724 



Fishery Bulletin 88(4), 1990 



Figure 3 



Frequency of offshore fishing trips by month for private vessel angler 

 participants, 1987-88. 



Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb 



Figure 4 



Frequency of offshore fishing trips l)y month for charterboat operator 

 participants, 1987-88. 



Only red snapper were caught often enough to allow 

 statistical comparisons between groups for each year 

 for offshore bottom fishing. Red snapper CPUE of 

 private vessel anglers in 1987 was significantly greater 

 (P<0.01) than that of private vessel anglers in 1988 

 and charterboat operators in 1987 but not significant- 

 ly greater (P<0.01) than that of charterboat operators 

 in 1988. 



Offshore trolling CPUE's were not dominated by a 

 single species, nor were they as high as the inshore and 

 offshore bottom fishing CPUE's. Private vessel anglers 

 and charterboat operators most frequently caught blue 

 runner, dolphin, king mackerel, little tunny, and Span- 

 ish mackerel while trolling offshore, and the CPUE's 

 of charterboat operators were generally higher, al- 

 though statistical comparisons were not performed 

 (Table 5). 



Private vessel angler and charterboat operator 

 CPUE estimates were pooled for each species to com- 

 pare CPUE rates between the three regions of coastal 

 Louisiana (Fig. 2) between years. Nearshore CPUE's 

 for all three regions were dominated by spotted sea- 

 trout, with the highest CPUE of spotted seatrout found 

 in the Bay region for both 1987 and 1988. The only 

 other striking differences were the CPUE rates of 

 bluefish and red drum which were highest in the Delta 

 region (Table 6). However, due to small sample sizes 

 no statistical comparisons could be performed. 



Red snapper CPUE's were the highest in all three 

 regions while offshore bottom fishing. Red snapper 

 CPUE's in the Cameron region during 1987 were 

 significantly greater (P<0.01) than those in the Cam- 

 eron region in 1988; otherwise no significant differ- 

 ences between years or regions for red snapper CPUE 

 were detected (Table 7). Other regional catch dif- 

 ferences included much higher CPUE estimates from 

 the Delta region, as opposed to the Cameron and Bay 

 regions, for Atlantic croaker; otherwise no other trends 

 in CPUE were detected between areas or years (Table 

 7). Due to the large number of zero catches in the 

 species other than red snapper, statistical comparisons 

 could not be performed. 



Offshore trolling CPUE estimates from the three 

 regions were not as high or dominated by a single 

 S].)ecies as were the observed nearshore and offshore 

 bottom-fishing estimates (Table 6). Blue runner, 

 dolphin, little tunny, and Spanish mackerel CPUE's 

 were highest in all three regions. Few trends could be 

 detected between years or regions, as only the CPUE 

 of Spanish mackerel from the Cameron region ap- 

 peared to be much higher than those of the other 

 species and regions (Table fi), although statistical com- 

 parisons could not be made. 



