Oceanographic characteristics at fish aggregating device sites for tuna pole-and-line fishery in eastern Indonesia

•We examine the oceanographic biophysical conditions at traditional anchored fish aggregating device in eastern Indonesia.•Catch-per-unit relationship with biophysical conditions were analysed with correlation and GAM analyses.•Tuna pole-and-line fishery at the research sites heavily depends on the installations of traditional anchored fish aggregating devices, called rumpon. The research was conducted to investigate the oceanographic characteristics at three traditional anchored Fish Aggregating Device (FADs) sites for tuna pole-and-line fishery in eastern Indonesia. The FADs locations, and sea surface temperature (SST) and chlorophyll-a (chl-a), salinity (sal), wave height (wav), wind (win) current (cur) were examined using a geographic information system (GIS). Relationships between Catch-per-Trip (CPT) with oceanographic characteristics (SST, chl-a, sal, wav, win and cur), were analysed using correlation and generalised additive models (GAMs) analyses. Correlation analyses was used in order to determine how strongly pairs of variables were related to one another, and generalised additive models (GAMs) were used in order to model relationships between Catch-per-Trip (response variable) and the oceanographic variables SST, chl-a, sal, wav, win and cur (predictor variables). Correlation analyses showed that significantly negative correlations were found in entire locations between SST and chl-a while in contrarily, the lowest correlation was found between CPT and chl-a. Furthermore, the GAM plots indicated that a positive association was observed between catch-per-trip and SST with approximately >26.5 °C, chl-a was 33 to < 34.5 (psu) for entire sites while wav was found at>0.23 for Sorong and >0,87 (m) in Larantuka and 4.1 m/s in entire research sites while cur had a positive effect on CPT occurred at