ICES CM 2004 / CC: 06 ESTIMATION OF BIOMASS, PRODUCTION AND FISHERY POTENTIAL OF OMMASTREPHID SQUIDS IN THE WORLD OCEAN AND PROBLEMS OF THEIR FISHERY FORECASTING Ch. M. Nigmatullin Atlantic Research Institute of Marine Fisheries and Oceanography (AtlantNIRO), Dm. Donskoj Str. 5, Kaliningrad, 236000 Russia [tel. +0112-225885, fax + 0112-219997, e-mail:
[email protected]] ABSTRACT 21 species of the nektonic squids family Ommastrephidae inhabits almost the entire waters of the World Ocean. It is the most commercial important group among cephalopods. Straight and expert evaluations of biomass were carried out for each species. In all ommastrephids the total instantaneous biomass is ~55 million t on average and total yearly production is ~ 400 million t (production/biomass coefficient - P/B = 5 in inshore species and 8 - in oceanic ones). Now there are 12-fished species, mainly 8 inshore ones. In 1984-2001 the yearly world catch of ommastrephids was about 1.5-2.2 million t (=50-65% of total cephalopod catch). The feasible ommastrephids fishery potential is ~ 6-9 million t including 4-7 million t of oceanic species. Thus ommastrephids are one of the most important resources for increasing high-quality food protein catch in the World Ocean. At the same time there are serious economical and technical difficulties to develop oceanic resources fishery, especially for Ommastrephes and Sthenoteuthis. A general obstacle in the real fishery operations and fishery forecasting for ommastrephids is their r-strategist ecological traits, related to monocyclia, short one-year life cycle, pelagic egg masses, paralarvae and fry, and accordingly high mortality rate during two last ontogenetic stages.