When discards survive: Accounting for survival of discards in fisheries assessments

Abstract

When discards data are included in fish stock assessments, it is generally assumed that all discarded animals die. However, there are fisheries in which a significant fraction of discards are able to survive. This case can be treated with a simple extension of the usual analytical model of exploited populations, enabling Virtual Population Analysis (VPA) to be used for parameter estimation. The paper examines the effects on estimates obtained by VPA when discards are allowed to survive, and validates a procedure for deriving partial fishing mortalities in multiple-fleet fisheries where discarding and survival rates are fleet specific.