Time series of Antarctic krill estimates around the South Shetland Islands from 2013 to 2019

Metadata for krill biomass time series obtained by Chinese krill fishing vessel in Subarea 48.1 is submitted with accompanying description of the acoustic survey and data analysis. Distribution of Antarctic krill for the 2013/14 to 2015/16 and the 2017/18 to 2018/19 fishing seasons were mapped by the Chinese F/V Fu Rong Hai to understand the interannual variations of Antarctic krill around the South Shetland Islands, one of the major fishing ground for Antarctic krill in Area 48. Acoustic data were collected with ship-mounted Simrad EK60 scientific echosounder system. A swarm-based Echoview EV template was used for echo-integration, and the areal krill density with coefficient of variance (CV) was calculated following Jolly and Hampton (1990). The results suggest that krill distribution displays an obvious interannual variations. Mean krill density of the whole survey area reveals an increasing trend during the last 6 years, increased from 20.22 g m^-2 in December 2013 to 70.13 g m^-2 in February 2019.