The primary objective of a sentinel fishery program is to develop time series of abundance indices to be used in the assessment process of cod stocks. The northern Gulf of St. Lawrence sentinel fishery program became the first program on the Atlantic coast to incorporate abundance indices into stock abundance assessment analyses. Since 1998, four of the five abundance indices coming from areas 3Pn and 4RS are used to calibrate the assessment of this stock come from the sentinel fisheries.

There are many ways to establish abundance indices. For this reason, the various sentinel fisheries that have been developed on the Atlantic coast are not all identical. They were developed in collaboration with fishermen’s associations to address certain issues in a specific way. This site is providing details on the unique aspects of the northern Gulf cod sentinel fisheries.

For more details: Sentinel Fisheries – About