during both seasons, and apparently were distributed over much of the shelf 

 during the winter. Adult fish were caught infrequently inshore in the spring 

 (Figure 14.3), and offsiiore in the fall (Figure 14.17) in the northern 

 areas. The larger fish caught inshore in the spring (Figure 14.3) were from 

 the late pre-iy76 surveys. 



Figures 14. 2U and 14.21 show the percentage occurrence by stratum of 

 young-of-the-year (YOY); cutoff sizes were, respectively, 13 and 9 cm for 

 spring and fall series. The high numbers of YOY caught in northern strata 

 during the autumn are an indication of the importance of the northern portions 

 of the Mid-Atlantic to the successful propagation of year-classes. 



319 



