Prior to 1970, there was almost no capelin fishery in the St. Lawrence Estuary and the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Commercial fishery began in earnest in the 1980s and 1990s. The 90s saw fishery for capelin expand to the southern part of the gulf and the Scotian Shelf. The considerable drop in abundance of groundfish, capelin predators, and the presence of unique oceanographic conditions, could explain this expansion. In 2009, capelin landings reached 12 080 tonnes. Most landings in the Gulf of St. Lawrence are recorded in Division 4R on the west coast of Newfoundland (cf. Figure 1). In this area, fishers were already well equipped for the pelagic fishery (mackerel and herring); they only had to modify the mesh in their fishing gear to adapt it to capelin fishery.