Report of Project FISH/2006/15-Lot8 for the European Commission DG FISH May 2009 Studies and Pilot projects for carrying out the common fisheries policy Lot 8: Joint data collection between the fishing sector and the scientific community in the Baltic Sea Contact: Tomas Gröhsler; [email protected] Daniel Stepputtis; [email protected] JOIFISH/Lot8 is supported by the European Commission within the call for tender (Ref. FISH/2006/15) Contract Number SI2.464138 1 Executive summary ............................................................................................. 4 2 Introduction and objectives of the project ............................................................ 6 2.1 Project participants....................................................................................... 6 2.2 The need for collaboration between fisheries and fisheries science ............ 7 2.2.1 Status of cooperative research/cooperative projects prior to JOIFISH/Lot8....................................................................................................... 7 2.2.2 Scientific demand for better data........................................................... 8 2.3 Scope of the study........................................................................................ 9 3 Tasks................................................................................................................. 10 3.1 Task 1: Organisation of workshops ............................................................ 10 3.1.1 “1st Baltic Fisheries Dialogue” ............................................................. 11 3.1.2 “2nd Baltic Fisheries Dialogue”............................................................. 13 3.1.3 Future of the Baltic Fisheries Dialogue ............................................... 15 3.1.4 Trust building actions .......................................................................... 16 3.1.5 Cooperation with Baltic Sea Regional Advisory Council -BSRAC....... 17 3.2 Task 2: In situ implementations of programmes......................................... 18 3.2.1 Self sampling....................................................................................... 19 3.2.1.1 Reference Fleet............................................................................... 22 3.2.1.2 Greenlandic length measurement protocol (Glmp).......................... 42 3.2.2 Investigations about cod recruitment................................................... 50 3.2.2.1 Cod recruitment survey ................................................................... 52 3.2.2.2 Pound net fishery ............................................................................ 64 3.2.3 Poland’s Discard Project ..................................................................... 74 3.3 Task 3: Implementation of programmes into assessment .......................... 76 3.3.1 A commercial tuning fleet.................................................................... 78 3.3.1.1 Data selection for tuning fleets ........................................................ 78 3.3.1.2 Quality and sensitivity analysis of data............................................ 79 3.3.1.3 Conclusions on use of commercial tuning fleets in assessment...... 81 3.3.2 Recruitment index for Western Baltic Cod .......................................... 82 3.4 Task 4: Coordination .................................................................................. 86 4 Evaluation of project performance..................................................................... 88 4.1 Organizational changes.............................................................................. 88 4.2 Key points for self-sampling programmes .................................................. 90 4.3 Feedback from fishermen........................................................................... 91 4.4 Problems encountered ............................................................................... 94 4.4.1 Problems in Denmark.......................................................................... 95 4.4.2 Problems in Sweden ........................................................................... 95 4.4.3 Problems in Germany ......................................................................... 95 5 References ........................................................................................................ 97 6 Annex 1: Baltic Fisheries Dialogue (BFD) ......................................................... 98 6.1 “1st Baltic Fisheries Dialogue “.................................................................... 98 6.2 “2nd Baltic Fisheries Dialogue “................................................................. 100 7 Annex 2: Protocols and Instructions ................................................................ 102 7.1 General instructions for self-sampling ...................................................... 102 7.2 Reference Fleet: haul protocol ................................................................. 103 7.3 Instructions for the discard acquisition ..................................................... 108 7.4 Instructions for biological sampling – length measurements .................... 109 7.5 Pound net fishery ..................................................................................... 111 7.6 Questionnaire for the analysis and evaluation.......................................... 112 8 Annex 3: Danish commercial tuning fleet ........................................................ 118 9 Annex 4: Cod Recruitment Surveys (CRS)...................................................... 120 1 9.1 Cruise report for the 1st CRS with BUR 6 „Tümmler“) .............................. 120 9.2 Cruise report for the 1st CRS with SAS 29 “Petra B.“ ............................... 128 9.3 Cruise report for the 2nd CRS with SAS 29 “Petra B.“ .............................. 136 9.4 Cruise report for the 2nd CRS with SIN 18 “Vingarö” ................................ 144 10 Annex 5: Polish research project ................................................................. 150 11 Annex 6: Estimating abundances of 0-group Western Baltic cod by using pound net fisheries ................................................................................................. 168 2 1 Executive summary The scientific assessment of fish stocks requires detailed information on fishing effort of the commercial fisheries, on the catch composition (e.g. discards) and the biological characteristics of the catch (e.g. length and age distribution). These data are usually derived from fisheries logbooks and scientific sampling of commercial catches (e.g. National Fisheries Data Collection Programmes under the EU Data collection regulation - DCR). However, the spatial and temporal coverage of scientific sampling is rather limited due to given restrictions in personal and funding. As a result, the quantity, quality and reliability of the data, derived from commercial fisheries, are often topic of debates and cause uncertainties in the assessment and the management. The participation of fishermen in the process of collecting relevant data could overcome those problems. The overall aims of JOIFISH/Lot8 (“Joint data collection between the fishing sector and the scientific community in the Baltic Sea”) were - to identify and design new programmes of joint data collection in the Baltic Sea - to test the feasibility of such programmes - to present potential ways to incorporate data, derived from self-sampling, into stock assessment. During the first Baltic Fisheries Dialogue, fisheries representatives and scientists from Western Baltic countries agreed to focus the cooperative work within the framework of JOIFISH/Lot8 on two main topics. With regards to both topics, several sub-projects were initiated and implemented to test their feasibility. All of them were designed in close cooperation with fishery: topic 1) The collection of additional information from fisheries a) The implementation of a reference fleet was tested (chapter 3.2.1.1), gathering representative data on the spatial and temporal distribution of its fishing activities, fishing effort and catch composition. The present reference fleet study has revealed that this approach can improve the input data used in the Western Baltic cod assessment. Nevertheless, some effort has to be allocated to ensure a long-term perspective of such reference fleet, e.g. regular training of fishermen and compensation for additional effort. b) The collection of length data of cod was tested (chapter 3.2.1.2) but proved to be more difficult. The main reason, as stated by fishermen, was the relative low compensation compared to the additional effort. However more compensation may overbalance the scientific benefit. c) To collect detailed information about fishing activity and catch composition of the Polish fishery, the project “Determining the magnitude of discards in the Baltic cod catches and further actions with regards to them if no-discards fisheries is implemented” was initiated (chapter 3.2.3). Whereas this project has revealed important insights into the dynamics of fisheries in the Baltic Sea and offered an interesting way of data collection, it may be difficult to expand this approach to other fleets. topic 2) The improvement of the estimation of Western Baltic cod recruitment The estimation of Western Baltic cod recruitment, based on recent scientific surveys, is problematic. Therefore, two alternative strategies to investigate