This assessment summarizes and synthesizes climate, biological, and fishing effects on the shelf and slope regions of the Gulf of Alaska (GOA), from an ecosystem perspective, and to provides an assessment of the possible future.
The Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands (BSAI) skate complex is managed in aggregate, with a single set of harvest specifications applied to the entire complex. However, to generate the harvest recommendations the stock is divided into two units.
Shortraker rockfish (Sebastes borealis) are distributed along the continental slope in the north Pacific from Point Conception in southern California to Japan, and are commonly found between eastern Kamchatka and British Columbia.
The shark complex (Pacific sleeper shark, spiny dogfish, salmon shark, and other/unidentified sharks) in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands is assessed on a biennial stock assessment schedule. In even years we present a full stock assessment.
Through 2010, octopuses were managed as part of the BSAI “other species” complex, along with sharks, skates, and sculpins. Historically, catches of the other species complex were well below TAC and retention of other species was small.
Fish previously referred to as rougheye rockfish are now recognized as consisting of two species, rougheye rockfish (Sebastes aleutianus) and blackspotted rockfish (Sebastes melanostictus). Bering Sea/Aleutian Islands.
Native Names: In the Aleut languages, Atka mackerel are known as tmadgi among the Eastern and Atkan Aleuts and Atkan of Bering Island. They are also known as tavyi among the Attuan Aleuts.
This assessment summarizes and synthesizes climate, biological, and fishing effects on the shelf and slope regions of the Gulf of Alaska (GOA), from an ecosystem perspective, and to provides an assessment of the possible future.