Deepwater chondrichthyan bycatch of the Eastern King Prawn fishery in the Southern Great Barrier Reef, Australia

Rigby, Cassandra L., White, William T., and Simpfendorfer, Colin A. (2016) Deepwater chondrichthyan bycatch of the Eastern King Prawn fishery in the Southern Great Barrier Reef, Australia. PLoS ONE, 11 (5). e0156036. pp. 1-24.

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Abstract

The deepwater chondrichthyan fauna of the Great Barrier Reef is poorly known and life history information is required to enable their effective management as they are inherently vulnerable to exploitation. The chondrichthyan bycatch from the deepwater eastern king prawn fishery at the Swain Reefs in the southern Great Barrier Reef was examined to determine the species present and provide information on their life histories. In all, 1533 individuals were collected from 11 deepwater chondrichthyan species, with the Argus skate Dipturus polyommata, piked spurdog Squalus megalops and pale spotted catshark Asymbolus pallidus the most commonly caught. All but one species is endemic to Australia with five species restricted to waters offshore from Queensland. The extent of life history information available for each species varied but the life history traits across all species were characteristic of deep water chondrichthyans with relatively large length at maturity, small litters and low ovarian fecundity; all indicative of low biological productivity. However, variability among these traits and spatial and bathymetric distributions of the species suggests differing degrees of resilience to fishing pressure. To ensure the sustainability of these bycatch species, monitoring of their catches in the deepwater eastern king prawn fishery is recommended.

Item ID: 45527
Item Type: Article (Research - C1)
ISSN: 1932-6203
Keywords: sharks, fisheries, life history
Additional Information:

© 2016 Rigby et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Funders: Australian Postgraduate Award, Oceania Chondrichthyan Society Passions of Paradise Student Research Award, Super Science Initiative, National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy Australia
Date Deposited: 29 Jun 2016 07:40
FoR Codes: 31 BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES > 3109 Zoology > 310914 Vertebrate biology @ 80%
41 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES > 4199 Other environmental sciences > 419999 Other environmental sciences not elsewhere classified @ 20%
SEO Codes: 96 ENVIRONMENT > 9608 Flora, Fauna and Biodiversity > 960808 Marine Flora, Fauna and Biodiversity @ 100%
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