Developing a management strategy for the red shrimp Aristeus antennatus fishery in the northwestern Mediterranean Sea = Desarrollo de una estrategia de gestión para la pesquería de la gamba roja Aristeus antennatus en el Mediterráneo Noroccidental

Resumen

The deep-sea red shrimp Aristeus antennatus is one of the main target species for bottom trawl fishery in the northwestern Mediterranean Sea. In the Catalan region, this species is fished along the continental margin of a system of submarine canyons and its landings present high inter-annual variability. Minimums in the historical series of yearly landings have been associated with the occurrence of strong bottom currents generated by an oceanographic phenomenon named Dense Shelf Water Cascading (DSWC). In fact, a drastic reduction of the red shrimp abundance in the fishing grounds of the Catalan area was observed during DSWC events. This thesis contains a thorough assessment of the red shrimp fishery in Catalonia, with the main objective to provide management advice for the sustainable exploitation of this resource. Historical series of fishery data (including fishing effort directed to the red shrimp) were reconstructed from various data sources, and trends in the data series were analyzed. Stock status in the 1980s and in recent years (2005-2008) was assessed using pseudo-cohort and yield per recruit analysis and compared. Then, a stock assessment using a Statistical Catch at Age model (SCAA) was performed. This method allowed to include all the available data, covering a period of more than fifty years (1963-2015), as well as the effect of the DSWC. In particular, the SCAA was used to test alternate hypotheses on the mechanisms of interaction between the DSWC and the red shrimp population and to estimate reference points for management. In addition, the spatio- temporal variability of fishery discards in relationship to the submarine canyons’ geomorphology was analyzed. Finally, the selectivity for red shrimp of three different codend mesh configurations was measured and compared: the 50 mm diamond mesh (50d), the 40 mm square mesh (40s) and the 50 mm square mesh (50s). A transition analysis to simulate the evolution of the yield per recruit and the biomass per recruit after a hypothetical implementation of the 50s in the fishery was performed. The results presented in this thesis indicate that the fishing effort directed to the red shrimp in the Catalan area underwent a steep increase starting from the second half of the last century up to 2009, while CPUE decreased. Including the effect of DSWC significantly improved the stock assessment model for this species. In particular, it was demonstrated that the DSWC significantly increases the red shrimps natural mortality. Both the yield per recruit analysis and the Statistical Catch at Age model showed that this resource is in overexploitation. In particular, the yield per recruit decreased by 10% between the 1980s and the recent years (2005-2008). In addition, the predicted equilibrium maximum sustainable yield (MSY) was considerably reduced in years of DSWC, indicating that only little harvest may be sustainable in years of adverse environmental conditions. The average discard ratio found in this study (0.2) was low compared to other trawl fisheries, and showed a marked seasonal variability with a maximum in spring and a minimum in summer. Most of the discarded biomass (almost 96%) was constituted of species with no commercial interest. Furthermore, the mesh configurations currently used in the red shrimp fishery in Catalonia (50d y 40s) were found not suitable to reduce the amount of juvenile individuals in the catch, both displaying a 50% retention length well below the size at first maturity. On the other hand, the 50s would significantly improve the selectivity in this fishery, and its implementation would lead to an increase of the yield per recruit of about 9% after five years. According to the results of this thesis, a fishery management aiming at the long term sustainable and profitable exploitation of the red shrimp should include measures to: reduce overfishing, increase yield per recruit and CPUE, lower the peak of discards in spring, and buffer the negative effect of DSWC. This could be achieved by decreasing fishing effort and fleet overcapacity, protecting the aggregations of juvenile individuals, and increasing the gear selectivity. In particular, the results of this thesis indicate that a fishery closure in winter/spring, when shoals of juvenile individuals aggregate in the fishing grounds and the discard ratio reaches the yearly peak, would be particularly appropriate. In addition, fishing effort should be further reduced in years of intense DSWC events, to permit the recovery of the population. Finally, the mitigation of overfishing is also likely to increase the red shrimp population resilience to the effects of DSWC.