Research Document - 1999/018
Temperature conditions on the Scotian shelf and in the Southern Gulf of St. Lawrence relevant to snow crab
By K. F. Drinkwater, R. G. Pettipas and W. M. Petrie
Abstract
Temperatures during 1998 are presented for the waters of Maritime Canada inhabited by snow crab. Data were available from a number of sources including groundfish surveys on the Scotian Shelf and Sydney Bight in July and on the Magdalen Shallows in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in September as well as at other times of the year from other fisheries surveys, research studies and ships-of-opportunity. Bottom temperatures in large portions of these shelf regions were between -1° and 3°C, conditions considered ideal for snow crab. The area of the bottom covered by waters between -1° to 3°C for each of the southern Gulf, Sydney Bight and northeastern Scotian Shelf has been relative large since the late-1980s compared to the 1970s and early 1980s, indicative of more preferred habitat for snow crab. Temperature trends within each of the snow crab fishing areas of the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence to the northeastern Scotian Shelf were similar and have shown generally colder-than-normal conditions since the late-1980s. Whereas temperatures collected during the groundfish surveys (on the inner half of the northeastern Scotian Shelf in July and on the Magdalen Shallows in September) were cooler in 1998 than in 1997, supplementary temperature data indicate that the slow warming observed in recent years throughout much of the Magdalen Shallows and the northeastern Scotian Shelf generally continued into 1998.
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