Mina Zayed market in the early morning.

MARKET SURVEY

Between April 4 and April 12 seven days were worked in the Mina Zayed, Abu Dhabi main fish market.

406 animals were processed and species, length, disc width, sex, and male maturity were recorded.

Elasmobranches at Mina Zayed appeared to fall into three main groups

1. Large sharks (up to 2.4m) - mostly blacktips and pigeyes - brought ashore by dhows fishing in the Gulf (AD waters). While these vessels were primarily targeting valuable finfish (e.g. hamoor) through the deployment of gargoor traps, the crew appeared to target sharks by deploying longlines from the vessel opportunistically, to supplement income.
2. Small sharks - mostly sliteyes and milk sharks (although also including near-term embryos of other species) - brought overland by ice truck from other emirates (e.g. Dubai, Sharjah) and possibly Oman; they could therefore originate from either The Gulf or the Gulf of Oman (or both).
3. Small amounts of guitarfish and stingrays landed by inshore gillnetters targeting finfish in local AD waters.

N.B. During a brief exploratory visit to Dubai retail market, it was observed that the market was dominated by milk and spottail sharks with a few hardnose sharks and some cownose rays.

The following is a list of the animals processed in Abu Dhabi

• 5 Arabian smoothound (Mustelus mosis)
• 1 Hooktooth shark (Chaenogaleus macrostoma)
• 23 Slender weasel shark (Paragaleus randalli)
• 22 Pigeye/java shark (Carcharhinus amboinensis)
• 5 Spinner shark (Carcharhinus brevipinna)
• 2 Whitecheek shark (Carcharhinus cf. dussumieri)
• 1 Silky shark (Carcharhinus falciformis)
• 6 Hardnose shark (Carcharhinus macloti)
• 1 Blacktip reef shark
• 30 Blacktip shark (Carcharhinus limbatus)
• 25 Spottail shark (Carcharhinus sorrah)
• 156 Sliteye shark (Loxodon macrorhinus)
• 111 Milk shark (Rhizoprionodon acutus)
• 1 Scalloped hammerhead (Sphyrna lewini)
• 13 Guitarfish (Rhinobatos halavi)
• 1 Bowmouth guitarfish (Rhina ancylostoma)
• 1 Reticulated/leopard whipray (Himantura uarnak/leoparda complex)
• 1 Pink whipray (Himantura fai)
• 1 Cownose ray (Rhinoptera cf. javanica)

Mina Zayed market.

Dhows unloading at Mina Zayed.

N.B. The data gathered on the SCS expeditions in Kuwait (2008), Qatar (2009, 2010) Abu Dhabi (2010) is all being assessed and written up by Alec Moore and will be published in due course.