Understanding life stage connectivity is essential to define appropriate spatial scales for fisheries management and develop effective strategies to reduce undersized bycatch. Despite many studies of population structure and connectivity in marine fish, most management units do not reflect biological populations and protection is rarely given to juvenile sources of the fished stock. Direct, quantitative estimates that link specific fishing grounds to the nursery areas, which produced the caught fish are essential to meet these objectives. Here we develop a continuous-surface otolith microchemistry approach to geolocate whiting (Merlangius merlangus) and infer life stage connectivity across the west coast of the UK. We show substantial connectivity across existing stock boundaries and identify the importance of the Firth of Clyde nursery area. This approach offers fisheries managers the ability to account for the benefits of improved fishing yields derived from spatial protection while minimising revenue loss.

了解生命阶段的连通性对于定义适当的渔业管理空间规模并制定有效的策略来减少规模过小的兼捕至关重要。尽管对海水鱼类的种群结构和连通性进行了许多研究，但大多数管理单位仍未反映生物种群，很少对鱼类种群的未成年人提供保护。将特定渔场与育苗区联系起来的直接，定量的估算对于实现这些目标至关重要。在这里，我们开发了连续表面耳石微量化学方法来地理定位鳕（Merlangius merlangus），并推断整个英国西海岸的生命阶段连通性。我们显示了现有存货边界之间的实质性联系，并确定了克莱德峡湾育苗场的重要性。这种方法使渔业管理者能够考虑到空间保护所带来的捕鱼产量提高带来的好处，同时又将收益损失降至最低。