{"id":37377,"date":"2022-10-20T13:00:21","date_gmt":"2022-10-20T17:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/?p=37377"},"modified":"2022-10-20T13:13:47","modified_gmt":"2022-10-20T17:13:47","slug":"chesapeake-bay-2022-young-of-year-survey-results-announced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2022\/10\/20\/chesapeake-bay-2022-young-of-year-survey-results-announced\/","title":{"rendered":"Chesapeake Bay 2022 Young-of-Year Survey Results Announced"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><em><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Striped Bass Reproduction Remains Low; Spot Abundance is Highest in Decade<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 359px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/5601\/15431625679_b82fca0ca8.jpg\" alt=\"Photo of four people inspecting juvenile fish at the water's edge\" width=\"349\" height=\"234\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Maryland Department of Natural Resources scientists conduct the annual young-of-year survey each summer. Maryland DNR photo<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Maryland Department of Natural Resources announced results of this year\u2019s <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/dnr.maryland.gov\/fisheries\/pages\/striped-bass\/juvenile-index.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">juvenile striped bass survey<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, which tracks the reproductive success of the iconic fish in the Chesapeake Bay. The 2022 young-of-year index is 3.6, which is slightly higher than <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2021\/10\/15\/chesapeake-bay-2021-young-of-year-survey-results-announced\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">last year\u2019s result<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, but remains below the long-term average of 11.3.<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Atlantic coastal striped bass population has decreased in size, but is still capable of strong reproduction with the right environmental conditions. Variable spawning success is a well-known characteristic of the species. Biologists continue to examine factors that might limit spawning success.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Biologists captured more than 40,000 fish of 58 different species during the 3-month survey. One positive result was the increased abundance of spot, a popular species used for food and bait. Spot abundance was the highest observed in over a decade.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Atlantic Coast states enacted <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">responsible conservation measures<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> in recent years to reduce harvest and protect striped bass during the spawning season. Maryland will work with other states in the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission to develop additional measures to enhance the striped bass population through the Atlantic striped bass fishery management plan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">For this annual survey, fishery managers examine 22 sites located in four major spawning areas: the Choptank, Nanticoke, and Potomac rivers, and the upper Chesapeake Bay. Biologists visit each site three times per summer, collecting fish with two sweeps of a 100-foot beach seine net. The index represents the average number of recently hatched striped bass captured in each sample.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vims.edu\/newsandevents\/topstories\/2022\/sbss_2022.php\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Virginia Institute of Marine Science conducts a similar survey<\/a> in the southern portion of Chesapeake Bay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/marylanddnr\/52442053505\/sizes\/c\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52442053505_db6b1681e6_c.jpg\" alt=\"Graph of historic Maryland Juvenile Striped Bass index from 1954 through 2022\" width=\"800\" height=\"542\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Striped Bass Reproduction Remains Low; Spot Abundance is Highest in Decade The Maryland Department of Natural Resources announced results of this year\u2019s juvenile striped bass survey, which tracks the reproductive success of the iconic fish in the Chesapeake Bay. The 2022 young-of-year index is 3.6, which is slightly higher than last year\u2019s result, but remains<a href=\"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2022\/10\/20\/chesapeake-bay-2022-young-of-year-survey-results-announced\/\">&nbsp;&nbsp;Read the Rest&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[957,11],"tags":[2982,3031,4130,3183],"class_list":["post-37377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-appnews","category-fisheries","tag-chesapeake-bay","tag-striped-bass","tag-surveys","tag-virginia-institute-of-marine-science"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37377"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37377\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37405,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37377\/revisions\/37405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}