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Contraction of the banana prawn (Penaeus merguiensis) fishery of Albatross Bay in the Gulf of Carpentaria, Australia
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Contraction of the banana prawn (Penaeus merguiensis) fishery of Albatross Bay in the Gulf of Carpentaria, Australia

J.D. Prince, N.R. Loneragan and T.A. Okey
Marine and Freshwater Research, Vol.59(5), pp.383-390
2008
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Abstract

When the biomass and area occupied by a stock decline together, catch rates can remain high (hyperstability) and management with effort controls may be ineffectual. Banana prawn (Penaeus merguiensis) catches declined from 2000 until 2005 in the Albatross Bay area in the Gulf of Carpentaria (GOC), Australia. Data from commercial logbooks were used to investigate historical changes in the banana prawn fishery in this and other regions of the Northern Prawn Fishery to infer the potential causes of this decline. Data since 1970 were analysed using: (1) the mapping of catch and effort; and (2) normalised rank order catch curves, to determine the distribution of catches across fishing areas. These analyses show that there has been a marked contraction of the Albatross Bay fishery over 33 years of fishing into the centre of a stable ‘hotspot’, suggesting a potential mechanism for the observed negative relationship between catchability and biomass. We believe this is the first observation of a Peneaus prawn fishing ground contracting as biomass declines, supporting the view that the contraction of an area occupied by a stock as biomass declines, is a generalised phenomena observed widely across fisheries resources and not a dynamic confined to certain finfish and molluscs.

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Collaboration types
Domestic collaboration
International collaboration
Citation topics
3 Agriculture, Environment & Ecology
3.2 Marine Biology
3.2.92 Fisheries Ecology
Web Of Science research areas
Fisheries
Limnology
Marine & Freshwater Biology
Oceanography
ESI research areas
Plant & Animal Science
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