436 



Fishery Bulletin 93(3). 1995 



■D 

 > 



T3 



C 



(D 



E 



3 



MARCH 



1988-90 n = 

 1991 n = 12 

 1992 n = 6 



■III 



Vm~ 



SEPTEMBER 



1988-90 [1 = 35 



1991 n=7 

 1992 n = 125 



APRIL 



1988-90 n = 



1991 n = 120 



1992 n=213 



OCTOBER 



1988-90 n = 2 

 1991 n=3 

 1992 n=109 



MAY 



1988-90 n = 

 1991 n= 12 

 1992 n = 218 



.--■I-,-,-, 



NOVEMBER 



1988-90 n = 

 1991 n=3 

 1992 n = 37 



JUNE 



1988-90 n = 7 



1991 n = 11 



1992 n = 20 



DECEMBER 



1988-90 n = 



1991 11=0 



1992 n=8 



* * * *' ^ £ £ £ £ £ # * * * * <?' * 

 Total length (mm) 



# jP # # # # f £ 



; £ j? £ £ *■' £ v 



Figure 5 



Monthly length frequencies of black sea bass, Centropristis striata, from 

 the Great Bay-Little Egg Harbor estuarine system during 1988-92. 



tapes taken during 1991 indicated that there were as 

 many as five individuals/m 2 in the surfclam shell habi- 

 tat. During the same periods they were not observed 

 in adjacent open sand bottom, sand with pronounced 

 megaripples, nor in exposed clay substrate habitats. 

 In situ observations at other locations found age 0+ 

 individuals at a number of continental shelf sites off 

 Barnegat Inlet, New Jersey, in 19-26 m depths. In many 

 of these instances the juveniles were associated with 

 broken mollusk shells on the bottom and were seldom 

 seen over sand substrate without shells (Witting 5 ). 



In the Great Bay-Little Egg Harbor estuary sys- 

 tem (Fig. 2), patterns of habitat use for age 0+ black 

 sea bass were derived primarily from beam trawl 

 catches in 1992 (Fig. 11). They were most abundant 



5 Witting, D. A. Marine Field Station, Institute of Marine and 

 Coastal Sciences, Rutgers Univ., Tuckerton, NJ 08087. Personal 

 commun., 1994. 



in habitats (Fig. 2) with sand and shell (Stn. 5) and 

 in habitats with sand with seasonally varying 

 amounts of amphipod (Ampellisca) tubes (Stn. 9). 

 They also occurred frequently in channels with silt 

 substrate (Stn. 10), over silt and shell (Stn. 12), over 

 bare sand (Stn. 8), over sand with seasonally occur- 

 ring macroalgae (Ulva lactuca) (Stn. 11), in marsh 

 creeks (Stns. 25-27), and were less abundant in an 

 area with extensive hydroids (Stn. 6). They were 

 absent in eelgrass (Zostera marina, Stn. 3) and in a 

 habitat mixture of sand, shell, sponge, and peat (Stn. 

 7). All of these habitats "were located at depths of 

 1-8 m in the polyhaline portion of the lower estuary. 

 Separate trap sampling in marsh creeks directed at 

 deep holes (2-3 m) confirmed the presence of age 0+ 

 individuals in these holes but not in uniform, shal- 

 low areas (approx. 1 m). 



Temperatures of areas where juvenile black sea 

 bass occurred varied seasonally. In the estuary at 



