Carangids fishery in India provides an overview of the carangids fishery in Indian waters. The following key points are mentioned: - Carangids contribute around 5.8% of India's annual marine fish landings and occupy the 3rd and 4th rank in pelagic and total marine landings respectively. - Around 60 species belonging to 20 genera are found along the Indian coast. The fishery is supported by species like Megalaspis cordyla, Decapterus russelli, Alepes djedaba, etc. - Production has increased from around 18,000 tonnes in 1950-1960 to over 200,000 tonnes currently. States like Gujarat

1. Carangids fishery in India

2. Introduction
• Carangids forms one of the largest families of bony
fishes, enjoying wide distribution world over and is
represented by about 140 species belonging to 32
genera.
• In the seas around Indian sub-continent, they are
represented by 60 species belonging to 20 genera
forming an assemblage of highly diverse group of fishes
with size varying from very small Seleroides leptolepis
measuring 18 cm to as big as the Chorenemus lyson
measuring 200 cm.

3. Taxonomic classification
Phylum – chordata
Sub phylum - Vertebrata
Super class - Gnathostomata
Grade - Teleosotmi
Sub grade - Actinopterygii
Class - Teleostei
Super order - Acanthopterygii
Order - Perciformes
Sub order - Percoidei
Family - Carangidae
Genus – 20 genera in Indian subcontinent
Species – 60 species in Indian subcontinent have been reported.

4. c
General identification characteristics
Caudal finPelvic fin
Scales
Scomberoide tala (barred queenfish)
Megalaspis cordyla (torpedo scad)

5. Carangids fishery
• Fishes of the family Carangidae are widely distributed along
both the coasts of India and their importance in the Indian
fishery is highly significant as they constitute nearly 5.8 %
(CMFRI – 2014-2015) of the annual marine fish landings in
India.
• 60 species belonging to 20 genera have been observed and
reported along the Indian coast.
• Carangids occupy 3rd in pelagic position rank next to oil
sardine, and mackerel and 4th in India marine landing next to
oil sardine, Indian mackerel, and perches ( CMFRI annual
report 2014- 015).

6. • They occur abundantly in shallow waters up to 80 m
depth along both the coasts supporting fisheries
almost round the year particularly along states of
Kerala, Karnataka, Tarnil Nadu and Andra Pradesh.
• The carangids are categorized into main sub groups
as Scad, Runners, Trevallies, Pilot fishes, Jacks,
Black pomfret, Queenfishes, Pompano and Darts.

7. Alepes kalla (banded scad)
Alepes melanoptera (blackfin scad)
Selar boops (oxeye scad) Decapterus macrosoma (shortfin scad)
Major subgroup belonging to different genera and
species of the family Carangidae from the Indian seas
Scad

8. Elagatis bipinnulata (rainbow runner)
Atropus atropus (cleft belly trevally)
Carangoids chryssophrys (longnose trevally)
Caranx melampygus (bluefin trevally) Caranx lugubris (black jack)
Runner
Trevally

9. Ulna mentalis (longrakered trevally) Gnathanodon speciosus (golden trevally)
Seriolina nigrofasciata (black banded trevally)
Naucrates ductor (pilot fish)
Seriola dumerili (greater amberjack) Uraspis uraspis (white mouth jack)
Pilot fishes Jack

10. Parastromatus niger (black pomfret)
Scomberoides lysan(doublespotted queenfish) Scomberoide tala (barred queenfish)
Alectis ciliaris (african pompano)
Trachionotus bolochii (silver pompano)
Black pomfrets
Queen fishes
Pompano and dart

11. • The commercial fishery is supported mainly by
Megalaspis cordyla, Decapterus russelli, Alepes
djedaba, Atule mate, selar crumenophthalmus.
Selaroides leptolepis, Caranx sexfaciatus., Carangoides
armatus.,Scomberoides tol., and Trachinotus mookalee.
Megalaspis cordyla (torpedo scad) Decapterus russelli ( Indian scad)

12. Alepes djedaba (shrimp scad) Atule mate (yellow tail scad)
Selar crumenophthalmus (big eye scad) Selaroides leptolepis (yellowstrip scad)

13. Caranx sexfaciatus (bigeye travally)
Carangoides armatus (long fin travally)
Scomberoides tol (needlescaled queenfish)
Trachinotus mookalee (indian pompano)

14. • The larger species of Trachinotus, Seriola and Caranx are
highly regarded as sport fish (FAO, 1984).
• Megalaspis cordyla and decapterus russelli contributed to
the carangid fishery all along the Indian coast.
• Alepes kalla and Atropus atropus formed good fisheries
along the southwest and northwest coasts respectively.
• Alepes djedaba and Atule mate formed a regional fishery in
Kerala.
• Carangoids armatus and Selaroides leptolepis constituted
the fishery in Tamil Nadu including Pondicherry.

15. Production status
Total marine landing 3.59 million tonne
Total pelagic production 2.05 mt. (57% )
carangids production 2.10 lakh ton (5.85% of total marine
and 10.24% of total pelagics
production.
Carangids position Ranked 3rd with 10.24% next to
mackerel 11.56% and oil sardine
26.6% respectively of total pelagic
production. Ranked 4th in total
marine landing.
Acc. To CMFRI annual report 2014-2015 :
West coast carangids contribution
East coast carangids contribution
total marine landing67% of
33 % of total marine landing

16. 19%
48%
6%
27%
North West South West North East South East
Region-wise carangids contribution (in % of total
marine landing) 2014-2015 data

17. 11%
7%
1%26%
20%
2%
1%
5%
17%
9%
1%
Gujrat
Maharashtra
Daman & Diu
Kerala
Karnataka
Goa
West Bengal
Odhisa
Tamil nadu
Andhra Pradesh
Pondicherry
State-wise carangids contribution in % of total marine landing in 2014-2015

18. State-wise ranking in carangids production in India (2014-15 data)
54446
41879
35946
23082
18816
14775
10494
3454 2690 2630 1958
0
10000
20000
30000
40000
50000
60000
Carangidsproduction(tones)

19. Gujrat
Karnatak
a
Kerala
Maharash
tra
Goa
Daman &
Diu
Horse Mackerel 7993 4694 2396 8017 938 796
Scad 3007 27762 38146 382 271 8
Leather Jacket 5853 705 171 1747 493 649
Other Carangid 6229 8718 13733 4629 1752 1177
0
5000
10000
15000
20000
25000
30000
35000
40000
45000Productionintonnes
Species-wise carangids production in west coast of
India(2014-2015)

20. Andhra
Pradesh
Odisha
Tamil
Nadu
West
Bengal
Pondicherr
y
Horse Mackerel 5244 4273 2041 1310 121
Scad 2971 153 12821 0 651
Leather Jacket 1413 2176 1720 169 145
Other Carangid 9188 3892 19364 479 1773
0
5000
10000
15000
20000
25000Productionintonnes
Species-wise carangids production in east coast of India 2014-2015

21. Sector-wise carangids contribution
• Carangids are extensively exploited by a multitude of
gears like trawls, drift gill nets, bottom set gillnets,
hooks & line, purse seine, ring seine, shore seine,
boat seine, bag nets, etc.
67%
11%
11%
8%
2% 1%
Differnt craft and gear % contribution in carangids catches (1998-
2000)
trawl
drift gill net
hook and line
purse seine
boat seine
bag net

22. 44%
10%9%7%
31%
% contribution dominant spp. in trawl net
Decapterus dayi
Caranx para
Selar crumenothalums
Decapterus macrosoma
others
37%
8%
6%
4%
45%
% contribution of dominant spp.
in gill net
megalaspis cordyla
Scomberoides spp
Carangoides
gymnostehus
Caranx sexfasciatus
others
43%
16%
16%
2%
23%
% contribution of dominant
spp. in purse seine
Alepes djedaba
Caranx para
Decapterus
macrosoma
megalaspis
cordyla
others

23. Decadal annual landings(1950-2010)
Period Average
landings (tones)
% of total
landings
1950-1960 18254 2.78
1961-1970 22785 2.74
1971-1980 28552 2.27
1981-1990 85916 5.05
1991-2000 149604 6.21
2001-2010 140468 5.06

25. Production trend of carangids of 10 yr. (2005-2014)
year carangids production
(tones)
% contribution of
total marine landing
2005 133350 5.2 %
2006 142109 6.2%
2007 141567 4.9%
2008 149499 4.6%
2009 172989 5.4%
2010 166693 5.7%
2011 230645 6.0%
2012 216447 5.5%
2013 248336 6.5%
2014 210433 5.8%

26. 0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
300000
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016
Productionintonnes
carangids production
tonn
Linear (carangids
production tonn)
PRODUCTION TREND OF CARANGIDS FROM 2005-2014

27. Biology
• Faster growth and short life span varying from 2 to 6 years
and prolonged spawning.
• Species are piscivorous and prefer to feed mostly on fishes
like anchovies, sardines, Thrissocles spp. Apogon spp.
silverbellies and ribbonfish among fishes, squids and
cuttlefishes among molluscs and prawns and crabs among
the crustaceans.
• The young ones prefer to feed more on prawns, squids and
anchovies and the adult mostly on fishes, molluscs and
crabs.

28. • Megalaspis cordyla fecundity 91854 to 324292
from Vizhinjam, spawning season from Apr.-Feb. and
peak: May to Aug, the length at first maturity 270 mm
at the age of 1.0 Year (Sreenivasan (1978) .
• Decapterus russelli fecundity 16388 to 107640 from
Kakinada, spawning season from Dec. to Aug. length
at first maturity 150 mm at the age of 1.0 year. Murty
(1991) .

29. Stock assessment
 Among the carangids species four of them that is Selaroides
leptolepis at tuticorin, decapterus macrosoma and Selar
crumenophthalmus at kakinada and and Caranx para at
mangalore are underfished.
 Species like Megalaspis cordyla is partially underfished along both
east and west coasts. However, there appear to be overfishing of the
species off Veraval and southwest region.
 Decapterus russelli indicated overexploitation off Kakinada. Others
like Alepes kalla along the southwest, and Alepes djedaba and Atule
mate along the Kerala coasts are over fished.
 Atropus atropus is optimally fished from the northwest region.

30.  Many carangid species form only a by-catch in almost
all the gears except in small meshed drift gill nets, boat
seine and shore seine. The landings by these gear are
negligible.
 In a situation like this, it is not only difficult but also not
possible to propose any specific regulatory measures
exclusively for judicious exploitation of carangid
resource.
 However, when certain fishery regulatory measures
either on the effort reduction or mesh size regulation for
increasing the size at first capture in order to ease the
higher fishing pressure are implemented, the same will
be equally beneficial to carangid resource also.
Conservation and management

31. CONCLUSION
 1950 – 1980 Slow progress of carangid fisheries.
 1985- 1995 A tremendous increase in the fishery could be
noticed.
 From 1995 production trend of carangids also exhibits
stagnation in increasing and decreasing trend.
 Many carangid species form only a by-catch in almost all the
gears except in small meshed drift gill nets, boat seine and
shore seine. The landings by these gears are negligible.
 Whereas, carangid fishery is sustained by many fast growing
species with short life span and that provides them better scope
to compete with other resources in the process of species
succession. This may be one of the reasons for a continued
increase in the over all carangid production in India.

32. References
• CMFRI, Annual Report 2005-2014. Central Marine Fisheries Research
Institute, Cochin.
• Mohamad Kasim. H. 2005 Status of the Fishery and Resource Characteristics
of Carangids along the Indian Coasts. The Seventh lndian Fisheries Forum
Proceedings,. Kochi. p. 7-14.
• Mohamad Kasim. H. Carangids. STATUS OF EXPLOITED MARINE
FISHERY RESOURCES OF INDIA, CMFRI, Cochin. p, 66-75.
• Murty V. Sriramachandra 1991. Observations on some aspects of biology
and population dynamics of the scad Decapterus russelll (Ruppell)
(Carangidae) in the trawling grounds off Kakinada. J. mar. blol. Ass. India.
1991, 3 3 (1&2): 396- 408.
• Radhakrishnan Nair. P.N., 2000. Carangid resources of India .Marine
Fisheries Research and Management. p. 317-348

33. • Rekha J. Nair*, Joshi. K. K, Somy Kuriakose and Geetha. P. M A Study on
the Diversity of Carangid Resources off Cochin, Kerala. Central Marine
Fisheries Research Institute. Cochin.
• Reuben'.S, Kasim. H. M, Sivakami. S, Radhakrishnan Nair. P. N, Kurup.
K.N, Sivadas. M" A Noble7. Somasekharan Nair. K. V' and Raiey. S. G
1992. Fishery, biology and stock assessment of carangid resources from the
Indian seas. Indian Journal of Fisheries; 39 (3,4) : 195-234,
• Sathianandan. T. V , Jayasankar. J, Somy Kuriakose, Mini. K. G and
Wilson T. Mathew. Indian Marine fishery resources: Optimistic present ,
challenging future. Indian J. Fish., 58(4) : 1-15, 2011.
• Sivakami. S, Radhakrishnan Nair. P. N, Jayaprakash. A. A, Kasim. H. M,
Yohannan. T. M, Sivadas. M, Said Koya. K. P and Seetha. P. K, 1996.
Distribution and abundance of carangids along the EEZ India.. Department of
Ocean Development, New Delhi. p 347-361.
• Sreenivasan. P.V. 1978. Observations on the fishery and biology of Megalaspis
cordyla (Linnaeus) at Vlzhinjam. Indian J. Fish; 25 (2,4): 122-140.

34. Thank you