Figure it.— Commercial landings 

 of spot in Delaware, 1880-1977. 



CO 



z 

 o 



I- 



o 

 cc 



IS) 

 Q 



Q 



3 

 I 



3.0 

 2,5 

 20 

 I 5 

 I 

 0.5 

 



\ 



80 





J \ L -^-4-4-, L^ 



90 



FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 79, NO. 4 



J LJ« 



1900 



10 



20 



30 



40 



50 



60 



70 



YEAR 



use, and is salted down for winter consumption. 

 Such fish are not normally recorded in the catch. 

 Existing records show that it reached a peak in 

 1931 and again in 1955, then fell off to nothing 

 after 1963 until 1975. It is possible that spot also 

 was affected by DDT in that period. Spot is 

 an inshore species and, like croaker and other 

 species, is near the northern limit of its range, 

 thus is subjected sometimes to great stress when 

 winter temperatures are low. 



Striped Bass 



Striped bass catches parallel those along other 

 sections of the coast, declining to a low in 

 the 1930's, then building up to a peak in the early 

 1970's, with rather wide fluctuations in between 

 (Figure 18). There is little doubt that abundance 

 has increased since the 1930's, but it is too early to 

 say whether the recent decline is large enough to 

 be of concern or simply reflects another temporary 

 low in abundance. Striped bass probably once 

 spawned in the Delaware River from Marcus Hook 

 to below Wilmington where the river waters are 

 normally between 1 and 51, in salinity. These 

 waters are presently heavily polluted. 



Regulation of the striped bass fishery has be- 

 come a social-political matter, as the resource has 

 grown in popularity as a sport fish. Recently, 

 the Congress has allocated considerable sums for 

 striped bass biological research, probably too late 

 to do much good. If past history repeats itself, the 

 resource will recover before the research produces 

 much new knowledge. The State-Federal Fishery 

 Management Board is putting together a coordi- 

 nated coastwise research and management pro- 

 gram, which may be of benefit if the states can get 

 together on a uniform management program in 

 the face of conflicting pressures. We will have 

 to wait and see whether the past 50 yr have pro- 

 duced any accumulated wisdom that can be ap- 

 plied effectively. 



Mullet 



Mullet, Mugil cephalus, produced maximum 

 landings in 1931 and fell off to low levels thereafter 

 (Figure 19). Mullet may not have caught on as a 

 popular fish in Delaware, and its brief upswing in 

 the early 1930's may have been in response to the 

 depression. There must be additional causes, how- 

 ever, for mullet has not been recorded in commer- 

 cial catches since the early 1960's. 



Figure 18.— Commercial landings 

 of striped bass in Delaware, 1880-1977. 



YEAR 



588 



