Horizon 1 1 17 ACL : Articles dans des revues avec comité de lecture répertoriées par l'AERES ICES Journal of Marine Science [14 ] abandoned lost or otherwise discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) coral reefs marine conservation marine litter purse seine tropical tuna fisheries SEYCHELLES OCEAN INDIEN 2022 fdi:010085186 ENG ICES Journal of Marine Science 1054-3139 ISI:000800321000001 10.1093/icesjms/fsac091 https://www.documentation.ird.fr/hor/fdi:010085186 https://www.documentation.ird.fr/intranet/publi/2022-07/010085186.pdf [Early access] Horizon (IRD) Purse-seine fisheries use drifting Fish Aggregating Devices (dFADs), human-made floating objects, to facilitate the capture of tropical tunas. Currently, the majority of dFADs are constructed primarily of highly durable non-biodegradable materials and there is no legal obligation to recover dFADs after deployment, leading to beaching events and potentially negative environmental impacts. We assessed beachings as a function of intra- and inter-annual trends, water depth, distance from land, seasonality, and benthic habitat within the local context of the Seychelles Archipelago using trajectories of dFADs deployed by French purse seiners over 2008-2020. Overall, 3842 beaching events associated with 2371 distinct dFAD tracking buoys were identified. Beachings occurred most frequently during the winter monsoon (December-March). Due to the shallow Mahe Plateau, beachings occurred in both nearshore (<= 5 km from land) and offshore (> 5 km) regions, predominantly in estimated depths less than 60 m. Despite representing < 20% of overall mapped habitat, the benthic habitat "Coral/Algae" had the highest beaching rate (35.3% of beachings), and therefore, beachings pose a significant concern for conservation. Our results provide a detailed view of the spatio-temporal pattern of beachings in the Seychelles, supporting the development of mitigation and prevention methods to reduce marine debris and perturbations to the marine environment. 040 ; 036 ; 021 ; 020 UR248