Abstract
The Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation (CFRF), the University of Rhode Island and local fishermen have completed both years of the South Fork Wind Farm pre-development fisheries monitoring ventless trap survey. The survey was designed to collect data on the abundance, distribution and movement of American lobster and Jonah crab. The South Fork Wind Farm development and two nearby reference control areas were sampled twice a month from May-November 2021 and 2022. Each area had ten stations consisting of ten traps with a target soak time of 5 days between samples. The traps at each station consisted of 6 ventless (V) traps and 4 standard (S) traps in the configuration: V-S-V-S-V-V-S-V-S-V. At each station, the entire catch was speciated and counted at the trap level, then sampled for size and sex. Additional data on water temperature and habitat were also collected. The catch in the survey changed throughout both years of the seven-month sampling periods with rock crab peak abundance in the first two months of the survey, followed by lobster peak abundance in the summer months, and finally Jonah crab peak abundance in the last two months of the survey. Overall in both 2021 and 2022, the eastern control area had the highest abundance of lobster, Jonah crab and rock crab, with decreased and more comparable abundance for all three species in the western control area and South Fork area. Overall, 2022 lobster abundance was lower than 2021, with the largest decrease in the eastern reference area and minimal decrease in the South Fork survey area. Jonah crab 2022 overall abundance was higher than 2021, driven by large increases in abundance in the South Fork and eastern reference survey areas. Finally, 2022 overall rock crab abundance was lower than 2021, with decreases in abundance seen across all three survey areas.