1. YELLOWEYE ROCKFISH: REBUILDING PLAN UPDATE
GIAB MAY 26, 2017

2. Outline Background Rebuilding Plan Refresher
Update on Yelloweye Rockfish Catch for 2015 and 2016
2017 Management Measures
Allocation of Mortality Caps
DFO is seeking GIAB’s recommendations today on the allocation of the mortality cap among sectors

3. Rebuilding Plan Refresher
A key element of the rebuilding plan is the definition of an overall mortality cap for Yelloweye (100 MT). The rebuilding plan commits to reducing fishing mortality under this cap by the 2018/19 fishing season
This cap applies to all known sources of fishing mortality
For DFO to effectively manage to the mortality cap, the overall cap of 100 MT needs to be split among all sources of fishing mortality
This will allow DFO to monitor different sectors’ catch compared to their caps and determine where management adjustments are needed over time, if any

4. Recent Yelloweye Rockfish Catches
Year^
Surveys* (t)
FSC from dual fishing trips** (t)
Recreational imputed catch (t)
Commercial groundfish catch (t)
Total catch (t)
Total catch excluding FSC and survey estimate (t)
2015
catch
TBC
8.6
67.5
230.8
298.3
2016
5.2
60.7
139.8
200.5
^ By relevant fishing year for each source of mortality * Surveys included: IPHC, synoptic longline, trawl, shrimp, sablefish ** This FSC estimate summarises only reported dual fishing events and is a partial estimate of FSC catch.

5. Current Yelloweye Rockfish Catches Commercial Groundfish Breakout
YEAR
HALIBUT (t)
LINGCOD (t)
ROCKFISH OUTSIDE (t)
SABLEFISH (t)
SPINY DOGFISH (t)
TRAWL (t)
2015
120.57
9.96
75.42
21.59
1.80
1.50
2016
81.81
8.75
37.22
10.03
0.81
1.13

6. 2017 Management Measures Commercial: Recreational:
40% reduction in Yelloweye rockfish Total Allowable Catch (TAC) for 2017/18
Cumulative reduction in Yelloweye rockfish TAC of 81% since 2015/16
Recreational:
Outside South Coast Rockfish: reduced to daily limit of 2 (from 3)
of which 1 may be Yelloweye (from 2)
Outside North Coast Rockfish: reduced to daily limit of 3 (from 5)
of which 1 may be Yelloweye (from 3)
Outside waters Lingcod: reduced to daily limit of 2 (from 3)
Alignment of the Outside waters Rockfish season with the Outside waters Lingcod Season: April 1 – November 15 (from year round)

7. Defining Sector Mortality Caps - Proposed Approach
DFO is proposing to define sectors’ mortality caps for Outside Yelloweye based on catch history, while acknowledging that some sources of mortality are priorities:
DFO Science surveys
FSC and treaty “domestic” fisheries
Amounts to account for priority sources of mortality would be deducted from the mortality cap prior to determining what is available for other sectors
Mortality caps would be inclusive of retained and released mortalities (as applicable)
Existing allocation formula defining split among commercial groundfish fisheries would be maintained

8. Proposed Approach Set aside amounts for surveys and FSC fisheries:
Base the survey amount on the average from the last 6 years of catch (to include 3 north PHMA surveys, 3 south PHMA surveys) and exclude 2013 when there was no PHMA survey
Base the FSC amount on the high end of the catch range documented from reported dual fishing landings in the last 5 years, to account for unreported FSC catch;
Revisit the FSC amount set aside on a periodic basis to determine whether changes are warranted
Account for minor amounts of mortality in various non-groundfish commercial fisheries:
Salmon troll, prawn, crab, shrimp trawl all noted in stock assessment
Base the amount on the high end of the catch range reported in the salmon troll fishery in the last 5 years

9. Mortality cap components
Sector
Mortality value
Rationale
FSC
18.9
High end of dual fishing reported catch range
Surveys
TBC*
Average of last 6 years of survey catch
Other Commercial
0.5
High end of salmon troll reported catch range
Total
TBC
* Pending summary of all survey catch for No data from PHMA or IPHC surveys in 2013, so this year is excluded from the calculation of the catch average here.

10. Proposed Approach
Divide the remainder of the mortality cap between commercial, groundfish and recreational
Set caps for these groups based on their shares of the combined recreational-commercial groundfish catch history
Three time periods were examined: , , and
is proposed as a middle ground between the other two timeframes
Apply the existing commercial groundfish allocation formula to break out the commercial groundfish mortality cap among fleets

11. Mortality cap components
Potential Commercial – Recreational Outside Yelloweye catch proportions
Example 
Timeframes
Average recreational imputed catch (t)
Average commercial groundfish catch (t)
Total recreational & commercial groundfish catch (t)
Recreational share of total
Commercial groundfish share of total
64.69
215.44
280.13
23.1%
76.9%
60.96
222.64
283.60
21.5%
78.5%
54.68
226.07
280.75
19.5%
80.5%

12. Results of proposed formula
Commercial Groundfish Breakout
Mortality cap after FSC, survey, and Other Commercial deductions (t)
Commercial groundfish (t)
Recreation (t)
Outside ZN (t)
Halibut (t)
Trawl (t)
TBC
Table values pending summary of science survey mortalities

13. Questions for GIAB
What are GIAB’s recommendations regarding the proposed approach for defining sector specific mortality caps?

14. Appendices: background on catch data

15. Catch data Survey data: FSC data:
Includes data from IPHC, synoptic longline, groundfish trawl, shrimp trawl, and sablefish surveys documented by DFO Science staff or independent monitors/technicians
FSC data:
Definition of FSC amount is challenging given limited catch data and lack of Yelloweye-specific FSC allocations for First Nations
In the absence of information regarding allocations, DFO will use catch information to inform a mortality cap value
Amount used in stock assessment is from dual fishing landings documented by groundfish dockside monitors and entered into FOS; this does not include unreported FSC catch

16. Catch data Commercial groundfish data:
Includes catch from six groundfish fisheries
100% at sea and dockside monitoring provides highly reliable and comprehensive estimates of catch by species for all fleets since integration in 2006

17. Catch data Recreational data:
Catch monitoring and reporting programs for Yelloweye vary among areas of the coast: in some areas (5, 6, 10), there are no catch estimates of Yelloweye from
In areas with estimates, months of coverage vary, WCVI includes estimates of releases but others do not, some areas have creel coverage whereas estimates in other areas are derived from lodge logbook programs, and the extent of identification of catch to species varies
For these reasons, summarising recorded catch does not provide a coast-wide estimate of Yelloweye catch
The only coast-wide estimate of catch for the time period in question is the imputed catch estimation figures used in the recent stock assessment

18. Catch data Imputed recreational catch from the stock assessment
The catch from the WCVI creel surveys (which include estimates of landed and released) and Central Coast lodge/guide logbook (landed only) were combined for the years 2002 to 2014
Catch in 2012 – 2014 from these sources was compared to coast-wide catch recorded in iREC for to generate the estimated proportion of catch in the these two areas to the total Outside catch of Yelloweye estimated in the iRec survey, in order to generate an estimate that accounted for north coast catch as well
The exercise indicated that WCVI and Central Coast recorded catch was approximately half of the coast-wide iREC total, so the WCVI and Central Coast combined catch was multiplied by two to generate an imputed coast-wide catch estimate from

19. Catch data Salmon troll data:
From 2001 forward, data is an estimate of total Yelloweye catch from troll fisheries based on CPUE from logbook data that was expanded by in-season total effort; this is the typical catch estimation procedure for salmon troll
Yelloweye are not permitted to be retained in troll fisheries, so logbooks reflect records of released catch
There is no independent verification of fishers’ logbook reported releases; accuracy and completeness of the logbooks is uncertain

20. Catch data Commercial invertebrate data:
Prawn, crab, and shrimp trawl fisheries were acknowledged in the stock assessment as occasionally catching Yelloweye; information on their catch is limited but their catch is thought to be minimal
No catch estimates were generated for the assessment

21. Recent catches
Year
Surveys (IPHC, synoptic longline, trawl, shrimp, sablefish) (t)
FSC catch from dual fishing trips** (t)
Salmon troll imputed catch (t)
Recreational imputed catch (t)
Commercial groundfish catch (t)
Total catch (t)
2006
17.11
 NA
0.70
94.50
157.85
269.64
2007
15.21 17
0.60
76.60
211.94
320.90
2008
16.62
23.7
0.50
70.10
213.93
324.49
2009
16.31
12.4
67.60
224.90
321.34
2010
18.68
13.2
61.80
209.72
303.52
2011
15.72
9.1
63.90
224.67
313.51
2012
18.09
16.7
0.40
54.00
244.73
333.62
2013
0.29*
18.9
44.60
233.85
297.73
2014
11.21
11.9
49.10
217.38
289.70
* No data from PHMA or IPHC surveys
** This is a partial estimate of FSC catch