U.S. Department of Commerce / NOAA	/ OAR /  PMEL  / OERD\  \ NMFS / AFSC / RACE/	FOCI
	Fisheries-Oceanography Coordinated Investigations

ATTENDING

Kevin Bailey, Ned Cokelet, Martin Dorn, Mike Guttormsen, Al Hermann, Sarah Hinckley, Anne Hollowed, Art Kendall, Allen Macklin, Bern Megrey, Jeff Napp, James Overland, Ron Reed, Phyllis Stabeno, Sonia Hamilton (rapporteur).

• An International Fisheries Symposium, "Fish stock assessments and predictions: integrating relevant knowledge" will be held in Bergen, Norway, 4-6 December 2000.  FOCI personnel and associated have submitted three abstracts.

• Loren Tuttle, AFSC, and Jennifer Adam, PMEL,  have departed FOCI.

• Sigrid Salo will take a 6-week satellite imagery analysis course at Cornell University in June.  The course will have a marine emphasis, including AVHRR and SeaWIFS image analysis.

• SEBSCC Phase III proposals are due July 11.  Proposals will be sent for peer review, then discussed by SEBSCC managers and advisors.   Research awards should be announced by October 1.

• Pat Livingston has requested input from FOCI for the Ecosystem Considerations chapter of the groundfish stock assessment report.  Contributors from last year have been notified and requested to submit updates to Bern Megrey, AFSC, or Allen Macklin, PMEL, by July 1.

• FOCI will contribute to a presentation to NOAA's  Science Advisory Board, July 19 - 21 2000, in Fairbanks, Alaska.   [At the time of this FOCI PI meeting, the degree of participation was not known.  Since that time, it has been established that FOCI will provide representative information to Alan Springer, UAF, who will make the presentation.]

 
• AFSC and the Polish Sorting Center held talks last week in Seattle.  The Sorting Center has been able to accelerate processing of biological samples, and their personnel have almost completed FOCI's samples from 1999.

• MF00-04 (EIT) - Mike Guttormses, AFSC, discussed this spring's hydroacoustic survey of Shelikof Strait walleye pollock.  Two survey passes were conducted in the Shelikof Strait area during March 17-27. The first pass surveyed the entire Shelikof Strait area and the second pass surveyed only the area on the west side of the Strait where the greatest densities of pre-spawning pollock historically have been observed during surveys conducted in March.  Acoustic backscattering was assigned to two categories of echosign: well-defined mid-water layers of primarily age-1 pollock about 150-200 m below the surface or near-bottom layers of primarily subadult and adult pollock.  The densest aggregations of primarily subadult and adult pollock during pass 1 were distributed off of Cape Kerkurnoi and Cape Nukshak on the west side of the Strait.  Echosign was less dense but more broadly distributed along transect lines from Chirikof Island to Cape Kekurnoi.  Backscattering during pass 2 was similarly distributed, although relatively greater scattering was detected off Katmai Bay. The highest densities of acoustic backscattering attributed primarily to pollock from the 1999 year class was observed on the eastern ends of the southernmost transects, and, to a lesser degree, between Cape Kerkurnoi and Katmai Bay.  The densest backscattering during pass 2 was located just south of Cape Kerkernoi.

The size composition of pollock varied over the survey area.  The numbers of age-1 pollock (modal FL 12 cm) exceeded the catch of older pollock in tows that targeted the age-1 mid-water layer.  Near-bottom tows conducted in the southern Strait area caught mostly age-1 and age-2 pollock (modal FL 22 cm), with lesser amounts of age-3 (modal FL 33 cm) and adult pollock.  Tows made in the mouth of the Strait caught a mixture of age-1, age-2, age-3, and adult pollock.  Tows made between Capes Kekurnoi and Kuliak on the western side of the Strait caught mostly adult pollock.

Large numbers of eulachon contaminated trawl catches conducted outside of the western side of the Strait.  Methods to apportion the acoustic sign between eulachon and pollock are being explored at this time.  Preliminary abundance analyses suggest that the 1999 year class is strong, roughly on the order of about 4 billion fish.  It also appears that the biomass of 40 cm and longer fish is the lowest since the 1989 survey, which was the lowest biomass estimate in the Survey history.

MF00-08 - Kevin Bailey presented information from the late-larval survey of Shelikof Shelf.  The cruise was conducted from May 25 to June 4 on the Miller Freeman.  A short way out of Dutch Harbor,  two satellite-tracked drifters were deployed in the Bering Sea.   Between Unimak Pass and the Shumagin Islands approximately 20 icthyoplankton stations were sampled with bongo tows.  The regular FOCI grid of stations was occupied from the Shumagin Islands to Kodiak Island. Approximately 120 stations were occupied. Three satellite-tracked drifters were deployed in the vicinity of high concentrations of pollock larvae. At the termination of the grid, line 8 was sampled with CTDs, 20/60 cm bongo tows and Calvet. The Calvet was utilized for sampling microzooplankton instead of bottle casts because water sample filtering devices were not available. Several line 8 stations were eliminated due to time constraints and due to a rupture of the hydraulic line on the port-side oceanographic winch.   The Munson (small boat) was deployed outside of Wide Bay for the nearshore sampling. Two bongo tows were taken inside Wide Bay. This work is still in the experimental phase to determine the feasibility of obtaining quality samples from a small boat.  Several bottom trawls and an Aleutian Wing midwater trawl were conducted to obtain samples. Three exploratory Methot trawl samples were collected for Atka mackerel juveniles by rigging the net frame to sample neustonically. Finally, several bongo stations were occupied on the outside of Kodiak Island and in Chignik Bay.

The abundance of larval pollock appeared to be moderately high compared to other recent years.  A large aggregation of larvae straddled the Shelikof sea valley and extended onto the shelf west of the Semidi Islands.   There appeared to be an unusually high abundance of larval euphausiids.
 

• MF00-06 - Jeff Napp led a cruise to the southeastern Bering Sea aboard the Miller Freeman in early May.  Cruise objectives to 1) occupy hydrographic stations along SEBSCC’s monitoring transects taking CTD, water bottle, bongo, and CalVET samples; 2) reoccupy stations at mooring sites 2 and 3 to examine rate processes of nutrient dynamics, primary productivity, and zooplankton growth and development; 3) collect plankton samples for stable isotope determination; and 4) examine larval fish distribution along the Alaska Peninsula were largely met.


On the first visit to site 2, the water column was well-mixed, temperatures were cold (0.5 — 0.9 °C), there was measurable nitrate and silicate in the surface water, and the spring phytoplankton bloom had not yet begun. Test deployments of a SCAMP (Self-Contained Autonomous Micro-structure Profiler) were conducted to determine proper ballasting of the instrument and collect data. At site 4, the water column was slightly stratified, temperatures were warmer (1 — 2 °C) than at M2, and the phytoplankton bloom had begun with diatoms dominating the assemblage (Chaetoceros spp., in particular). Surface nitrate and silicate concentrations were lower than at M2.  On a transect between the Pribilof Islands and out Pribilof Canyon taking CTD and bongo tows to look for pollock (Theragra chalcogramma) eggs and larvae, and for evidence of transport of nutrients along the axis of the canyon and up onto the shelf, concentrations of large phytoplankters were so high that the largest mesh zooplankton nets were clogging. At site 3 and at four stations surrounding the mooring, phytoplankton clogging of nets was again a problem, but this time it was the fine mesh (153 µm) 20-cm bongos that were affected. The cod end foamed when the net was washed and there was a distinctive odor of Phaeocystis pouchetti in the catch. Examination under the microscope confirmed that the bloom was dominated by the colonial form of this taxon. On the revisit to site 2, the water column was now stratified (both salinity and temperature), slightly warmer (0.5 — 1.5 °C), and the spring phytoplankton bloom had begun with Thalassiosira, Coscinodiscus and to a lesser extent Chaetoceros dominating the diatom community.  Phaeocystis colonies were also present, but their concentration was lower than at M3.  Nitrate and silicate concentrations had decreased since the previous visit.  The cruise ended with two lines of stations (4 each) orthogonal to the Alaska Peninsula and crossing the Inner Front. Bongo net tows (60 cm only) were taken to look for eggs and larvae of  pollock.  Pollock larvae were found in abundance at the stations closest to the peninsula.  The new Cruise Observation Database (COD), designed by Bill and Lisa Rugan to replace the FOCI Discrete Sample Database (DSDB), is working well.

A discussion of the methods for incorporating non-base FOCI research into annual ship requests was postponed until later this summer when all  interested PIs could attend.

The next FOCI PI meeting will be at 10 a.m. on Thursday, 13 July 2000, in the Cloud Chamber (3/2065). Please submit to Allen Macklin, no later than the day before the meeting, agenda items and fax-ready copies of figures or handouts that you intend to present at the next meeting. Alternately, presentation materials may be posted on the WWW or e-mailed to remote participants before the meeting.

Mail corrections and addenda to the FOCI Coordinator.