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Alternate Title

Bycatch and Bycatch Reduction in Recreational Shrimping

Abstract

We estimated the bycatch from recreational shrimping by quantifying the catch from fishery independent trawling and through a survey of licensed recreational shrimpers in Alabama during 1990. We used paired trawls to test two net modifications (fish shooter and Florida flsheye) for bycatch reduction. The mean fish bycatch was 5.4 kilograms per 20 minutes tow and contained 426 fish primarily from three families (Sciaenidae, Engraulidae, and Clupeidae). The total recreational shrimping effort for Alabama was an estimated 37,244 h resulting in a potential fish bycatch of 603,000 kg or 47.8 million fish. The fish shooter did not significantly reduce the bycatch in either weight or numbers while the Florida flsheye significantly reduced bycatch in both weight (28 percent) and number (48 percent). Further testing of the Florida fisheye with the position of the nets reversed revealed no significant reduction in weight but a significant reduction in bycatch number (38 percent).

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