The Structure of Multispecies Associated Communities of Fish at the Western Sakhalin Coast by the Results of a Trawling Assessment Survey on R/V Bukhoro in June 2018

Abstract

Life cycle and migration activity of sea demersal fishes throuout the seasons defines the formation of associated multispecies communities allocated on the restricted area of the shelf and the upper slope zone. They were characterized by some features like particular species structure, specific ratio between individual biomass within the group of dominant species, and their existence probably determined by similar preferences of the species in view of their spawning, feeding, and wintering sites. Annual appearance of communities allows one to trace their seasonal dynamics caused by the change in fish habitat during the perennial biological cycle and also species biomass dynamics associated with long-term periodical shift of fish resources in the area. Some revealed specific communities have been called “summer shallow-area,” “gadids,” “cottids,” and “flat-fishes” according to their dominant components. Peculiar features of these communities studied facilitate developing efficient multispecies fishery and, at the same time, to control the structure of the fish community in its quasi-random nature.