Identification of fishing grounds for emerging non-conventional crustacean fishery resources off south-west coast of India

Abstract

Trawling operations, extended wide and far, have resulted in the emergence of many non-conventional fishery resources. Apart from regular commercial crustacean resources of shrimps, crabs and lobsters, crucifix crab, <em>C. feriatus</em>, <em>C. smithii</em> and <em>C lucifera</em> are forming bulk catch in regular trawl fishery recently. The south-west coast of India contributes one-third of country’s stomatopod production in which <em>Oratosquilla nepa </em>contributes the maximum. Extension of fishing grounds has resulted in exploitation of larger-sized stomatopods <em>Harpiosquilla harpax, </em>which is edible<em>. </em>Present study aims at understanding the spatio-temporal distribution of these non-conventional resources, through GIS-based resource mapping which is indicative of their distribution and abundance. The study showed that there is good potential for commercial exploitation of non-conventional resources which can form a part of the commercial fishery in coming years to enrich the seafood availability and to provide new avenues for fishermen for maximising their returns from the fishery.