Quote:
Originally Posted by bfish
It shows that the size limit is working. The exploitation rate is 63-84% (ie 2/3 plus of all keepers in the population are kept). 15" size was chosen so that males and females could spawn twice before being harvested. Macenia and Bettoli have a few technical papers, if you want more details.
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I haven't been following the sauger studies for a little while. Has there been any new data on how many fish showing up in the creel are spawned fish vs. stocked fish? Last time I looked at it, the spawning success was low enough that sauger were in danger of turning into a put/take fishery. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter how many time the fish spawn before harvest if the spawns aren't producing harvestable fish. I'm hoping some progress is being made - it didn't sound encouraging last time I read much on the state of the sauger population. I'm pretty out of date on the subject though.
bd