Fixed nets
Fixed nets represent a threat for sea turtles mainly in coastal areas but the quantification of turtle captures in these widely spread fisheries is very difficult to assess, because of the very high number of small boats disseminated along all the Mediterranean coasts.
In Slovenian and Croatian waters some authors estimated that gillnet incidental loggerhead bycatch may be as high as 4.038 captures per year (with a minimum of 657 loggerhead captures/year), suggesting a significant conservation concern for loggerheads in the North Adriatic Sea.
Some authors suggested that fixed nets may have the same impact as the bottom trawl nets. Over 30.000 captures per year with a mortality of over 50% are estimated mainly in Tunisia, Libya, Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Croatia, Italy, Morocco, Egypt, France. Juveniles are frequently caught nearby nesting areas in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus. Some authors consider fixed nets as the most deadly fishing methods for turtles, with a reported a mortality rate up to 94.4%. Drowning is the main reason for the sea turtle mortality because turtles are forced underwater for unsustainable period of time. Thus in the Mediterranean the interaction of sea turtles with the static net fishery could be very important and comparable to other fisheries.
