A fish blog.com

The halibut in Norway suffers from previous decades of over fishing. The situation is fortunately improving but strict regulation is still necessary if the stoch should be able to grow to former hights.

Torstein Halstensen has spent years tagging halibut from serveral areas in the souther part of Norway. He spend most of his spare time in a boat, fishing for halibut. By tagging, releasing and recapturing the fish he has added new knowledge about the migration pattern and behavior of halibut from different areas. Some fish are recaptured at the exact same position as it was tagged.

In an email Torstein tells about the finding of a spawning ground in a fjord. Torstein has interviewed a lot of old fishermen and searced through a lot of old documents in his search for traditional spawning grounds. One that has been forgotten for decades was recently re found by Torstein.

He does not share information about the locations of all the spawning grounds he has found. His work is done in order learn more about how we can protect the halibut – not as a guide for fishermen who want to fish as much halibut as possible.

The pictures in this post shows Torstein fishing halibut in a Norwegian fjord. All the halibut are being tagged and then released.

While the small ones can be lifted on board, the biggest must enter the boat from the stern.

Torstein has long experience in getting the halibut off the hook without causing damages to its mouth. Last year he caught the biggest male halibut ever in Norwegian waters. The last picture shows a halibut that is recaptured and then tagged by Torstein for the second time. Photos: Audun Skjølberg

In March and April a Norwegian fishing vessel was a part of a multinational survey on the fishing grounds west of Ireland. The survey covered the spawning area of the blue whiting in order to collect data about the blue whiting stock. Acoustic data and biological samples gives the scientists a good impression of the size of the stock and its age composition. Sometimes the catch includes more than just blue withing. On the picture below you can see an Atlantic pomfret (Brama brama) caught by trawl.

The Atlantic pomfret can reach a length of 1 meter and it it is found in all oceans (except the North Pacific) where it can be caught on different depths down to 1000 meters. It is not a rare fish all though Norwegian fishermen rarely see them.

On the picture above you see more of the catch sorted out from the blue whiting. The small fish are Benthosema glaciale (also referred to as “lanternfish”), the long and flat fish with red fins are deal fish, and you can also see some mackerels. Photos: Øyvind Tangen

The Atlantic halibut is one of the biggest fish found in Norwegian waters. While the female halibut can reach a weight of more than 200 kilos, the male is considerably smaller. The pictures shown on this post are taken during a tagging experiment in the western part of Norway. The halibuts are caught on long lines.

It was believed that the maximum size of male halibuts in Norwegian waters was about 50 kilos which was the weight of the biggest male halibut caught by then.

A couple of days ago I got some pictures in my mailbox. The pictures were sent me by Torstein Halstensen who is an eager halibut-tagger. He uses a lot of his spare time and holidays to catch and tag halibut in order to get better knowledge about the behaviour of this vulnerable species.

The halibut shown on this page is a male which proportions are breaking the former record. This male was 1,75 meters long, weighing 75-80 kilos.

The fish was tagged and released, and if it get caught again we will learn more about the maximum size of male halibuts.

Late summer the sprat is found in Norwegian fjords. When the quality of the sprat is good enough for the buyers, the fishery starts. This fishery has a long tradition in Norway, but nowadays only a few vessels are participating. The fresh photos shown on this page are given by Kåre Grønsnes who lives in Hardangerfjorden, a fjord in the southwestern part of Norway.

A small seiner is looking for sprat in Harangerfjorden in August 2008.

The oldest (but still beautiful) fishing vessel in Norway; “Fremad II”. Here seen with a smaller seiner during a brake in the fishery. “Fremad II” was built in Enland in 1888. If you scroll up to the header of Afishblog you will see the same vessel fishing bluefin tuna in 1968.

The sprat is located and the seine is set.

Here are some of the small seiners participating in the sprat fishery.

Live sprat is delivered from a small seiner to a fish carrier.

While waiting for the fish carrier, the crew is forcing the sprat to gather in one part of the seine. This year (2008) the fishery in Hardangerfjorden was very good, giving hopes for this fishery in the future.