Report of the 1st International Workshop on Protecting Fishery Catches from Whale Depredation (WS001)

The focus of this Workshop was to explore opportunities in terminal gear modification and catch protection – an area previously identified as having the highest likelihood of ‘breaking the reward cycle’ in depredation. Rather than develop a new fishing gear or method, the goal was to generate ideas for the creation of additional low cost, easy to adopt gear modifications, to securely retain demersal longline catch of flatfish (e.g., Pacific halibut (Hippoglossus stenolepis) or Greenland turbot (Reinhardtius hippoglossoides)): essentially some additional tools for the fishermen’s toolbox.