Coastal fisheries of Latin America and the Caribbean

24Coastal fisheries of Latin America and the CaribbeanBivalves and gastropods: In Buenos Aires Province, bivalves are shovelledalong exposed sandy beaches. Traditionally, this fishery targeted primarily theyellow clam * (almeja amarilla), but because the populations collapsed, the fisherynow targets beach clams (berberechos). However, the yellow clam sustained asignificant fishery that started in the 1940s, with landings reaching a maximumof 1 073 tonnes in 1953 (Dadón, 2001, 2002). When catches declined because ofa dramatic increase in effort, the fishery was closed in 1956. It reopened with a45-tonne quota in 1957, and closed again for ten years in 1958, and it has remainedclosed to a commercial fishery ever since. A daily bag limit (2 kg/person) has beenallowed for personal consumption, as clams are valued by tourists. Althoughrecreational gathering is the only harvesting that has been allowed for decades,the yellow clam populations have continued to decline. This is due to a varietyof reasons, including growing pressure from recreational harvesters and illegalcommercial fishing. In addition, the destruction of habitat caused by the extractionof sand for construction, circulation of vehicles along the beaches, and an everexpandingurban development has compounded the pressure on this species. Aftera mass mortality event decimated most populations in 1995, a complete closure wasput in place in 1996, including the bag limit for personal consumption. Althoughillegal, harvesting continues to be a common activity during the summers and themass mortality did not affect stocks of berberecho (Dadón, 1999), whose size evenincreased after 1998. As a result, it has been increasingly targeted recreationallybut also commercially. This fishery is not regulated and catch is not monitored.Although not illegal, most of the catch is marketed through informal conduits.The daily catch is frozen and sold in bulk.In Chubut Province, many families of coastal gatherers harvest molluscs inthe intertidal zone (Figure 2), mostly in San José Gulf. They target blue mussels(mejillón), etched clams (almeja rayada), ribbed mussels (cholga), volute (caracol),and beach and hot snails (caracoles). In the case of clams, harvesters can recognizethe holes left by the siphons at the surface, and use 2- or 3-prong forks; small snailsare concentrated using bait. The shellfish catch is collected in handheld mesh bags(chinguillos) with an approximate capacity of 40 kg. Once a team has filled 10 to20 chinguillos, these are transported ashore, 1 to 3 km across tidelands. The catchis transported by truck to processing plants, fish shops or restaurants in PuertoMadryn and Trelew. The activity is seasonal (autumn and winter), generallyconstrained by the onset of the red tide season (Santa Ana, 2004).Gastropods and bivalves are also gathered in scattered locations of Santa Cruzand Tierra del Fuego Provinces. In the latter there is a small catch of blue mussels,etched clams, white clams, brown clams, limpets (lapas) and voluta snails. Theactivity is seasonally constrained by the development of red tides, usually duringthe summer. The product is marketed locally, fresh and unprocessed.* Correspondence between scientific names and common Spanish and English names are summarizedin Table 3. English names are used throughout text; the first time that the name is used, the Spanishname is quoted in parentheses. Fish common names follow Cousseau and Perrotta (2000) in mostinstances.