Definition of the problem of estimating fish abundance over an area from acoustic line transect measurements of density

The problem of acoustic abundance estimation is briefly reviewed. Under proper conditions, fish density can be measured with high accuracy along line transects. Observed variations in fish density consequently reflect biological variations, or inhomogeneity in spatial distribution. The particular problem of estimating fish abundance over an area from line-transect measurements of fish density is defined. Related problems of estimating the variance of the abundance estimate and of mapping the spatial distribution are also defined. A partial list of candidate methods for solving the several problems is given. Among these, the so-called spatial statistical techniques appear to be most promising because of their exploitation of the observed spatial structure.