FFS Solea 690
Cruise summary report
| Cruise Info. | |
| Ship name (ship code) | FFS Solea (06SL) |
| Cruise identifier | 690 |
| Cruise period | 2014-06-25 — 2014-07-15 |
| Status | Completed |
| Port of departure | Cuxhaven, Germany |
| Port of return | Cuxhaven, Germany |
| Purpose | Fisheries |
| Objectives | Objective
The 690th survey of the FRV Solea was conducted in the framework of the international hydroacoustic survey on pelagic fish in the North Sea, which is co-ordinated by the ICES Planning Group for Herring Surveys (WGIPS). The main objective was to assess clupeoid resources, mainly herring and sprat, in the North Sea. The reported acoustic survey is conducted every year to supply to ICES the most important fishery independent data (i.e. biomass estimate) for the assessment of herring and sprat stocks in the area. Narrative We left the port of Cuxhaven at the 25th June 2014. The investigation area covered the southern part of the North Sea from 52°N to 56°N. The acoustic survey was performed during day time. The acoustic equipment was an echosounder EK60 working on 38 kHz and 120 kHz. The hull mounted 38 kHz-transducer and the 120 kHz-transducer was calibrated in the open sea close to the Danish coast at a distance between transducer and calibration sphere of between 14.30 and 18.30 m. The echo integration, i.e. the allocation of the area backscattering strength, sA, to the species was done by the post-processing system EchoView. The specific settings of the hydroacoustic equipment were used as described in the 'Manual for Herring Acoustic Surveys in ICES Divisions III, IV and VI' (ICES C.M. 2005/G:04, Annex 4). Pelagic trawl hauls were carried out to identify the target species. From each haul, subsamples were taken to determine length and weight of fish. Further sub-samples of herring and sprat were examined for sex, maturity and age. After each 30 NM sailed, hydrographical conditions were investigated with a CTD probe. The survey ended on 15th July 2014 in Cuxhaven. |
| Chief scientist | Eckhard Bethke (Thünen Institute of Sea Fisheries, Hamburg) |
| Coordinating body | International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) |
| Cruise report |  (0.30 MB) |
| NPRC | (0.33 MB) |
| Ocean/sea areas | |
| General | North Sea |
| Specific | Southern North Sea |
| Track charts | (0.07 MB) |
