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Summary: Fisheries · VOL 31 NO 12 · DECEMBER 2006 · WWW.FISHERIES.ORG 601
INTRODUCTION
Queen conch (Strombus gigas) is a com-
mercially-valuable marine gastropod that
ranges throughout the Caribbean to
Bermuda. It is the basis of a lucrative
export market to the United States and
Europe that was estimated at $60 million
USD in 2001 (CITES 2003). Fishing pres-
sure is intense and has led to significant
declines in most populations over the past
two decades. The conch fishery crashed in
Florida and has not recovered to
exploitable levels despite a 20-year fishing
moratorium and an active reintroduction
program (Glazer and Berg 1994). The sta-
tus and trends of regional queen conch
fisheries led to listing of the species on
Appendix II of the Convention on
International Trade in Endangered
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