Reducing trawl length

to improve size selection in the Northern shrimp fisheries

Target species:
Northern shrimp (Pandalus borealis)

Area, Vessel
The trial took place in the Skagerrak (ICES IIIa) on board FV Tempo (28 m, 746 kW)
Gear type:
demersal

Gear modification
The trawl length, from fishing line to escape grid was reduced from 63 to 38 m by using steeper cutting rates. A regular and a modified trawl with 40 mm mesh sizes in the bottom panels were towed simultaneously and the catches were compared.


Results:
The two gears caught large (cooked) shrimp equally, catches of medium sized shrimp were reduced by 11% and undersized shrimp by 29%. No handling problems were experienced.
Further information:
Ólafur A. Ingólfsson (olafuri@hi.no) Terje Jørgensen (terjej@hi.no) Liz Kvalvik (liz.kvalvik@hi.no)




Citation :
, 2017. Reducing trawl length . In O’Neill, F.G. and Mutch, K. (Eds): Selectivity in Trawl Fishing Gears. Scottish Marine and Freshwater Science Vol 8 No 1.