Where I come from as a researcher is trying to do science that is going to be applicable and usable. I don’t just want to ask a question because it’s an interesting natural history question.

The deep water red crab fishery is a candidate for MSC certification, which is a sustainable fishery label, or certification process. The study that I did has been considered and has been looked at by the consultants who are hired to assess that fishery. So that, I think, is pretty rewarding, and that particular study looked at the discard mortality rate of the undersized crabs that they were catching, and the female crabs that they were catching, because the market wants just male crabs of a large size. The other question we looked at in that study was the size selectivity of the traps they’re using, and could we play with escape ring sizes to maximize the efficiency of their traps.

Cod tagging really began in 2002. We had five different tagging organizations. We had about eight scientific organizations involved in the study overall, and by the time it had all finished we had 106 vessels working on the program, with about 250 fishermen as either captains or crew involved in the tagging trips. We tagged 114,000 cod, ranging from Cape Cod up to New Brunswick. Our role as the program wore on was to make sure the data was accessible to the federal scientists who would then use it for stock assessments that certain movement analyses had been undertaken, growth analyses from the tagging data as well. And essentially, every step of the way, making sure that when federal scientists had a question at Woods Hole, about the data and how they could bring it into the assessment, that we could provide an answer and support.

For 2008 when the 19 groundfish stock were all reassessed for the groundfish reassessment review meeting, these tagging data were incorporated into the assessment providing an estimate, not only of movement between stock areas, but also a measure of fishing selectivity, particularly in larger fish. I think this study is just a really good example of how a large-scale collaborative research project can work, and can really have an impact.