Impact of the commercial fishery and shore-based sampling programs on inshore fish of the South Shetland Islands

BARRERA-ORO E.; CASAUX R.; MARSCHOFF E.

Berichte zur Polar und Meeresforschung

Alfred Wegener Institut für Polar und Meeresforschung

Año: 2008 vol. 571 p. 365 - 372

1618-3193

<!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; text-autospace:none; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:ES-TRAD;} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:70.85pt 3.0cm 70.85pt 3.0cm; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> The monitoring of coastal fish populations can be used to detect changes in inshore marine ecosystems. The necessity of implementing these studies in the Antarctica has been pointed out in the compass of international programmes such as BIOMASS (Biological Investigations On Marine Antarctic Systems and Stocks) and CS-EASIZ (Coastal Systems-Ecology of the Antarctic Sea Ice Zone Program) (Anon. 1994). Trawling can not be used due to the lack of areas of seafloor suitable for trawling in most of the Antarctic shallow water areas. In 1983, the Ichthyology Project of the Instituto Antartico Argentino implemented a long term monitoring program of pre-recruit demersal fish from inshore sites of the lower South Shetland Islands, mainly near Jubany Scientific Station in Potter Cove, King George Island, using trammel nets (Fig. 1) (Barrera-Oro et al. 2000). The main aim of this program was to study the impact of the offshore commercial fishery on inshore fish of the area. In addition, the local effects of an intensive sampling program on the population of the dominant fish species in the region was analysed. In this work, we summarise the main results on this matter, from related publications of ours.