ond world war, landings in both states rose, especially in 

 New York, as mussels were sought as a source of Vitamin 

 A, but this use was soon ended by development of syn- 

 thetic vitamins. There is a small but steady demand by 

 certain ethnic groups which appreciate the fine flavor of 

 mussels, and these landings have increased somewhat 

 recently (Table 16). If demand were greater, it is almost 

 certain that by wise management of harvesting the 

 natural resource, or by mariculture, the yield could be in- 

 creased considerably. 



Tautog 



100 

 75 

 50 

 25 



V) 



i 



u ISO 

 a: 



i '" 



100 

 76 

 50 

 25 



J^- 



.--^ 



^ 



./•x^'VWs'V^^. 



Tautoga onitis (Linnaeus), tautog, is of minor com- 

 mercial importance in the New York Bight region, but of 

 considerable recreational importance (Table 17), es- 

 pecially in the region from New York north. Earll (1887) 

 did not mention tautog as an important species in New 

 Jersey in the 1880s, but Mather (1887) listed it among 

 important species in Long Island Sound. The species is 

 listed by ICNAF under the category "Other ground- 

 fish," but this probably is to accommodate the U.S. 

 catch, for the species is not known to move in significant 

 numbers beyond 12 miles from the coast (Bigelow and 

 Schroeder 1953). Commercial catches in New York and 

 New Jersey apparently have been declining in the long 

 run (Fig. 14). New Jersey commercial landings have 

 almost always been larger than in New York except 

 recently. 



Tautog is a relatively nonmigratory coastal species 

 with specialized habitat preferences. Commercial 

 catches are taken mostly by pots and traps in New Jer- 



Table 17. — Estljnated conunercial and recreational catches of 

 tautog in the north and middle Atlantic regions of the united 

 States coast 1960-1975. weights in metric tons. 



The national saltwater angling surveys for 1960, 1965. and 1970 

 did not give data by individual states. New York was included 

 with the Now England states and New Jersey with the other middle 

 Atlantic states. 



Figures for L97S in parentheses assume that un.ivailable landings 

 in N.H., conn., and Del. equal the average of recent years. 



Figure 14. — Annual commercial landings of tautog in New York and 

 New Jersey 1887-1975. 



sey, pound nets in New York, incidental to catches of 

 other species. There is no evidence that the resource is in 

 poor condition. Catches in the middle Atlantic area 

 appear to be extremely variable, as might be expected 

 with a species near the southern limit of its range. 



American Shad 



Once one of the most popular food fishes of the Atlan- 

 tic coast, American shad, Alosa sapidissima (Wilson), 

 has declined to relatively minor importance in the New 

 York Bight area. 



In upper New York Bay and Newark Bay as well as in 

 the Hudson, one of the most important fisheries in the 

 1880s was for American shad. Demand for shad in this 

 area, and prices, were said to have declined because the 

 fish had oily flavors (Mather 1887), but shad also were 

 said to be less abundant than formerly. A few shad were 

 caught even in some bays along the south shore of Long 

 Island. 



The history of commercial landings in New Jersey is 

 similar to the trend in New York, although landings in 

 New Jersey have been considerably higher. This is un- 

 derstandable, because most shad taken in New York 

 waters come from the Hudson River, while New Jersey 

 fishermen can fish in two major rivers, the Hudson and 

 the Delaware. Most of the time more than half the weight 

 of shad landed in New Jersey comes from the Hudson. In 

 New Jersey, as in New York, commercial shad landings 

 have shown two major peaks, one at the turn of the cen- 

 tury and one in the 1940s (Fig. 15). The decline from 

 about 1900 to the 1920s was caused by overfishing, water 

 pollution, and construction of dams, but overfishing was 

 believed to be the principal cause (U.S. Fish and Wild- 

 life Service 1945). The increase which began about 1935 

 and reached a peak in the 1940s, in New York as well as 

 in New Jersey, was caused by the management program 

 in the Hudson River, which, by reducing fishing effort, 

 allowed more fish to reach the spawning grounds. In part, 

 the second peak was generated by the second world war, 

 when regulations were relaxed to increase the supply of 

 protein. A similar maximum in the 1940s shows in Con- 

 necticut shad landings also. The subsequent drop in 



20 



