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MF6001 REM Monitoring of Common Skate By-Catch 2018

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MF6001 REM Monitoring of Common Skate By-Catch 2018 World Class Science for the Marine and Freshwater Environment FINAL REPORT Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) of Common Skate By-catch II Part of ELECTRA MF6001: Work Package Task 1.3 Stuart J. Hetherington, Rose E. Nicholson, Paul Nelson, Rebecca Skirrow, Samantha Elliott, John Richardson, Thomas Barreau & Michael Spence th 20 July 2018 Cefas Document Control Sarah Jones and Jamie Rendell Submitted to: 20th July 2018 Date submitted: Suzanna Neville Project Manager: Hetherington et al. Report compiled by: Thomas Catchpole & Suzanna Neville Quality control by: Suzanna Neville, 20th July 2018 Approved by and date: 6 Version: Version Control History Author Date Comment Version Hetherington et al 11th June 2018 First draft. V0 Further statistical Thomas Catchpole 11th June 2018 V1 analyses required. Suzanna Neville 20th June 2018 Clarification to the V1 text required. Additional statistical Hetherington et al 28th June 2018 V2 analyses complete. Thomas Catchpole 29th June 2018 Further clarification V3 to the text required. Hetherington et al 18th July 2018 Final draft. V4 Approved with minor Thomas Catchpole 18th July 2018 tracked changes to V5 text. Hetherington et al 20th July 2018 Final. V6 Project Title: Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) of Common Skate By-catch II. Defra Contract Managers: Sarah Jones and Jamie Rendell Funded by: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) Marine Science and Evidence Unit Marine Directorate 2 Marsham St, Westminster London SW1P 4DF Authorship: Stuart J. Hetherington1, Rose E. Nicholson1, Paul Nelson2, Rebecca Skirrow3, Samantha Elliott3, John Richardson4, Thomas Barreau5 & Michael Spence1. 1 Cefas, Lowestoft; 2 MMO, Hayle; 3 Cefas, Scarborough; 4 Shark Trust, Plymouth; 5 MNHN, Concarneau. Disclaimer: The content of this report does not necessarily reflect the views of Defra, nor is Defra liable for the accuracy of information provided, or responsible for any use of the reports content. This report can be cited as: Hetherington, S. J., Nicholson, R.E., Nelson, P., Skirrow, R., Elliott, S., Richardson, J., Barreau, T., Spence, M. (2018). Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) of Common Skate By- catch II (ELECTRA MF6001: Work Package Task 1.3). Project report (Cefas). 46 pp. Page 3 of 46 Table of contents Page How to use this report………………………………………………………………… 5 Executive Summary…………………………………………………………………… 6 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………….. 9 Background……………………………………………………………………… 9 Novel use of Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM)…………………………. 9 Rationale and purpose…………………………………………………………. 10 Adding to existing evidence on common skate catches to inform policy…. 11 Fishery-dependant approach………………………………………………….. 13 Building capacity………………………………………………………………... 13 Aim and Objective……………………………………………………………………... 14 Methods………………………………………………………………………………….. 14 Fishing Vessel, gear and REM equipment…………………………………... 14 Training & verification by an at-sea observer………………………………... 17 Sampling process aboard……………………………………………………… 18 Verification and validation process………………………………………….… 18 Estimation of total length and weight based on disc width…………………. 19 Statistical analysis……………………………………………………………… 19 Results…………………………………………………………………………………… 21 Estimation of catch and distribution of common skate……………………… 21 Blue skate biomass in relation to the total retained commercial catch…… 31 Length frequency of blue skate……………………………………………….. 32 Improvements to species identification………………………………………. 33 Discussion…………………………………………………………………………….… 38 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………….…… 40 Next Steps………………………………………………………………………….……. 40 Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………………. 41 References………………………………………………………………………………. 42 Annex 1………………………………………………………………………………..…. 44 Page 4 of 46 How to use this report This report is an update to the previous project report titled Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) of Common Skate By-catch; Hetherington, S. J., Nelson, P., Searle, A., Bendall, V. A., Barreau, T., Nicholson, R. E., Smith, S. F., Sandeman, L. R. (2017). Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) of Common Skate By- catch (ELECTRA MF6001: Work Package Task 1.3). Project report (Cefas). 30 pp. This report, Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) of Common Skate By-catch II, contains the 2016 REM results and findings from the previous report and the latest 2017 results, reported here together, along with advancements in the project. Page 5 of 46 Executive Summary Common skate is considered to comprise of two separate species, the larger bodied flapper skate Dipturus intermedius, and the smaller bodied blue skate Dipturus batis. This is referred to as the common skate complex (Dipturus batis complex). By-catch of common skate (predominantly blue skate) caught by fishermen from the South- west of the UK operating in the Celtic Sea (ICES Division 7e-h) is of concern, both to fishermen and to Defra. Under EU fisheries legislation, common skate is classed as a prohibited species, therefore these fish cannot be targeted, retained, transhipped or landed. However, their aggregative nature and large size make them susceptible to by-catch, and with a prohibition on landings, common skate by-catch must be discarded. The level of by-catch and discards can be significant in the Celtic Sea trammel net fishery (Bendall et al., 2012; Ellis et al., 2015), with anecdotal information suggesting an increasing by-catch of juveniles in the otter and beam trawl fisheries of the western English Channel and Celtic Sea (ICES Division 7e). A high level of discarding of these species is not compatible with Defra’s principles for sustainable use of the marine environment, e.g. opposing wasteful discards when supported by scientific evidence (Bendall et al., 2017). This collaborative pilot project between Cefas, the Marine Management Organisation (MMO), the Shark Trust and the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, France (MNHN) aimed to assess whether Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) can validate fishermen’s self-sampling records of common skate aboard a twin-rig otter trawler and beam trawler. Further methodological advances have been identified to increase the quality and utility of the data and are reported here. The species and number of common skate were recorded, and for a subsample of these fish, the disc width measured, and the estimated total length and weight calculated. The catch estimates provided by the skippers were compared with the estimates generated by an analysis of the REM data. The REM analyst could not always be certain of the speciation of common skate, Dipturus batis complex, when reviewing the REM footage, so unless absolutely certain of the species identification (blue skate or flapper skate) the REM analyst recorded the individual as Dipturus species. Due to this difficulty for the REM analyst, validation of the skippers’ self-sampling records of blue skate and flapper skater were limited, with blue skate and flapper skate recordings combined for analysis. The skipper provided comments about catch composition on 367 of 508 hauls in May to December 2016 (72%) and 318 of 377 hauls (84%) in July to December 2017. Hauls with no comments were assumed to have no data rather than zero common skate caught. For hauls with comments, but no record of common skate, it was assumed that zero common skate were caught, as the skipper only recorded the presence of common skate in the catch, and didn’t record the absence of common skate in the catch. Data from the 26 fishing trips made in 2017 by the participating twin-rig otter trawler, showed a significant but poor linear correlation (R2=0.496, p<0.05) between numbers of the common skate complex recorded by the skipper and the REM analyst. Page 6 of 46 For 318 of 377 hauls in 2017 where the skipper provided comments on catch composition, the total estimated number of common skate caught based on the above correlation was 250 (equivalent to 0.55 common skate recorded by the skipper for each common skate recorded by the observer), with 95% lower and upper confidence limits of 196 and 345 (0.39-0.69 common skate recorded by the skipper for each common skate recorded by the observer. To account for the fact the skipper did not provide comments on catch composition for 59 of 377 hauls (16%), 59 hauls were randomly selected from the 318 hauls with skipper comments and added to the 318 hauls with comments to estimate the number of common skate caught over all 377 hauls. Based on 1,000 iterations of the random selection, the mean estimated number of common skate caught for all 377 hauls was 296, with estimates ranging from 199 and 566. This equates to 0.53-1.50 common skate caught per haul by the twin-rigged otter trawler. The estimates based on linear correlation were higher, and had a wider range, compared to estimates based on 1,000 iterations of a probabilistic modelling approach aiming to account for the high frequency of observations of no common skate and very low numbers of common skate, and the uncertainty associated with the skipper’s observations. The model yielded a mean estimate of 237 common skate individuals caught during the 26 fishing trips made in 2017, with minimal and maximal estimates of 171 and 312, equating to 0.45-0.83 common skate caught per haul. Skipper self-sampling records and REM data were available for a second vessel, a beam trawler which fished on three distinct grounds. No common skate were recorded by the skipper and the REM analyst on two of the fishing grounds, with the exception of one
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