Contribution scientifique a la grande pêche campagne du « Cryos » de janvier à Mars 1973 dans le golfe du Saint-Laurent et sur les bancs méridionaux de Terre-Neuve

This cruise of the "Cryos» enabled us, based on our observations on the biology of the cod stocks, the thermic environment and the catches, to explain the situation of the fishery in the gulf of the Saint-Laurent and on the southern banks of Newfoundland, from January to March 1973. Our best catches were made in the Banquereau area and especially in the gulf of the Saint-Laurent. Unfortunately, the fleet of the Grande Pêche has not cruised much around the Banquereau area in the past years, and the very low quotas set in June 1972 by the ICNAF (International Commission of the North-Western Atlantic Fisheries) in this area (4 Vs) do not allow any further development. On the contrary, the catches of the metropolitan trawlers in the gulf of the Saint-Laurent, on the western coast of Terre-Neuve, have kept on accounting for a more and more important share of the total amount of fishes caught in the North-Western Atlantic Ocean: 16 % in 1969, 50 % in 1970 and 1971 and even 25 % last year, despite an unfavourable ice situation. Thanks to the current absence of quotas in this area (4 R) and to the agreements signed with Canada and allowing metropolitan trawlers to fish in this area until 1986, the catches should remain the same in the years to come. All the more than our observations enabled us to demonstrate the presence of large stocks of young cods within the 12 miles boundary and thus not submitted to the fishing effort. [...]