The American lobster settlement index

Lobsters are the single most valuable fishery in the state of Maine, and among the top two fisheries in New England and Atlantic Canada. The American Lobster Settlement Index (ALSI) has been a long-standing indicator of the health of the lobster resource and is now entering a new phase of expansion. Over the years, analyses of the ALSI time series have been the spring board for project proposals funded by NSF, NASA, NOAA and state agencies. It has been useful in the development of forecasting tools for trends in the fishery and in understanding the ecological drivers of variable recruitment. It has been adopted by federal and state stock assessment scientists as a major indicator of the health of the lobster fishery. Bringing the database to a new level of accessibility is a necessary first step to facilitating key research analyses that use the data. Over the next 5 years, we project three critical analyses of the data set that together will help determine the predictive value of the index for trends in lobster abundance.

Investigator: Wahle, R.

Unit: School of Marine Sciences

Termination Date: 30-Sep-16