Abstract
A video survey was conducted from 28 May to 23 August 2003 to provide spatially explicit estimates of sea scallop density and size distributions along the offshore northeast waters of the United States. Sea scallop, Placopecten magellanicus, densities in the Mid-Atlantic (26,270 km super(2)) and Georges Bank (28,523 km super(2)) ranged from 0.04 to 0.79 and 0.09 to 0.26 scallop/m super(2), respectively, and represented approximately 217,520 mt tons of scallop meats (approximately US$2.4 billion). On Georges Bank 82% of the sea scallop biomass was located within the three closed areas, while 36% of the scallop resource in the mid-Atlantic was within the closed areas. In the Georges Bank closed areas the proportion of sea scallop pre-recruits (<90 mm shell height) was low and sufficient to replace the adult population at an instantaneous mortality rate of 0.10 but not at a higher rate. A large number of pre-recruit scallops were observed in the southern portion of the Hudson Canyon closed area extending south into open waters. Sea stars outnumbered sea scallops (approximately 39 to 16 billion, respectively) although most were small (20 to 40 mm arm length). Sea stars may be responsible for sea scallop mortality in the southern portion of Closed Area II. The video survey technique has several advantages over dredge surveys; it is fast, accurate, precise, and provides information on the biology of scallops and the associated habitat without disturbing the sea floor.