Flatfishes, goatfishes and whitefishes

Although in order to exploit these minor demersal resources there are no specialised fishing efforts, their contribution to demersal Jinjish production is substantial, mostly exploited by bottom trawling in recent years. The annual flat fish production has been amounting upto 63,344 t in 1992, that of goatfishes upto 33,300 t in 1991 and of whitefish to 25,340 t in 1985. Of late, Kerala has accounted for 47% flatfish production, followed by Karnataka-Goa 23% and Maharashtra 14%. For goatfishes, Tamilnadu-Pondicherry is responsible for 41% followed by Kerala 30% and Andhra Pradesh 13%. Gujarat has been harvesting 49% of the Whitefish yield, followed by Karnataka-Goa 18 % and Maharashtra 13%. The present paper brings together all the available data published and unpublished on the fishery and biology of various species contributing to the fisheries in different parts of the country. Based on these it is seen that the catch of the Malabar sole can be marginally increased in Calicut but not in Mangalore. In the case of the whitefish, there is an all-India decline in production in all the states due to indiscriminate exploitation of juveniles by considerably small cod end mesh size of bottom trawls. The present paper draws attention to the gaps still existing in our knowledge and the future research need on the fishery and biology of the important species, stock assessment estimates, relationships between the parental stocks and the progeny: the bottom hydrological conditions and the biological characteristics of the various populations in space and time, for realising the Maximum Sustainable Yield and for implementing their management and conservation