Mobile-Gear Sentinel Fishery in NAFO Fishing Area 4S and 4T

This requirement is for: Fisheries and Oceans Canada.

Title

Sentinel fisheries using mobile gear - NAFO Fishing areas 4S and 4T (northern part).

Introduction

This work is a useful component for the assessment of several groundfish stocks including the northern Gulf cod, Atlantic halibut, redfish and Greenland halibut (turbot). These surveys began in 1995 and have been conducted each July since that time.

Although the sentinel program covers several components, the specifications here concern only the trawl surveys in fishing areas 4S and 4T (northern part).

The survey’s main objective is to develop an independent abundance index for the fishery, which will ultimately be used for the annual adjustment of total allowable catches (TAC). The data from this program are available on the website of the St. Lawrence Global Observatory (SLGO): Sentinel Fisheries – About | SLGO .

Contractor’s requirements

Conduct a sentinel trawl survey in fishing area 4S (over 10 fathoms) and 4T (northern part) (over 100 fathoms) in July, weigh and measure the fish caught (cod, redfish, halibut and turbot). Harvest otolith samples from the cod and assess their condition.

To do so, the Contractor must:

• Ensure the at-sea sampling by one or more fishers with a commercial license to fish cod with mobile gear in fishing areas 4S and 4T;
• Be able to use Star Balloon 300-type trawls mounted on a Rock Hopper bicycle (145 mm mesh size with a 40 mm lining in the cod-end);
• Do basic maintenance on trawls when surveys end;
• Have technicians certified by a DFO-accredited company (observers) on all vessels to collect the biological data and samples for DFO needs.