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West of Scotland herring

Main characteristics and peculiarities
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Assessment Summary
year	2000 (WG 2001)
type	single species: Integrated Catch Analysis
assessment quality	poor, but improving over the last years
main problems	(1) serious amount of misreported (between IVa (North Sea) and VIaN) and unallocated catches (2) insufficient biological sampling (3) stock highly contagious in its spatial distribution
fisheries independent information	(1) hydroacoustic summer survey
catch	23'200 t (1999: 29'700 t)
spawning stock biomass	93'000 t (1999: 84'000 - 152'500 t)
fishing mortality	F(adults [3-6])=0.18 (1999: 0.11)
reference points	not defined
state of the stock	uncertain, but there are indications that stock is lightly exploited
perspective	uncertain, but stock parameters rather stable

Stock parameters (under construction)

This standard figure can be downloaded as a printable pdf-file (requires Acrobat Reader)

Distribution
West of Scotland herring is distributed in ICES Area VIa(North) and sometimes in the adjacent (southern) part of Area Vb.

Fleets
Mainly 3 fleets operating in the area:
• the Scottish inshore paired midwater trawl fleet (in the Minches and around the Isle of Barra, in the south of the area
• Scottish and Norwegian purse seiners in the northern part (also in IVa)
•the offshore fleet (mainly Dutch and German freezer trawler) on the continental shelf edge

• Management advice
No explicit management objectives for this stock. Catches in 2002 should not exceed the average of the period 1991-2000, which is about 30'000 t.

Source
ICES Working Group for the assessment of Herring South of 62°N 2000, ICES CM 2000/ACFM:10, and 2001, ICES CM 2001/ACFM:12

Data entered/updated by (Date)
Christopher Zimmermann (01-07-00/27-06-01)

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