Relationship between sea-surface temperature and catch fluctuations in the Pacific stock of walleye pollock in Japan.

This paper investigates the relationship between sea-surface temperature (SST) and catch fluctuations in the Pacific stock of walleye pollock Theragra chalcogramma in Japan. Incorporating time lags between years of birth and harvest, the correlation coefficients between the catch and SST in two regions off the east coast of Hokkaido were calculated. The catch in year t had a high negative correlation with the SST during January–April and November–December of the years t-2 and t-3 in the spawning area. These results coincided well with the correlation observed in the northern ‘Sea of Japan’ stock. Both analyses suggested that the long-term catch fluctuations of the two stocks could be explained by the same mechanism, that is, the fluctuations would be explained by the SST in their spawning area during the spawning season using 2–3 or 3–5 years time lags, which corresponded to the dominant age of the catch within these two stocks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]