Hello everyone!
I would like to know about any conferences for 2023/2024 that are about fisheries or one of the themes is fisheries that are legitimate as there are more and more conferences that are predatory.
I want to make sure that what I am signing up for isn’t essentially a scam or a conference made up simply to make money.
I would also appreciate any websites that usually post legitimate conferences/workshops.
Thank you all!
The cartoon graphically and effectively illustrates and promotes the recently completed Themed Set in the ICES Journal of Marine Science on Challenges to incentivizing avoidance of unwanted catch. The cartoon, alongside a pretty good summary of the findings, also appears at the ICES website.
The 18 open-access articles in the Set (plus an Introduction) cover three major topics including a range of human behavioural models to understand motivations and incentives in use of selective gears by fishers and others, challenges to cooperative spatio-temporal avoidance of bycatch, and other relevant technical or other measures to reduce bycatch.
The set includes possibly the last publication by Sarah Kraak. Credit is due to her for initiating the Themed Set and acting as its major driving force before her tragic death in early 2022. To those of you who knew her, I hope you find that she is appropriately acknowledged and recognized in the Set.
My involvement in these questions of uptake of proven fishing gears grew out of a Topic Group at WGFTFB, Steve Eayrs having overcome my resistance to participating. That’s a pretty strong example of the relevance and impact of WGFTFB’s activities and of the value of our collective experience and wisdom.
I hope you find the Set useful. There is still a lot to be learned on the subject!
Proceedings of the 15th international DEMaT workshop (12-15 September 2022) hosted by the University of Rostock in Germany (Download)
I am searching for any material describing or evaluating the bottom impact of bottom longlining or any other environmental impact generated from bottom longlining. I have seen that longlines tend to generate more ALDFG than other gears.
I would appreciate it if anyone could provide relevant references or grey literature.
Haraldur Arnar Einarsson
The International ICES/FAO WG on Fishing Technology and Fish Behaviour (WGFTFB) taking place 13-17 February 2023 (Kochi, India) will be the first physical meeting since 2019, and as such will be an important event for relaunching the groups primary function of exchanging important research findings, innovations and building of dynamic new networks and collaborations.
Call for Abstract(s)
Oral and poster presentations are the main mechanism for the exchange of information. This mail serves as a first call for abstract submissions. We invite proposals for two types of presentations:
1. Oral Presentations (formal presentations and slides) (*)
2. Poster Presentations
(*) if time slots for presentations are limited, some abstracts for oral presentation may be accepted for poster presentation.
Topic Areas.
There is no limitation to the topic of your abstract – apart from relevance for WGFTFB. Topics could include for example:
– research related to fishing gears
– modelling approaches
– implementation and implications for fisheries management
– behaviour of animals related to the catch process
– new ideas and projects
– technical solutions to help investigations
– technical issues that need addressing
Proposal Submission
Interested presenters should submit an abstract using the form: https://wgftfb.org/annual-meeting/abstract-submission/, summarising the proposed presentation and indicating to which (if any) Topic Group the abstract relates to. Submissions will be judged on relevance to the working group themes, clarity of thought, data/documented results, fit within the meeting program and other criteria.
NOTE: The deadline for abstract submission is 12th December 2022.
Meeting Registration
All presenters are required to register online at: https://wgftfb.org/annual-meeting/registration/.
Registration is free of charge for WGFTFB members (Regular and Chair-invited members).
For more details on online registration, abstract submission, accommodation, flight, and venue, please visit our website https://wgftfb.org/annual-meeting/.
Important dates
12th December 2022. Deadline for Abstract Submission
12th January 2023. Notification of Acceptance
13th January 2023: Meeting registration deadline
6th February 2023. Deadline for National Report Submission
13-17 February 2023. WGFTFB23 Meeting Dates.
We look forward to see you at the WGFTFB23 meeting.
Antonello, Daniel, and Jon (WGFTFB Chairs)
Underwater footages in bottom trawling
I am involved in a project focused on understanding, through underwater footage in bottom trawling, the efficacy of selection grids and gaining basic information on the behaviour of fish/shrimps towards them. Hauls will be performed at depths ranging from 100 to 200 m.
In my institute, we have always worked with GoPros and deepwater housings associated with lights (see the images attached), but sometimes, especially in dark and/or high turbidity environment, the footages are not usable.
Do you have any alternative or advice on the best solution to obtain useful footages during trawl hauls to monitor escapees from selection devices and some behaviour information?
We use these devices on commercial vessels, so we need easy-handling equipment.
Andrea Petetta, CNR IRBIM
Several of you know about the work on the MiniSeine as potential alternative gear for some gillnet fisheries in areas with high seal depredation rates on gillnets like the Baltic Sea.
Some work on the gear is ongoing in Sweden (SLU), some work has been done in Denmark (DTU), and the first trials in German waters (Thünen; https://www.thuenen.de/en/institutes/baltic-sea-fisheries/projects/fisheries-and-survey-technology/miniseine-eine-kleine-snurrewade-fuer-die-deutsche-kuestenfischerei) finished some weeks ago.
Although the catches in the German trials were rather promising, several major issues with the gear (e.g., slow retrieval speed due to weak drum engines) could be identified. Therefore, we are considering/planning to procure a more professional system and would like to make use of our “swarm intelligence” to find out if anyone can recommend any company being able to provide us with such gear.
Besides Kynde & Toft in Denmark (https://kyndeogtoft.dk/), whose service catalogue covers mainly larger systems, I am in touch with Lorentzen Hydraulikk in Norway (https://lormek.no/), who offer more or less exactly what we need: https://lormek.no/products/kombinasjonsvinsjer-18-tonn/.
Anyway, I would like to know if you have experience, suggestions, or ideas for other companies that could produce or even offer such gear.
Thomas Noack
Fisheries and Survey Technology
Thünen Institue of Baltic Sea Fisheries, Rostock (Germany)
More and more countries are developing offshore wind installations for electrical generation. Some already have installed large numbers of turbines. The existing and proposed installations often overlap with existing commercial fisheries. In some regions, the fishing industry has expressed concern that fishing will be completely displaced due to several concerns, primarily involving safety and mobile gears. The installations will also interfere with the monitoring of fish resources by impairing trawl-based resource surveys.
Mike Pol is interested in a closer examination of several topics related to the accessibility of wind farms for commercial fishing and for surveys. His interest was spurred because he was asked to create scaled drawings of mobile gears within a wind farm (see an example in Figure 1), and he was surprised at the relative size of the gear, as well as a lack of relevant literature.
He thinks would be interesting to:
At an informal discussion after the Annual Meeting of WGFTFB recently, Mike Pol was pleasantly surprised to find several of the WG members are similarly interested. It was suggested a blog post on the WGFTFB website would be a good way to inspire a discussion that could lead to a topic group or similar effort.
He would be interested in any and all feedback.
Figure 1. A scale model drawing of an 87 ft vessel towing an otter trawl within the footprint of a 1 nm x 1 nm wind farm.
Dear WGFTFB-members,
the meeting is coming up soon. Therefore some updated information below
1) We are still planning a hybrid meeting, as the situation and possibilities for a physical meeting in March are not yet clear.
2) The website now contains more information about the meeting (time line, agenda, travel, accomodation etc.). See https://wgftfb.org/annual-meeting/
3) You can submit your abstracts now (deadline 28.02.2022). See https://wgftfb.org/annual-meeting/abstract-submission/
4) Please feel free to encourage others to join our group and the meeting. Information on how to become a member can be found here: https://wgftfb.org/annual-meeting/1486-2/
If you want to contact the chairs, please use chairs@wgftfb.org
Best regards
WGFTFB-Chairs
Meet the WGFTFB Members and Chairs
This is an interactive Blog to communicate with FTFB chairs and WGFTFB22 participants.