Recently rumors have circulated in the fishing community about the upcoming striped bass stock assessment. The current striped bass stock assessment will be presented to the ASMFC striped bass management board on November 10^th. . Excerpts from the document that are quoted below show overfishing coast-wide in 2003  by a considerable degree. However, remember, Amendment 6 increased the commercial quota by 42% without having all states come up to the benchmark of 2 fish at 28” as permitted in Amendment 4 (passed in November, 1989). Also, in 2001 and 2002 the New Jersey coastal catch was down.

The tagging studies, however, did not support the VPA analysis, leading most members of the TC to question the validity of the report. The interpretation of these results were apparently left to the management board. We will not know the impact of this interpretation until after the November 10^th meeting.

Below are some items quoted from the ASMFC  Technical Committee’s report to the management board.

“Stock Size: The estimate of total abundance for January 1, 2004 is 56.7 million age-1 and older fish due to the very strong 2003 year-class. This estimate is about 11 million fish higher than the average stock size for the previous five years and 23.8% higher than the 2003 abundance.

Spawning Stock Biomass (SSB): The female spawning stock biomass for 2003 is estimated at 30 million pounds which is above the recommended biomass threshold of 28 millions pounds (12,726 mt). However, most Technical Committee members expressed concern over the current estimates spawning stock biomass and, hence, the conclusions derived from these estimates.

Recruitment: Recruitment of the 2003 cohort for all stocks combined is 21.6 million age-1 fish and is the highest observed in the time series. Preliminary survey indices for young-of-the-year striped bass for 2004 in Chesapeake Bay indicate that the 2004 year-class is of average strength.

Fishing Mortality Rates: Based on VPA results, average age 8-11 fishing mortality in 2003 is estimated at F=0.62 (a 77% increase compared to 2002) and exceeds the Amendment 6 target of 0.30, and above the threshold of 0.41. However, all technical committee members expressed concern over the terminal year estimate of F from the VPA and, hence, the conclusions derived from this estimate.

Recreational harvest (2.4 million fish) and discards (1.2 million fish) accounted for 76% of the total 2003 catch. Maryland recreational fisheries harvested 21.8% of total recreational landings, followed by MA (16.9%), VA (16.7%), NJ (16.3%), and NY (13%). The remaining states each landed 5% or less of the total recreational landings.

Commercial harvest (0.86 million fish) and discards (0.27 million fish) accounted for 24% of the total 2003 catch. Maryland commercial fisheries harvested 50.8% of the total commercial landings, followed by VA (18.7%), PRFC (9.6%), NY (7.9%), and MA (6.4%). The remaining states each landed 4% or less of the total commercial landings.

Overall, recreational harvest represented 51.2 % by number of all losses. Striped bass ages five through nine comprised 71% of landings). Highest landings occurred for age seven (1996 year class) which made up 19.4 % of the total . The states landing the largest proportion were Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia (Table 9). Landings in Maryland made up 21.8 % of the total and were the highest of all states.

The total loss of striped bass in 2003 was 4.7 million fish, an increase from 3.6 million fish in 2002 and 4.3 million fish in 2001. These changes reflect a 26.3 % and 8.3 % increase over 2002 and 2001, respectively. More importantly, losses of fish age eight and older in 2003 were a 51.1% and a 39.4 % increase over losses of age eight and older fish in 2002 and 2001. Total losses in 2003 were the second highest since 1982. The increase in harvest from 2002 was spread among all age classes with the exception of age six as the 1996 year class shifted from age six to age seven .  Ages 5 (1998 year class) and 7 (1996 year class) sustained the highest losses in 2003.”