Decadal trends in abundance, size and condition of Antarctic toothfish

We report the analyses of a dataset spanning 39 years of near-annual fishing for Dissostichus mawsoni in McMurdo Sound, Antarctica, 1972–2011. Data on total length, condition and catch per unit effort (CPUE) were derived from the> 5500 fish caught, the large majority of which were measured, tagged and released. Con-trary to expectation, the length frequency of the McMurdo Sound catch was domi-nated by fish in the upper two-thirds of the overall distribution exhibited in the industrial catch for the Ross Sea shelf. Fish length and condition increased from the early 1970s to the early 1990s and then decreased. Fish length positively cor-related with Ross Sea ice extent in early spring, a relationship possibly caused by more ice encouraging larger fish to move farther south over the shelf and into the study area. Fish condition positively correlated with the amount of open water in the Ross Sea during the previous summer (Feb), perhaps reflecting greater avail-ability of prey with the higher productivity that more open water brings. Decreas-ing fish size corresponds to the onset of the fishery, which targets the larg