Bycatch, as used in the present study, is the incidental catch of nontarget organisms that occurs to some extent in almost all commercial fi sheries (Alverson, 1994). Some of these incidentally caught organisms may be protected species—such as marine mammals, marine turtles, and seabirds—or they may be fish or invertebrates that are either harvested as target species by other fi sheries, or spe...

Since the 1970s the role of fishery bycatch as a factor reducing, or limiting the recovery of, marine mammal populations has been increasingly recognized. The proceedings of a 1990 International Whaling Commission symposium and workshop summarized fishery and bycatch data by region, fishery, and species, and estimated the significance of the ‘impacts’ of bycatch in passive gear on all cetacean ...

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Although some sea turtle populations are showing encouraging signs of recovery, others continue to decline. Reversing population declines requires an understanding of the primary factor(s) that underlie this persistent demographic trend. The list of putative factors includes direct turtle and egg harvest, egg predation, loss or degradation of nesting beach habitat, fisheries bycatch, pollution,...

The spatial and temporal variations of finfish bycatch assemblage cutlassfish trawl were compared in two fishing areas (Hormozgan and Bushehr). Data were collected on board of commercial vessels in the fishing grounds of Trichiurus lepturus in Bushehr and Hormozgan marine waters between early May 2010 to late November, 2010. There was a significant difference in the bycatch assemblages bet...

Fisheries bycatch is a significant marine conservation issue as valuable fish are wasted and protected species harmed with potential negative ecological and socio-economic consequences. Even though there are indications that the small-scale handline fishery of the Galapagos Marine Reserve has a low selectivity, information on its bycatch has never been published. We used onboard monitoring and ...

Sea turtles interact with a variety of fishing gears across their broad geographic distributions and ontogenetic habitat shifts. Cumulative assessments of multi-gear bycatch impacts on sea turtle populations are critical for coherent fisheries bycatch management, but such estimates are difficult to achieve, due to low fisheries observer effort, and a single-species, single-fishery management fo...

Bycatch--the incidental catch of nontarget species--is a principal concern in marine conservation and fisheries management. In the eastern Pacific Ocean tuna fishery, a large fraction of nonmammal bycatch is captured by purse-seine gear when nets are deployed around floating objects. We examined the spatial distribution of a dominant species in this fishery's bycatch, the apex predator silky sh...

In 1991, the National Marine Fisheries Service, as mandated by the U.S. Driftnet Impact Monitoring,. Assessment, and Control Act of 1987 and U.S. Public Law 101-627, developed methods to estimate the incidental catches (bycatch) of salmonids in the North Pacific squid driftnet fisheries of Japan, the Republic of Korea (ROK), and Taiwan. Two analytical approaches were used for the Japanese fishe...

The effect of commercial fisheries on nontarget species is a burgeoning issue for both fishery managers and estuarine biologists. We documented diamondback terrapin (Malaclemys terrapin) bycatch in cloth-funnel eel pots used in a Maryland (United States) commercial American eel (Anguilla rostrata) fishery. Between 1992 and 2001, we obtained 40 male and 9 female terrapin captures and 1 male terr...