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Fishery characteristics of barfin flounder Verasper moseri in southern Tohoku, the major spawning ground, after the start of large-scale stock enhancement in Hokkaido, Japan

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Abstract

Commercial landings of a rare pleuronectid flatfish, barfin flounder Verasper moseri, recovered drastically after large-scale stock enhancement in Hokkaido conducted since 2006. This study investigated commercial landings, fishing grounds, size distributions, and sex and age compositions of barfin flounder during 2007–2011 in southern Tohoku, their major spawning ground, which is over 700 km south of Hokkaido. Landings, mostly comprising stocked fish, increased drastically in southern Tohoku: from 2.0 tons in 2007 to 20.8 tons in 2010. Over 98 % of them were landed during January–April, with the peak period during February–March. Fishing logbook data of offshore bottom-trawl vessels during 2007–2010 revealed the upper continental slope off southernmost Tohoku as the main fishing ground (35°40′–36°50′N, annual weighted mean depth 267–299 m). Two size modes in the landings consisted of males (ca. 40 cm) and females (ca. 60 cm). The main age at fishery recruitment in southern Tohoku was younger for males (age 2+) than for females (ages 3+ and 4+), the result of which was that the female percentage was lowest at 1.5 % in 2009 and highest at 7.9 % in 2011. Our results showed clearly how the effectiveness of large-scale stock enhancement in Hokkaido extended to southern Tohoku in association with spawning migration of stocked barfin flounder.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful to T. Matsubara for his helpful advice and encouragement on this study. We acknowledge T. Matsuda for his useful information about the sex ratio of barfin flounder seedlings in Hokkaido. We thank Y. Narimatsu for providing us with important literature. This study was conducted as part of a research project, “Research and Development Projects for Application in the New Policy of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries”, funded by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries, Japan. We are grateful to R. Kawabe, T. Ichikawa, S. Sawaguchi and to the members of this project for their help in promoting this study. We thank all the fishery workers who provided invaluable information related to barfin flounder via fishing logbooks.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Soma Branch, Fukushima Prefectural Fisheries Experimental Station, Soma, Fukushima, 976-0022, Japan

    Toshihiro Wada

  2. Fukushima Prefectural Fisheries Experimental Station, Iwaki, Fukushima, 970-0316, Japan

    Kyoichi Kamiyama & Shinya Shimamura

  3. Mariculture Fisheries Research Institute, Hokkaido Research Organization, Muroran, Hokkaido, 051-0013, Japan

    Osamu Murakami

  4. Wakkanai Fisheries Research Institute, Hokkaido Research Organization, Wakkanai, Hokkaido, 097-0001, Japan

    Tadashi Misaka

  5. Kushiro Fisheries Research Institute, Hokkaido Research Organization, Kushiro, Hokkaido, 085-0024, Japan

    Masayoshi Sasaki & Takaaki Kayaba

Authors
  1. Toshihiro Wada
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  2. Kyoichi Kamiyama
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  3. Shinya Shimamura
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  4. Osamu Murakami
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  5. Tadashi Misaka
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  6. Masayoshi Sasaki
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  7. Takaaki Kayaba
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Correspondence to Toshihiro Wada.

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Wada, T., Kamiyama, K., Shimamura, S. et al. Fishery characteristics of barfin flounder Verasper moseri in southern Tohoku, the major spawning ground, after the start of large-scale stock enhancement in Hokkaido, Japan. Fish Sci 80, 1169–1179 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12562-014-0803-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12562-014-0803-1

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