Behavioural patterns, spatial utilisation and landings composition of a small-scale fishery in the eastern Mediterranean

Abstract

Small-scale fisheries (SSFs) are crucial for global food security and cultural heritage, however, information on their spatial distribution and practices are often lacking, precluding effective management and mitigation of ecological impacts. This is acutely the case in the eastern Mediterranean basin, where, despite concerns being raised regarding the magnitude of marine turtle bycatch in SSFs over two decades ago, a poor understanding of the fishery persists. To address this knowledge gap, we characterised the SSF fleet of Northern Cyprus through a combination of onboard observations, fisher self-reporting and vessel tracking to provide the first comprehensive overview of the fishery. Northern Cyprus had a fleet size, standardised by coastline length, ranked 14th of 23 Mediterranean fleets assessed, with an estimated 49542 and 57198 fishing days in total in 2020 and 2021, respectively. Vessels operated mainly over the continental shelf (< 200 m) and were predominantly active during the night (53.2%, n = 573378 locations). Clear crepuscular peaks in vessel activity and gear deployment raise concerns over spatiotemporal overlap with vulnerable species, even within MPAs previously established to protect them. Fishers (n = 1296 fishing operations) predominantly utilised static and demersal gear types including gill nets (35.0%), trammel nets (27.3%), trammel and gill nets combined (20.3%), demersal longlines (17.0%) and handlines (0.5%). Landings composition was highly diverse with a minimum of 238 different taxa identified, including, but not limited to, 123 species of bony fish, 22 elasmobranch species, 3 marine turtle species and 12 mollusc species of which 18.6% are considered threatened either at a Mediterranean or global scale. However, over 70.0% of total landing mass was comprised of only five species including bogue (Boops boops), picarel (Spicara smaris), blotched picarel (Spicara maena), greater amberjack (Seriola dumerili) and Mediterranean parrotfish (Sparisoma cretense). As the most up to date and detailed understanding of this fishery's operating behaviours, our research compares the results obtained from onboard observer and self-reporting fisher sampling methodologies and discusses the caveats of each and identifies potential opportunities to adapt existing practices and MPAs to improve long-term sustainability of the fishery, whilst maintaining its socio-economic benefits to the local community.