Working Group on Cephalopod Fisheries and Life History (WGCEPH - outputs from 2023 meeting)

Landings of Octopodidae from all countries combined are presented by ICES divisions. Commercial catches of Octopodidae are mainly common octopus Octopus vulgaris, horned octopus Eledone cirrhosa, and musky octopus Eledone moschata. The first two species are distributed from ICES area 27.3 to 27.10, E. cirrhosa is more abundant in the northern area and O. vulgaris in the southern and at the Azores. E. moschata inhabits waters from ICES area 27.9.a towards the south. Trends of these catches are analysed in the period 2000–2022 along with survey abundance indices. In cuttlefish, the important areas of commercial fisheries (English Channel and Bay of Biscay), the average landings in the last three years (2020–2022) were lower than in the precedent three years (2016–2018) and in all stocks but the North Sea they were below the historical mean (1992–2022). The period of high landings in the English Channel, Bay of Biscay and Western Iberia and Gulf of Cadiz was around 2004–2007 with consequent decline illustrating possibility of common environmental drivers impacting dynamics of the different cuttlefish population. In loliginids, the main fisheries landings are Loligo forbesii (in the north), Loligo vulgaris (towards the south) and very little Alloteuthis. In 2022, the English Channel and North Sea landings were among the highest values seen over the 2000–2022 time-series. Nevertheless, when trends between triennial period 2017–2019 vs. 2020–2022 were calculated these showed that the North Sea fishery landings were stable. The picture from surveys (mainly L. forbesii) in the North Sea was mixed, depending on the survey. L. vulgaris was absent or very low in recent times in the North Sea. Fisheries landings of Loligo in the English Channel and Celtic Seas were down on recent times, as was abundance from surveys in the Western Channel. The Northwest Groundfish Survey in quarter three was an exception in this regard, where there was an increasing trend in all loliginids. The Bay of Biscay showed an upward trend on both fisheries landings and surveys in both Loligo spp. Western Iberia and Gulf of Cadiz also showed a positive trend for both landings and surveys in L. vulgaris, while L. forbesii generally declined in surveys in these regions. Landings of Ommastrephidae from all countries combined averaged around 4 000 t annually along the dataseries. There was a peak in 2012, mainly due to the Spanish catches in Subarea 8 and afterwards landings fluctuate in the time-series. In year 2022, there was the highest peak of landings of the time-series. This increase was mainly comprising Spanish catches from division 8c. Commercial catches of Ommastrephidae are thought to be composed mainly of Illex coindetii, Todaropsis eblanae and Todarodes sagittatus. Due to data call by species, some countries provide data by species but most on aggregated lower taxa. Survey data for several areas was provided on species level but a lot of variability was also observed. These preliminary researches within the framework of ToR A were supported by an annual data call for fishery and survey data that recently was developed to also obtain detailed information on catches of individual vessels by ICES rectangle. This added detail should be used to its full extent by the end of this triennial period of WGCEPH.