Research Document 2017/017

A review of the biology of Atlantic hagfish (Myxine glutinosa), its ecology, and its exploratory fishery in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence North Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO) Div. 4T)

By Morin, R., Ricard, D., Benoît, H., and Surette, T.

Abstract

Since 2011, four vessels have been licensed to conduct an exploratory fishery for Atlantic hagfish (Myxine glutinosa) in the NAFO Div. 4T9ab management area, located off northern Cape Breton, of the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence. Hagfish in this fishery are fished using baited barrels. This report reviews the biology of Atlantic hagfish, summarizes the current knowledge of its ecology in the southern Gulf, and how the fishery is managed in the southern Gulf and elsewhere. Atlantic hagfish is a primitive fish, known to occupy cold waters of full salinity. It is associated with soft sediments in which it burrows and it feeds on various invertebrates and small fishes, but also scavenges fish and marine mammal carcasses. In surveys of the southern Gulf, hagfish were captured on the slopes of the Laurentian Channel at depths > 260 m, at water temperatures mainly between 5 and 6°C, and salinities of 34 to 35 ppt. Prior to the 1990s, hagfish were only caught in small numbers and not every year in the southern Gulf survey. Survey indices indicate a considerable increase in hagfish abundance and occurrence in the southern Gulf during the 1990s, with annual fluctuations without a trend during the 2000s. A survey index for the 4T9ab management area, based on calibrated data from the northern and southern Gulf research vessel surveys, fluctuates widely without a clear trend, likely owing to the small number of survey tows conducted in this area annually. No data are available on the size at maturity of Atlantic hagfish in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The minimum commercial weight of hagfish for buyers supplying the Korean market has been reported to be 80 g, or approximately 43 cm. Hagfish < 43 cm composed 21% to 72% of the number of hagfish caught in four commercial fishing trips sampled by observers and dockside monitors in 2012. Discarding occurs in the fishery and has exceeded 10% of the catch weight in two of the five years. Discarding may be partly due to spoiled catches when traps were deployed and untended for more than 24 hours. The potential of the hagfish resource to support exploitation is uncertain due to the lack of biological data, particularly their age structure, growth, and mortality, as well as the lack of capacity to assess population changes in response to fishing and the effects of unaccounted catch, particularly discarding.

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