Approximately 35% of the species of rays and sharks (elasmobranchs) that live beyond 200 meters depth are threatened with extinction. These animals are vulnerable to various human activities, such as fishing (directly or as bycatch), since they grow slowly and produce a low number of offspring in each reproductive cycle. Additionally, assessing the status of their populations is challenging because they live in hard-to-access habitats. Much research has been conducted in recent decades to better understand the biology, ecology, and conservation of elasmobranchs, but overall, knowledge about them remains limited, which hinders the proposal and effective implementation of conservation actions.

Therefore, the DELASMOP project aimed to promote the conservation of deep-sea elasmobranchs by developing procedures to reduce their capture and mortality resulting from crustacean trawling activities in the Northeast Atlantic, specifically off the southern and southwestern coasts of Portugal.

To achieve this, a characterization of the bycatch of deep-sea elasmobranchs by crustacean trawlers in southern Portugal was conducted, as well as an assessment of the impact of this fishing on the condition and survival rates of elasmobranchs, and the overlap between fishing zones and the feeding areas of these species.

The DELASMOP project was a collaboration between the Algarve Centre for Marine Sciences (CCMAR) of the University of Algarve, the Interdisciplinary Centre for Marine and Environmental Research (CIIMAR) of the University of Porto, and the Portuguese Institute for the Sea and Atmosphere (IPMA). It was funded by the Save Our Seas Foundation and the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), and also received technical support from the company OLSPS marine.