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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Marine Fisheries, Aquaculture and Living Resources
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fmars.2024.1433071

Impact of environment on English Channel squid (Loligo spp.) recruitment strength and spatial location

Provisionally accepted
Anna Marcout Anna Marcout 1*Eric Foucher Eric Foucher 2Graham J. Pierce Graham J. Pierce 3Jean-Paul Robin Jean-Paul Robin 1
  • 1 Université de Caen Normandie, Caen, France
  • 2 L'Ifremer en Manche Mer du Nord, Boulogne-sur-Mer, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France
  • 3 Institute of Marine Research, Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Vigo, Madrid, Spain

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The English Channel has the highest squid landings in the Northeast Atlantic, making squid one of the most valuable resources exploited by demersal fisheries operating in this area. This resource consists of two short-lived long-finned squid species: Loligo forbesii and L. vulgaris, which have a similar appearance (they are not distinguished by fishers) but differ in the timing of their life cycle: in L. forbesii, the recruitment peak occurs in July while in L. vulgaris recruitment peak occurs in November.The abundance and distribution of cephalopod species, such as Loligo spp., depends on favourable environmental conditions to support growth, reproduction and successful recruitment. This study investigated the role of several environmental variables (bottom temperature, salinity, current velocity, phosphate and chlorophyll concentrations) on recruitment biomass (in July for L. forbesii and November for L. vulgaris), as based on environmental data for pre-recruitment period from the Copernicus Marine Service and commercial catches of French bottom trawlers during the recruitment period over the years 2000 to 2021. To account for non-linear relationship between environmental descriptors and the biological response, General Additive Models (GAM) were fitted to the data.Separate models were obtained to forecast L. vulgaris and L. forbesii biomass indices during their respective recruitment periods. These models explain a high percentage of variation in biomass indices (65.8% for L. forbesii and 56.7% for L. vulgaris) and may be suitable to forecast the abundance (in terms of biomass) and spatial distribution of the resource. Such forecasts are desirable tools to guide fishery managers. Since these models can be fitted shortly before the start of the fishing season, their routine implementation would take place in real-time fishery management (as promoted by fishery scientists dealing with short-lived species).

    Keywords: Squid, recruitment, English Channel, Predictions, environment, Loligo forbesii, loligo vulgaris

    Received: 15 May 2024; Accepted: 01 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Marcout, Foucher, Pierce and Robin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Anna Marcout, Université de Caen Normandie, Caen, France

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.