Where and when will they go fishing? Understanding fishing site and time choice in a recreational squid fishery

ICES Journal of Marine Science, Oct 2014

Recreational fishing effort greatly fluctuates in space and time. Therefore, one of the most relevant conceptual issues when managing recreational fishing is to understand the primary complexities associated with anglers' preferences in selecting site and day, and the way that these choices affect the catch. However, two practical pitfalls (data acquisition and statistical issues) are hampering progress towards the understanding of this problem. In this study, we propose several strategic improvements and apply them to the recreational squid fishery in Palma Bay (Balearic Islands). The spatial scenario (20 km width) was surveyed 63 times (visual censuses) during two years. For each of the 173 grid cells (1 km2) into which Palma Bay was divided, the fishing effort (number of recreational boats targeting squid) was recorded. In addition, a number of variables intended to summarize any potential driver of anglers' choices were also recorded. The principal drivers of squid recreational fishing in Palma Bay appeared to be expected harvest and distance to the nearest port, but the effect of these variables was clearly modulated by sea conditions. The fine-scale estimates of effort (daily predictions for each 1 km2 cell) provided here represent the first step towards understanding angler preferences, estimating total catches, and selecting the best management options for avoiding conflicts between stakeholders, thus ensuring resource sustainability.

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Where and when will they go fishing? Understanding fishing site and time choice in a recreational squid fishery

ICES Journal of Marine Science ( Marine Science Miguel Cabanellas-Reboredo 0 Josep Alo´s 0 David March 0 Margarita Palmer 0 Gabriel Jorda` 0 Miquel Palmer 0 0 Instituto Mediterra ́neo de Estudios Avanzados, IMEDEA, C/Miquel Marqu`es 21 , 07190 Esporles, Islas Baleares , Spain *Corresponding author: tel: +0034 971611408; fax: +0034 971611761; e-mail: Cabanellas-Reboredo, M., Alo´s, J., March, D., Palmer, M., Jorda`, G., and Palmer, M. Where and when will they go fishing? Understanding fishing site and time choice in a recreational squid fishery. - ICES Journal of Marine Science, 71: 1760 - 1773. Recreational fishing effort greatly fluctuates in space and time. Therefore, one of the most relevant conceptual issues when managing recreational fishing is to understand the primary complexities associated with anglers' preferences in selecting site and day, and the way that these choices affect the catch. However, two practical pitfalls (data acquisition and statistical issues) are hampering progress towards the understanding of this problem. In this study, we propose several strategic improvements and apply them to the recreational squid fishery in Palma Bay (Balearic Islands). The spatial scenario (20 km width) was surveyed 63 times (visual censuses) during two years. For each of the 173 grid cells (1 km2) into which Palma Bay was divided, the fishing effort (number of recreational boats targeting squid) was recorded. In addition, a number of variables intended to summarize any potential driver of anglers' choices were also recorded. The principal drivers of squid recreational fishing in Palma Bay appeared to be expected harvest and distance to the nearest port, but the effect of these variables was clearly modulated by sea conditions. The fine-scale estimates of effort (daily predictions for each 1 km2 cell) provided here represent the first step towards understanding angler preferences, estimating total catches, and selecting the best management options for avoiding conflicts between stakeholders, thus ensuring resource sustainability. angler preferences; fishing effort; fishing quality; hierarchical Bayesian model; Loligo vulgaris; spatio-temporal analysis Introduction The study of the reasons that anglers go fishing is fundamental for a better understanding of the substantial heterogeneity of fisher behaviour and the effects of this heterogeneity on recreational catches. Accordingly, this topic has been extensively explored (Ditton, 2004; Arlinghaus, 2006) . However, where and when anglers go fishing, i.e. the spatial and temporal distribution of recreational fishing effort, have received less attention (Hunt, 2005; Hunt et al., 2011; Post and Parkinson, 2012) , especially in the case of marine recreational fishing (Veiga et al., 2010; Lynch, 2006; Parnell et al., 2010) . Nevertheless, this topic is relevant because understanding the spatial and temporal components of fishing effort has been widely demonstrated to improve the success of management decisions in the case of commercial fisheries (Poos and Rijnsdorp, 2007; Lorenzen et al., 2010) . Recreational fisheries are rarely managed based on the same assessment methods used for commercial fisheries (Morales-Nin et al., 2010). Even if these methods are used in recreational fisheries management, management decisions are based on population dynamics models that may incorporate fishing effort but typically assume that both effort and fish abundance are spatially homogeneous (Lynch, 2006) . However, although the spatial and temporal dimensions of the processes driving the spatial patterning of effort may have been ignored, management measures often involve spatial and temporal restrictions (e.g. marine protected areas or seasonal closures; Morales-Nin et al., 2010) . As a result, management measures can be inconsistent and can create conflicts between stakeholders (e.g. commercial vs. recreational fishers) because access to valued ecosystems, localities and stocks is prohibited or heavily curtailed (Cox et al., 2003; Coleman et al., 2004; Salz and Loomis, 2005; Granek et al., 2008) . Nevertheless, the principal complexities of anglers’ preferences in selecting a site and a day for fishing continue to be poorly known and have been considered only rarely in analyses of marine recreational fishing (Parnell et al., 2010) . This gap is due to not only the complexities of anglers’ preferences but also the challenge of obtaining, analysing and interpreting effort data for marine recreational fishing. Data acquisition is more complex for recreational than for commercial fishers. In the case of commercial fisheries, the mandatory use of tracking devices, such as vessel monitoring systems, has notably improved the knowledge of the spatial distribution of fishing effort (Mills et al., 2007; Bertrand et al., 2008; Gerritsen and Lordan, 2011) . However, these systems have rarely been implemented in recreational fisheries. To solve this gap, alterat (...truncated)


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Miguel Cabanellas-Reboredo, Josep Alós, David March, Margarita Palmer, Gabriel Jordà, Miquel Palmer. Where and when will they go fishing? Understanding fishing site and time choice in a recreational squid fishery, ICES Journal of Marine Science, 2014, pp. 1760-1773, 71/7, DOI: 10.1093/icesjms/fst206