SC/60O7 SC/60/O7 Cruise report of the Second phase of the Japanese Whale Research Program under Special Permit in the western North Pacific (JARPN II) in 2007 – Coastal component off Kushiro TOSHIYA KISHIRO1, HIDEHIRO KATO2, HIDEYOSHI YOSHIDA1, TOMIO MIYASHITA1, TOSHIHIDE IWASAKI1, YU KANAJI1, TAMEO RYONO3, SHIGEO TABATA3, YUKA MORITA3, RYOSUKE OKAMOTO2, HIKARI MAEDA2, SYOKA NAGATUKA2, NATUKO OGAWA2, KAZUYOSHI NAKAI3, TADASHI EBISUI3, AKIRA MATUMOTO2, AKIHIRO GOKITA2, HIROSHI KIWADA3 AND SHIGEYUKI KAWAHARA1 Contact e-mail:
[email protected] 1 National Research Institute of Far Seas Fisheries, 2-12-4, Fukuura, Kanazawa, Yokohama Kanazawa 236-8648, Japan 2Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, 1-5-7, Konan, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 108-0075 Japan 3 The Institute of Cetacean Research, 4-5, Toyomi-cho, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 104-0055, Japan. ABSTRACT The fifth survey of the JARPN II coastal component off Kushiro, northeast Japan (northern part of the sub-area 7) was conducted from 10 September to 31 October 2007, using four small-type whaling catcher boats and one echo sounder-trawler and dedicated sighting survey vessel. The sampling was conducted in the coastal waters within the 50 nautical miles from the Kushiro port, and all whales sampled were landed on the land station in the Kushiro port for biological examination. During the survey, a total of 6,827.7 n. miles (637.6 hours) was searched for whale sampling, 98 schools/ 99 individuals of common minke whales were sighted and 50 whales were sampled. Average body length of sampled whales was 6.45m (SD=1.10, n=33) for males and 5.49m (SD=0.81, n=17) for females, respectively.