Estimating the Abundance of Bottom Fish at the Shelf and Continental Slope in Northern Primorye

Abstract

Based on materials from bottom trawl surveys of 2009–2015, biomass and abundance of bottom fish of the Sea of ​​Japan between the Povorotny and Zolotoy capes (Northern Primorye) were estimated. Information is provided on the population structure of common fish species in the study area. According to the long-term biomass data, scale-eye plaice Acanthopsetta nadeshnyi (20.43%) and Alaska pollock Gadus chalcogrammus (11.31%) dominate. The total average annual ichthyomass is 188 300 t or 5.4 t/km²; the number is 1482.6 million ind. or 42 300 ind./km². The average specific biomass of fish varied over the years from 1.8 (in 2010) to 7.8 t/km² (in 2014). In 2010, compared to 2000, the average specific biomass of fish has increased approximately twofold due to the appearance of a number of generations of common species of the bottom ichthyocene relative to the productive generations.