Shark Depredation and Unwanted Bycatch in Pelagic Longline

Appendix 8
USA Hawaii-based Pelagic Longline Swordfish
and Tuna Fisheries:
Industry Practices and Attitudes towards Shark Depredation
and Unwanted Bycatch
Eric Gilman, Blue Ocean Institute, egilman@blueocean.org
Information from interviews of twelve fishermen of the Hawaii pelagic
longline tuna and swordfish fisheries conducted between 25 January
and 22 March 2006, from analyses of the Hawaii longline logbook and
observer databases and from a literature review is used to describe the
Hawaii pelagic longline fleet. Of the 12 interviewed fishermen, seven
are owner-operators, three are captains but not vessel owners and two
are crew. The 12 fishermen have been pelagic longlining between 4 and
27 years with a mean of 12.5 years, and have been longlining based
from Hawaii between 2 and 27 years with a mean of 11.4 years.
A8.1. Fleet Development and Characteristics
Longline fishing in Hawaii had been conducted for many decades
prior to the expansion of the fishery in the late 1980s. Hawaii
longline vessels evolved from wooden pole-and-line tuna sampans,
employing longlines made from rope and fishing mainly within
2 - 20 nm of the coast. By the 1930s the longline fishery was second
only to a pole-and-line “aku” or skipjack fishery in landed volume of
fish, and accounted for most of the yellowfin (Thunnus albacares),
bigeye (Thunnus obesus) and albacore (Thunnus alalunga) landed in
Hawaii. The fishery peaked in the mid-1950s with landings exceeding
2000 t and then declined steadily through lack of investment in boats
and gear until the late 1980s. The revitalization of the Hawaii-based
longline fishery was due to the development of local markets and export
markets for fresh tuna from the U.S. mainland and Japan, and expansion
of fishing for swordfish around the Hawaiian Islands. Participation in
the longline fishery increased from 37 vessels in 1987 to 88 in 1989, and
then doubled again to 141 vessels in 1991 (Table A8.1). Of a possible
164 active vessels, there were 125 active Hawaii-based longline vessels
in 2005, which set 34,895,229 hooks and made 1,427 trips targeting
tuna and 106 trips targeting swordfish (Table A8.1) (Clemens, 2006).
Further entry to the longline fishery was halted through a moratorium
in 1991, followed by a limited entry program to restrict effort. The new
entrants in the longline fishery were mostly steel hulled vessels up to
110 ft in length and their operators were former participants in the
U.S east coast tuna and swordfish fisheries. These newer vessels in the
fishery were also characterized by a greater reliance on sophisticated
electronic gear for navigation, marking deployed longline gear and
finding fish. The revitalized fleet also adopted more modern longline
gear, using continuous nylon monofilament main lines stored on
spools, with snap-on monofilament branch lines.
All Hawaii longline vessels are < 30.8 m in length. Most medium and
larger vessels between 17 and 30.8 m long target swordfish, while the
smaller vessels < 17 m in length target tuna (Fig. A8.1) (U.S. National
Marine Fisheries Service, 2001). Vessels use ice for fish preservation,
to meet market demand for fresh fish (McCoy and Ishihara, 1999).
A8.2. Range of Fishing Gear and Methods
Fig. A8.1. Hawaii pelagic longline vessels at berth in front of the Honolulu
fish auction.
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