Coral Triangle Fishers Forum

15-17 June 2010Bali, Indonesia

Bycatch Initiatives forPacific Islands from SPC

Steve Beverly,Secretariat of the Pacific Community

Themes

• Fishing gear experiments• Protected species ToT workshop• Awareness materials• Tools• Databases• Lessons learned

Deep setting technique, or

• Effects of eliminating shallow hooks from tuna longline sets on target and non-target species in the Hawaii-based pelagic longline fishery

No shallow hooks

• Reduce bycatch of epipelagic and protected species

• Ensure that all hooks fish below 100 meters of depth

• Determine if method is operationally feasible within existing fishery

• Analyze changes in catch composition

Method• Uses mainline as floatline

• 3 kg lead weights are attached directly to mainline to sink all gear below 100 meters

• TDRs attached to all sets at first and middle hook positions

• 2000 hooks per set

Operational plan• 7 trips• 90 sets - alternated• 45 control vs 45 deep sets • No running or time break

between paired sets• Used same gear/bait for all sets• 14 sets per trip• Most trips lasted 21 days• Trips ran from June-December

2006

Catch % by gear type

Sickle pomfret

Opah

Shortfin mako shark

Bigeye tuna

Blue shark

Yellowfin tuna

Albacore tuna

Broadbill swordfish

Escolar

Blue marlin

Wahoo

Mahimahi

Striped marlin

Shortbill spearfish

%Deep

%Control

Deep setting:Deep setting:

IncreasesIncreases

No effectNo effect

DecreasesDecreases

Lessons learned

• Fisheries dependent experiments work better if the vessel has been chartered or otherwise compensated

• Just because a mitigation method works well does not mean that it will be taken up or put into regulations

• Fishermen are very concerned about cost – in time and money of mitigation methods

• Fishermen come up with solutions

Large circle hook experiments

• Establish cooperative research relationships• Test large circle hooks in existing Pacific Island

domestic longline fisheries • Determine the efficacy of large circle hooks at

catching target species compared with the hooks currently in use in the fisheries

• Promote the use of large circle hooks in the fisheries

What is a circle hook?

• Polynesian hook • Steel circle hook

• Point/shank 90o • Rotating hook

Other longline hooks

• Japan tuna hook • J hook/Spanish hook

• Terashima hook

Method

• Change half of vessels’ hooks to16/0 stainless steel offset circle hooks

• Begin first set by alternating hooks• All other sets have a random mixing of hooks• Maintain a 50/50 ratio• Monitor all catch by hook type• Make no other changes to fishing operations• Utilize local observers

Catch composition (number caught)

34%

30%

17%

10%

7% 1%1%

Albacore tuna

Mahimahi

Broadbill swordfish

Bigeye tuna

Skipjack tuna

Striped marlin

Wahoo

Target species catch by hook type

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

Albac

ore tu

na

Mah

imah

i

Broadb

ill sw

ordf

ish

Bigey

e tuna

Skipja

ck tu

na

Stripe

d m

arlin

Waho

o

Species

Nu

mb

er c

aug

ht

O HOOK

X HOOK

Lessons learned

• Many fishermen are already using circle hooks• Cooperative research involving fishermen,

fisheries departments, RFMOs, IGOs, and NGOs can work well

• Identification of hooks by type and size is very important

• 50-100,000 hooks needed for analysis

Protected species ToT workshop 2009

Lessons learned

• Training of Trainers probably needs to be an ongoing activity because of turnover

• Resource materials and/or protected species course should be delivered as a generic finished product that can be amended according to individual country needs and practices

• Fulfills obligations of exporting countries

Awareness materials

• Manuals• Brochures• Posters/stickers• Species ID guides

Lessons learned

• Print limited numbers of awareness materials as things change rapidly and mistakes are made (eg, teracima/Terashima)

• Initial bi-lingual or tri-lingual material saves translation and reproduction costs down the road

• Include distribution costs in budget proposals• Ship as cargo not as baggage

Tools given out by SPC

• De-hookers• Line cutters• Bolt cutters• Dip nets

Alternative tools

Lessons learned

• Money can be saved by being innovative. Line cutter made with seat belt cutter cost $2.50. Commercial line cutter costs $200.

• De-hookers can be made from common materials

• Buying in bulk saves money.• De-hookers, line cutters, and dip nets have

other useful applications on a longline boat so are an easy sell.

Bycatch Databases

• Catch and effort database from logbooks and observer reports – in progress at SPC

• Document database – in progress at SPC• Lessons learned – budget a lot for this kind of

activity – it takes longer than you think, set up data bases as living documents, and hire a webmaster

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