Research Document 1998/95

1997 assessment of snow crab Chionoecetes opilio stock in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence (Areas 12-25/26, 18, 19, and zones E and F)

By M.E. Hébert, E. Wade, P. DeGrace, A. Hébert, M. Biron, and M. Moriyasu

Abstract

The 1997 evaluation of the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence snow crab stock (Areas 12-25/26, 18, 19, E and F) was done using data from the commercial fishery (fisher logbooks, purchase slips from processing plants and quota monitoring reports) and data derived from the trawl survey in Areas 12, 19, E and F. No survey was done in Areas 18 off Cape Breton in 1997. The 1997 landings were 17,655 t in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence (Areas 12, 18, 19 and 25/26). The catch per unit of effort (CPUE) in the southern Gulf fishery was 49.2 kg/trap hauls and the fishing effort was estimated at 349,322 trap hauls. The 1997 landings for exploratory Zones E and F were 163 t and 287 t respectively. The CPUE was 34.7 kg/trap hauls in Zone E and 44.9 kg/trap hauls in Zone F. Fishing effort was estimated at 4,695 trap hauls in Zone E and 6,390 trap hauls in Zone F. The harvestable biomass (B) in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence (Areas 12-25/26 and 19) for the 1998 fishing season was estimated at 36,245 t (± 8,987 t). The recruitment to the fishery (R) was estimated at 20,026 t (±4,608 t). Given the continious decline tendancy of the recruitment to the fishery (R) and the decrease of pre-recruits (R-2) since 1993, the harvestable biomass (B) will continue to decline until the next recruitment pulses enter into the fishery within two or three years. A strategy to set a conservative exploitation rate is recommended by avoiding highgrading activity and protecting the soft-shell crab because the pre-recruits (R-2 and R-3) will become more and more abundant within one to two years which can result in a high incidence of soft-shell crab in the commercial catch

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