- Reaction score
- 1,677
A simple technique to “illuminate the exits” in trawl fishing nets can almost halve the numbers of unwanted catch, new research has found, potentially protecting both the environment and fishermen’s livelihoods.
Attaching LED lights to larger holes in nets, intended to allow non-target species to escape, dramatically reduced the numbers killed unnecessarily, a team from Bangor University found.
The research, published in Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, inverts an old fishing technique of shining a light on water to attract fish into a net.
The study, conducted between June and August 2017, tested the effect of lights in reducing the number of haddock and flatfish caught in a queen scallop fishery off the Isle of Man.
It found that while existing devices to reduce bycatch (species caught unintentionally) were effective at shallower depths of 29-40 metres, they had no effect in deeper, darker waters of 45-95 metres. But once LEDs were added to these “exits” in deep water, haddock bycatch was reduced by 47% and flatfish by 25%.
Read more here. (The Guardian UK)
Attaching LED lights to larger holes in nets, intended to allow non-target species to escape, dramatically reduced the numbers killed unnecessarily, a team from Bangor University found.
The research, published in Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, inverts an old fishing technique of shining a light on water to attract fish into a net.
The study, conducted between June and August 2017, tested the effect of lights in reducing the number of haddock and flatfish caught in a queen scallop fishery off the Isle of Man.
It found that while existing devices to reduce bycatch (species caught unintentionally) were effective at shallower depths of 29-40 metres, they had no effect in deeper, darker waters of 45-95 metres. But once LEDs were added to these “exits” in deep water, haddock bycatch was reduced by 47% and flatfish by 25%.
Read more here. (The Guardian UK)
