Modelling the Distribution of Alfonsino, Beryx Splendens, Over The
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Abstract.- Commercial and Modelling the distribution of scientificbottom longline catches of alfonsino, Beryx splendens, from alfonsino, Beryx splendens, over seamounts off New Caledonia were sampled to study length-frequency distributions. A total of 14,674 fish the seamounts of New Caledonia were measured. CPUE of Beryx splendens on two seamounts is mod- Patrick Lehodey elled in terms of length and depth. The data show that mean length in- Paul Marchal creases with depth; this is well de- scribed by a bivariate normal model Rene Grandperrin that estimates catch for a given sea- Centre ORSTOM, BP A5, Noumea, New Caledonia mount. In addition, the data show I that mean length also varies with the depth of the top of seamounts; this is described by a recursive model that is designed to predict ap- proximate catch for any seamount. A bottom longline fishery operated recursive model predicts catch on The limitations of both models are on the seamounts of the Exclusive any seamount. discussed, particularly with regard Economic Zone (EEZ) of New Cale- to temporal variation. donia from February 1988 to July 1991.l Three vessels were involved Material and methods but only one vessel was operated at any given time. The fishing effort, Data which totalled 4,691,635 hooks, fo- Alfonsino were captured with long- cused on five seamounts (B, C, D, line gear (Fig. 2). The main line, J, and K) whose summits are lo- averaging 4,000 m, was held on the cated at depths ranging from 500 1). bottom by means of terminal an- to 750 m (Fig. The target species, chors and regularly spaced heavy alfonsino, Beryx splendens, ac- sinkers that delimited five equal counted for 92% of the catch by line sections. During a fishing trip weight. This species has a world- wide distribution, from the equator to the temperate latitudes, and is Grandperrin, R., and P. Lehodey. 1993. Etude de la pêcherie de poissons profonds fished by bottom trawl or longline. dans la zone économique de Nouvelle- Alfonsino generally occupies waters Calédonie. Rapport final. Contrat de re- between 200 and 800 m, although cherche ORSTOM / Territoire de Nouvelle- Calédonie. Nouméa: ORSTOM, Conv. Sci. it has been caught at depths of only Mer, Biol. Mar. 9, 321 p. 25 m and as deep as 1,240 m Masuzawa, T., Y. Kurata, and K. Onishi. (Busakhin, 1982). Some authors 1975. Results of group study on population have noted an increase in mean of demersal fishes in water from Sagami Bay to the southern Izu Islands-popula- length with depth2 (Yamamoto et tion ecology of Japanese alfonsin and other al., 1978, Seki and Tagami, 19861, demersal fishes. Japan Aquatic Resources a trend which has been observed in Conserv. Assoc. Fish. Res. Paper 28, 105 p. [English translation held at Fisheries other fishes (Heincke, 19131, par- I Research Centre Library, MAF, P.O. Box ticularly some deep-water demersal 297, Wellington]. species3?49 (Ralston and Williams, Brouard, F., and R. Grandperrin. 1985. Deep bottom fishes of the outer reef slope 1 1988).There have been few studies in Vanuatu. South Pacific Commission relating the size distribution of 17th Regional Technical Meeting on Fish- i alfonsino to depth. The objective of eries, W P 12, 127 p. this paper is to describe an ap- Clark, M. R., and K. J. King. 1989. Deep- water fish resources off the North Island, proach for estimating the abun- New Zealand: results of a trawl survey, dance of alfonsino by modelling its May 1985 to June 1986. N.Z. Fish. Tech. distribution in terms of fork length Rep. 11, 55 p. and depth of capture. A bivariate Dalzell, P., and G. L. Preston. 1992. Deep reef slope fishery resources of the South Manuscript accepted 31 March 1994. normal model describes this distri- Pacific. South Pacific Comm. Inshore Fish. Fishery Bulletin 92: 748-759. bution for a given seamount and a Res. Project. Tech. Doc. 2,299 p. 748 Fonds Documentaire ORST L CL/ Fx Yi- cote: 64e 13 * 749 Lehodey et al.: Modelling the distribution of Beyx splendens V -L a1 Figure 1 Main seamounts fished for alfonsino, Beryx splendens, by bottom longline in New Caledonia. made by the longliner Humboldt from May to July drift of the line during sinking was limited or the 1991 over seamounts B, C, D, J, and K,6 the depth slope of the bottom was slight. Therefore, despite the profile of the bottom was recorded on an echosounder lack of a maximum depth recorder to determine the as the line was set. The position and the depth at actual depth of the main line (Somerton and Kik- the exact time the terminal anchors and intermedi- kawa, 1992), it was reasonable to assume that its ate sinkers were thrown overboard were also re- configuration was similar to the depth profile indi- corded. The longliner Humboldt was equipped with cated by the echosounder. a Doppler sonar current indicator which provided The estimated depth of the sinkers was used to allo- current velocity and direction at three selected cate a mean value of depth of capture & = l/2 (di + di+l) depths. Data recorded suggest that the current ve- to all the fish caught on the same 800-m line section locity rapidly decreased with depth (Fig. 3A) and that (Fig. 2). Ten meters, which is roughly half the length horizontal drift was probably minimaL6 On 23 occa- of the branch lines, was then added to each mean sions over the total of 73 longline sets, the depth of depth of capture & to correct for bias introduced by the bottom was recorded at the time the buoy was the fact that catches may occur at any hook level. grabbed at the beginning of retrieval. This depth was Figure 3C gives the depth variation within each sec- compared with the depth of the corresponding ter- tion. Eighty-one percent of the variation in depth is minal anchor recorded when the line was set. Depth less than 15 m and 92% is within the 0-25 m range. difference was less than 10 m for 74 % of the paired This indicates that in most cases the longline was comparisons (Fig. 3B) which indicates that either the nearly horizontal with the bottom. Therefore, the allocation of a single depth of capture to all fish Lehodey, P. 1991. Mission d'observations halieutiques sur le caught on the same line section seems reasonable, palangrier Humboldt. Campagne de pbche du 30 mai au 12 juillet 1991, Nouméa. ORSTOM Rapp. Missions, Sci. Mer Biol., particularly as the depth of capture data were ag- Mar. 8,44p. gregated into 25-m depth classes for analysis. Dur- ~~ i 750 Fishery Bulletin 92(4), 1994 i float main line . 4 shooting (7 kn) o m __... ,. , .. ...: , . .. di 813m 790 780 m 780 m Detail of branch line (20 hooks) Figure 2 Longline gear employed from the longliner Humboldt during a set (15) on 7 June 1991 on seamount K (lat. 24"43'S; long. 170"06'E)and detail of a branch line. Main line is 4,000 m long and divided into five sections (each section has 840 hooks [42 branch lines x 20 hooks] and is 800 m 1ong):di depthI/ recorded on the echosounder at time ti when sinker was thrown overboard; di= 2 (di + di~ + 10 = mean depth of capture allo- cated to all fish hooked on section i. Figure 3 100 "T B Measurements taken to assess the 90 50 -- N=23 deviation between the depth pro- 80 file recorded on the echosounder 70 40 -- and the actual configuration of the c swE50 longline on the bottom: (A) current E 30- 5 velocity from the Doppler sonar E, 20 -- current indicator recorded at dif- 30 ferent depths during the settings 20 lo -- of the longline by the Humboldt 10 O o-! , , , (n=694current measurements); (BI 20 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 Od 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 5 10 15 25 30 35 deviations between the depth of the (m) CURRENT VELCCITY(kn0l DEPTH DEVIATION terminal anchor recorded when the I line was set and the depth of the bottom recorded at the time the cor- f responding buoy was grabbed at C 45 T D the begining of retrieval (n=23 N=290 sets); (C) depth variations within sections recorded during the fish- ing cruise carried out by the longliner Humboldt (n=290 line sections of 800 m each); (D) depth variations (differences between maximum and minimum depths) for the whole line recorded during the fishing cruises carried out by O 5 10 15 20 7.5 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 25 50 75 100 125 150 175 MO 225 250 (m) (m) the longliners Hokko Maru and DEPTHVbRIATION WlTHlN SECTIONS DEPTH VARIATION OVER WHOLE UNE Fukuju Maru (n=287 longlines of 4,000 m). Lehodev et al.: Modellina the distribution of Bemm/endens 75 I ing two other commercial cruises conducted by the all the depth zones were not sampled in the same way, longliners Hokko Maru and Fukuju Maru, observers catch per unit of effort (CPUE=number of fish caught recorded the maximum and minimum depths reached per 100,000 hooks) was taken as the abundance index. by the longline7, (Fig. 3D). The data collected during the Humboldt cruise was Fork length (FL) was measured on a total of 14,674 used to model the distribution of CPUE in terms of alfonsino. During the commercial fishing trips, fish length and depth over seamounts.