Fisheries models are generally built to assess the dynamics of a resource with a given fishing mortality
which level can be decided by some “decision maker” and/or which can be an observed process, e.g. times series proportional to some observed values of fishing effort. In these cases, the resource dynamics...
Opakapaka (Pristipomoides filamentosus) is a snapper (family Lutjanidae) native to the waters around Hawaii. Recent population declines of this commercially important species have increased interest in the culture of this fish. Survival of this fish through the larval period in culture has been consistently low, usually not exceeding 2%. The...
Sablefish, Anoplopoma fimbria, is a valuable North Pacific Ocean species caught in several commercial fisheries and is often discarded due to size or catch limits. Managers must account for the mortality of discarded fish to assess fish populations and harvest impacts, yet discard mortality rates of specific fisheries are generally...
Age and size at maturity are key life-history traits in a fish stock. At the individual level, age and size at maturity affect fecundity, growth and survival. At the population level these factors interact to affect the age and size distribution, the population dynamics and the productivity of the stock....
The problem of extinction in the sea has been recognized
only recently by the scientific community (Roberts and
Hawkins 1999). For the last decade, the American Fisheries
Society (AFS) has pursued an initiative to identify marine
fish stocks that may be at risk of extinction in North America
(Musick 1998;...
It is well known that fishing activities may affect the structure of aquatic habitats and consequently determine the diversity, composition and productivity of the associated biota. The direct effect of fishing
activities is on the habitat structure and the indirect effects occur when the fishing activity initiates shifts in the...
In many situation, fishing activity adversely impacts the state of the marine ecosystem, impacts which feed back to affect fish stocks. Some ecosystems appear to have multiple equilibria and exhibit hysteresis, whereby they can become stuck in low productivity states. We show how adding ecosystem dynamics to a classic fisheries...
A debate is emerging over the extent to which privatization of fishery resources – private ownership and resource management without significant state oversight- is practical and socially desirable. What we term the “optimists” maintain that there are no effective limits to privatization and that the decades old fear that privatization...
Because of the stagnation of commercial landings, the development of aquaculture activities is expected to rise during the next decades to match the growing demand for fisheries goods. Overall, it is often expected that the aquaculture sector could reduce to a certain extent the pressure applied over wild stocks. However,...
Relationships among myxozoan parasites of the order Multivalvulida were examined through comparative DNA sequence analysis. Members of this group of parasites is known for the damaging effects they have on their fish hosts, especially commercially important species. Most species infect muscle, where they form cysts and many release proteolytic enzymes....