Report of the Workshop on scrutinisation procedures for pelagic ecosystem surveys (WKSCRUT)

The Workshop on scrutinisation procedures for pelagic ecosystem surveys(WKSCRUT), chaired by Matthias Schaber, Germany, met at the Thünen‐Institute ofSea Fisheries, Hamburg, from 7–11 September 2015. The overall aims of the workshopwere a) to compare, evaluate and harmonize echogram scrutinisation and post‐processingprocedures currently applied by different participants of pelagic surveys coordinatedby the ICES Working Group of International Pelagic Surveys (WGIPS); b) todocument recommended methods to be followed by survey participants to produceacoustic density values by species and sampling units from raw acoustic energy data,and implement data requirements needed for a move to a new database for the storageof disaggregated survey data; c) update the WGIPS survey manual with the recommendedmethods.