Preliminary results of saithe tagging experiments on the west coast of Norway in 1971 and 1972

In 1971 and 1972, 3993 immature, 2-4 year old saithe were tagged and released at seven localities on the west coast of Norway. This paper deals with the recoveries made before 1973. The migration pattern appears to be quite similar for all the experiments. There is first a distribution along the coast after which most of the saithe migrate into the eastern part of the North Sea. Although the experiments so far do not show where the saithe migrate to spawn, it seems very likely that a major part of it will spawn in the North Sea, and thus belong to the North Sea stoch. The experiments north of the 62°N have, however, produced relatively few recaptures and seem inadequate to draw firm conclusions from, especially since earlier tagging experiments on saithe just north of 63°N have indicated a basically northern migration pattern from this region