Migration, mingling and homing of North-East Arctic cod from two separated spawning grounds

Abstract

Migration of mature North-east Arctic cod tagged in 1975 and 1979-81 on two different spawning areas were studied. The numbers tagged were 11,500 in Lofoten and 3,350 off More, of which 1,088 and 476 recaptures are reported respectively. During the feeding periods in the Barents Sea and the Bear Island - Spitsbergen area mature cod from the two spawning areas intermingle, although the M0re cod have a more westernly and southernly distribution than cod from Lofoten. Returnc from the experiments clearly indicate homing to the spawning area where tagging occured. Whether this is homing in the strict sense of the word, i.e. return to birth area, can not be answered from these tagging results. The results show that cod spawning off More and in Lofoten do not randomly interbreed during repeated spawnings, and a possible division into separate spawning populations is discussed.