Working group on bycatch of protected species (WGBYC 2021)

• Main Authors: Basterretxea, Mikel, Bjørge, Arne, Bærum, Kim Magnus, Ferreiro, Lucía Cañas, Chatzispyrou, Ada, Couperus, Bram, von Dorrien, Christian, Evans, Peter, Fernández, Ruth, Fortuna, Caterina Maria, Fotiadis, Nikolaos, Hardman, Samuel, Junge, Claudia, Kavanagh, Ailbhe, Kindt-Larsen, Lotte, Koschinski, Sven, Bonanomi, Sara, Königson, Sara, Lefkaditou, Eugenia, Marçalo, Ana, Mugerza, Estanis, Northridge, Simon, Moan, André, Peltier, Hélène, Pinto, Carlos, Rahikainen, Mika, Penas, Camilo Saavedra, Siemensma, Marije, Woźniczka, Adam
• Other Authors: Kingston, Al, Sigurðsson, Guðjón Már
• Format: Book
• Language: English
• Published: International council for the exploration of the sea (ICES)/Conseil international pour l'exploration de la mer (CIEM) 2021
• Subjects: Bycatch; Protected species; Marine mammals; Birds; Turtles; Rare fish; Bycatch monitoring; Bycatch mitigation; harbour seal; North East Atlantic; Northeast Atlantic
• Online Access: https://research-portal.st-andrews.ac.uk/en/publications/b16acc7b-1831-4fef-a805-0423a59fe2ea; https://doi.org/10.17895/ices.pub.9256; https://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/bitstream/10023/30487/1/Kingston_2021_Working-group-on-bycatch_CC.pdf

The Working Group on Bycatch of Protected Species (WGBYC) was established in 2007 and collates and analyses information from across the Northeast Atlantic and adjacent sea areas (Baltic, Mediterranean and Black Seas) related to the bycatch of marine mammals, seabirds, turtles, and sensitive fish species in commercial fishing operations. Sensitive fish species were not considered at the 2021 meeting pending approval from the ICES Advisory Committee (ACOM) on fish species lists of bycatch interest that were developed at the ICES Workshop on Fish of Conservation and Bycatch Relevance (WKCOFIBYC) in 2020. WGBYC seeks to describe and improve under-standing of the likely impacts of fishing activities on affected populations at biologically relevant scales, to inform on the suitability of existing at-sea monitoring programmes for the quantification of robust bycatch estimates, and to collate information on and coordinate bycatch mitigation efforts at an international scale. In 2021, the WG met by correspondence to address eight Terms of Reference (ToR), including a data scoping exercise as part of a special request on seabird bycatch from the North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission (NEAFC), which concluded that there was insufficient bycatch monitoring data from NEAFC waters to warrant further analyses at this time. The report also provides an overview of monitoring and fishing effort data contained in the WGBYC database for 2019 and 2020. This showed that during 2020, in most geographical areas of relevance, at-sea monitoring effort was significantly affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Specific analyses were carried out to describe potential fisheries impacts (reported bycatch numbers, min/max bycatch rates and/or mortality estimates) for harbour seal in the Greater North Sea ecoregion and parts of the Baltic ecoregion, three turtle species in four Mediterranean ecoregions and in the Azores and Bay of Biscay and Iberian Coast ecoregions, and several seabird species in six ecoregions (Adriatic, Baltic, Bay of Biscay ...