Identifying unregulated fisheries seasonality through commercial landings and local fishers’ knowledge

Seasonality in fisheries is known when opening and closing dates are established, but it is much less defined in places lacking seasonal regulations. Highlighting fisheries seasonality is critical because, for one, it can influence seafood supply and prices. Here, we examine fisheries seasonality by analyzing extensive datasets of monthly commercial landings and prices spanning over twenty years for 22 major finfish stocks in Kuwait, where seasonal closures are uncommon. Additionally, we develop a questionnaire to obtain information from the recreational fishery—the only fishing sector composed of local fishers—to investigate whether peak commercial landing months overlap with local fishers’ knowledge. We found a distinct seasonality in finfish commercial landings: at the two ends of the spectrum, the strongly winter-spring finfish landings (60% or more of landing proportions), which plummet sharply over warmer months, and the strongly summer-fall finfish landings. Landings influenced seasonal mean prices, with higher landings generally meant lower prices and vice versa. Further, we found that months identified by local fishers as being the “best fishing seasons” are consistent with months of peak landings for most stocks, though fishing seasons for a few stocks diverged widely from seasonality in commercial landings. Broadly, our analysis underscores high seasonality unrelated to seasonal regulations and supports combining commercial landings and local fishers’ knowledge to understand fishery and finfish seasonality, particularly in data-limited situations.