Researchers at the New England Aquarium, in conjunction with those from state agencies, are getting closer to releasing study results on the collateral impact of recreational haddock discards on the overall mortality rate of the species.
Dr. John Mandelman, director of research at the Boston-based aquarium, said the the field work for the study was completed in early November. He expects the New England Fishery Management Council, which helped fund the study, to complete vetting the analysis sometime early next spring.
The field work was performed with significant assistance from recreational fishing operators such as Gloucester-based Yankee Fleet and Seabrook, New Hampshire-based Eastman’s Docks Fishing Fleet.
“As with all studies, what we very much tried to do was to work as much as possible as part of a legitimate fishing effort, or what we call a fishery-dependent exercise” Mandelman said. “This was a really nice partnership.”
Mandelman said project researchers made about eight trips last spring aboard some of the Yankee Fleet’s larger party boats, focusing on observing how a full range of anglers — from novice to veteran — performed catch-and-release of haddock discards, while also charting catch gear, catch conditions, injuries to the fish, time out of water and sea temperatures.
They made almost twice as many trips aboard boats from Eastman’s Docks, using acoustic tags to track the fate and health of discarded haddock for weeks after they were released back into the water.
The study, according to researchers, is important because haddock is assuming a much higher profile among recreational anglers in the wake of the NOAA-imposed restrictions that effectively have shuttered the Gulf of Maine to all commercial and recreational cod fishing.
Also, just this month the New England Fishery Management Council voted to raise the recreational haddock quota 149 percent to 926 metric tons in 2016. So, it stands to reason that haddock will be a kingpin fish for recreational fishermen when the 2016 season opens.
In 2013, according to researchers, nearly twice as much haddock was discarded as was kept and scientists want to know what becomes of those discarded fish and how those levels of discards affect the overall mortality rates of the stock.
The findings of the study, Mandelman said, should provide additional data to fishery managers and assist them in the development of a variety of management policies, including stock assessments and size and possession limits.
Mandelman and his researchers, in conjunction with those from the state Division of Marine Fisheries and the School for Marine Science and Technology at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, previously performed a similar study on Gulf of Maine cod and plan a subsequent one on cusk.
The cod study, Mandelman said, showed that — depending on gear, handling conditions and environmental conditions, 9 percent to 21 percent of the fish died, better than the 30 percent estimate regulators had been using.
“Barring severe injury inflicted by gear — most prominently by jigs — the likelihood of survival by cod is fairly high,” he said. “They’re fairly resilient fish.”
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.