Report of the Study Group on Life Histories of Nephrops

The Study Group on Life Histories of Nephrops (SGNEPH) was established in 1994. The group last met in Lorient in April 1996 and a report of the meeting was presented at the 1996 ICES Annual Science Conference (ICES, 1996). The report dealt with a range of biologica1 issues and listed a series of recommendations for areas of future work. Although SGNEPH pointed out that these recommendations should be regarded as areas of work for longer-term consideration, ICES nevertheless adopted several of these as terms of reference for the Study Group to deal with by correspondence during 1997. SGNEPH has attempted to provide something on these issues but wishes to draw attention (see Section 7, below) to more immediate matters arising from the 1997 meeting of the Working Group on Nephrops Stocks (WGNEPH) which could properly be dealt with at a meeting of SGNEPH in 1998.