pollock.
* There are relatively few one-year-old pollock in the 2017 trawl survey.
* Future catches near current levels will require more effort.
The presentation noted “..the ability to catch the same amount as in 2017 through to 2020 will require about 35% more effort with a decline in spawning biomass of about 28% compared to the current level (based on expected average recruitment).”
This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.