Analysis of the relative fishing power of the mexican purse seine fleet operating in the eastern Pacific

Abstract

Around 80% of the boats in the Mexican tuna fleet are purse seiners. These boats have different sizes and consequently different ranges to produce fishing mortality. The relative fishing power is estimated to minimize these differences and use it to standardize fishing effort as an index of fishing efficiency. Logbook information of the purse seine fleet of Mexico from 1984 to 1986 and as CPUE catch/trip, catch/set, catch/day of absence and catch/day of fishing, were used to categorize this fleet. For each CPUE, 6, 4, 2 and 2 categories were found, respectively. The relative fishing power of each category was calculated. Boats of 1,090 metric tons of carrying capacity belong to the more efficient category. Fishing success is related to the type of fishing, aerial help and fishing areas. The results of this work show that the more efficient boats fish in traditional as well as in more oceanic waters, set more often with dolphin and use aerial help.