The Striped Bass Technical Committee (TC) and Stock Assessment Subcommittee (SAS) met via webinar on November 13, 2024 to address the tasking from the Striped Bass Management Board’s October 2024 meeting. The Board requested these tasks to inform consideration of 2025 management measures to be discussed at a special Board meeting in December 2024.
Technical Committee Reports and Summaries
Detailed analyses and recommendations from technical committees, including working groups, sub-committees, plan development teams, and plan review teams, on specific scientific and management issues related to fisheries.
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The Atlantic Menhaden Stock Assessment Subcommittee (SAS) and Ecological Reference Point Workgroup (ERP) met in Arlington, Virginia, and via webinar to discuss a re-analysis of the historic tagging data that resulted in a different estimate of natural mortality and model development of the single-species Beaufort Assessment Model (BAM) and suite of ERP models.
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In August 2024, the Board tasked the Striped Bass Technical Committee (TC) with calculations to determine how decreasing recreational release mortality could contribute to any potential reduction needed to achieve rebuilding. Part of this tasking required the TC to identify a method for estimating the reduction in live releases associated with no-targeting closures. The TC met in September and October 2024 to address these tasks.
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The Striped Bass Technical Committee (TC) and Stock Assessment Subcommittee (SAS) met via webinar on October 2, 2024 to review the 2024 Stock Assessment Update Report, discuss the projection scenarios, and discuss options and considerations for potential management response. This memorandum summarizes TC-SAS discussion on the likelihood of the different projection scenarios and considerations for management.
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The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Lobster Technical Committee (TC) was tasked by the American Lobster Management Board (Board) at the Commission’s 2024 Winter Meeting to compile information on the lobster resource and fishery in and around the Northern Edge of Georges Bank. This task is in response to a potential action at the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) that is considering allowing scallop fishery access on the Northern Edge of Georges Bank to a currently closed Habitat Management Area.
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An annual Data Update process between American lobster stock assessments was recommended during the 2020 stock assessment to more closely monitor changes in stock abundance. The objective of this process is to present information—including any potentially concerning trends—that could support additional research or consideration of changes to management.
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The Cobia Technical Committee (TC) met via webinar on September 13 and September 25, 2024 to discuss the Addendum II confidence interval approach as tasked by the Board in August 2024. The Board asked for TC discussion on the potential application of the confidence interval approach to the regional allocation framework, and to consider other confidence interval levels in addition to the 95% confidence intervals specified in Addendum II.
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The 2023 Black Drum Benchmark Stock Assessment determined the Atlantic coast stock was not overfished nor experiencing overfishing in the terminal year of the assessment (2020). However, the assessment acknowledged lack of contrast in black drum data sets coupled with high uncertainty in model-based estimates. To this end, the Black Drum Technical Committee (TC) recommended close monitoring of empirical stock indicators annually between stock assessments to identify any concerning trends in a timely manner.
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The TC met via webinar on September 23, 2024, to review updates to the Sustainable Fishery Management Plans (SFMPs) for river herring from New Hampshire and Maine, as well as updates to the SFMPs for American shad from Massachusetts and Connecticut. The Maine and New Hampshire updates also included proposals to change and reopen their fisheries, respectively.
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