A surface-trawl survey was conducted by the R/V Kaiyo mare in the southern Okhotsk Sea and western North Pacific Ocean off the Kuril Islands in October and November 1993. The distributions and abundances of the species caught are described and discussed. Twenty-four fish species (1 lamprey, 1 shark, and 22 teleosts) and one squid species were identified. Juvenile Pacific salmon (6 species of the genus Oncorhynchus) were the most abundant, followed by myctophids, juvenile arabesque greenling (Pleurogrammus azonus), and gonatids including boreopacific gonate squid (Gonatopsis borealis) and probably schoolmaster gonate squid (Berryteuthis magister). Northern smoothtongue (Leuroglossus schmidti) were also abundant. Juvenile arabesque greenling were abundantly taken in the Okhotsk Sea in October but disappeared from the surface waters in November because they settled on the bottom. There were marked differences in the oceanic distribution of arabesque greenling and Atka mackerel (P. monopter ygius), suggesting that these species segregate their habitats. Northern smoothtongue mostly occurred in the Okhotsk Sea, and myctophids were caught in the North Pacific Ocean. We conclude that the surface layer of the southern Okhotsk Sea provides favorable habitats for the feeding and growth of juvenile salmonids, arabesque greenling, and other epipelagic migratory species from summer to mid-autumn but ends its role in late autumn with decreasing sea-surface temperatures.