Optimisation of essential habitat in sustainable fishery management

The project examines the three-way relationships between habitat, fishing activities and management, aiming to provide understanding and tools to allow managers to optimise the value and sustainability of ecosystem services provided through fishery productivity. The project applies this approach to inshore fisheries, using creel fisheries for crustaceans and whelks as case study exemplars in Orkney, Dornoch Firth and North Berwickshire (St Abbs). The overarching principle underlying the project is that healthy ecosystems deliver benefits for fisheries by sustaining productivity (ecosystem structure and function) and providing essential habitat for different life stages (especially recruitment) of commercially important species. This leads to the following key research questions: What are the impacts of inshore fishing on ecosystem productivity and the structure of seabed habitats? How can these impacts be managed within an ecosystem approach? And, how might these impacts be modified in a changing environment? The objectives of the research are: to describe and model the inshore fishery systems and their ecosystem context at a holistic level, focusing on creel fisheries for crustaceans and whelks; and to allow these systems to be projected for scenarios of future environment (climate change) and management. These objectives will be addressed by the following research activities:
1. Fishery observer trips in Orkney and St Abbs, recording spatially-explicit information on quantities, composition and fate of catch and by-catch. Coupled with information on distribution of fishing activities provided by OSF Ltd in Orkney, data from this research activity will be used to quantify and characterise removals and discards of target and non-target species in the creel fisheries, linking this information to location and seabed habitat types. This activity will build on existing monitoring activities in Orkney (OSF Ltd) and St Abbs (sponsored by Blue Marine Foundation).
2. Underwater observations by scientific diving and drop-down video, including the deployment of simple baited remote underwater video systems involving GoPro cameras attached to creels, and photogrammetry of captured images. Existing seabed mapping completed at St Abbs will contribute high resolution photogrammetry data. Data from this activity will be used to characterise the seabed environment, including large benthic species, physical and biogenic structural habitat dimensions.
3. Ecological modelling focusing on low- to medium-complexity approaches, using field data and published information to describe flows of energy and material in relation to impacts and removals. Ecosystem modelling will be used both to characterise the current fishery-ecosystem structure and function and to project this for future environmental and management scenarios.