A Pilot Pot Fishery for Nephrops Norvegicus off the Northern Ireland coast

Summary

The study was managed by officials from DARD, ANIFPO including the owners of the vessels engaged in the study and AFBI who carried out scientific monitoring of the pilot fishery. With the introduction of the Irish Sea cod recovery programme and its associated temporary sea area closures, several Northern Irish fishing vessels were displaced. They were encouraged to find sustainable alternatives to complete their annual fishing plans. Amongst the fishing vessels affected were four small (under 12 metre) vessels, which had traditionally targeted cod using gill-nets. The closure effectively stopped this fishery. As a result the four vessels, like many of their larger colleagues diversified into the Nephrops fishery using trawls. However, with the increasing costs of fuel and other overheads, combined with reductions in the landed price for Nephrops, the owners of the four vessels, together with the ANIFPO, decided to investigate alternative fishing opportunities. Following internal discussion, and with DARD’s Sea Fisheries Division, an application for funding was submitted to allow sea trials in the “open Irish Sea”, to examine the practicalities of using pots/creels to catch Nephrops. While creels were used in Strangford Lough, and other similar Loughs around Scotland, the possibility of using creels in areas traditionally trawled had not been investigated.

Publication date

01 September 2007

Category

• Technical Report
• .Web-Responsible Sourcing