Developing Biological Reference Points and Identifying Stock Status for Management of Paddlefish Polyodon spathula in the Mississippi River Basin

Paddlefish (Polyodon spathula) is commercially and recreationally important throughout much of the Mississippi River drainage. There is growing concern about the status of major stocks, primarily due to recent increase in demand for Paddlefish roe, as well as increased popularity of Paddlefish as an target of the recreational fishery. We assembled and critically reviewed existing biological information, landings, indices of abundance, modeling and management approaches to identify sustainable rates of exploitation, develop biological reference points, and provide management and research recommendations. Lack of sufficient time series of basic fishery dependent data qualifies most Paddlefish stocks as “data poor.”  Due to these limitations, attempts to apply fishery models that require catch information, catch and an index of abundance, or catch combined with age structure and indices of abundance were not possible. A range of potential biological reference points was considered for management purposes.  Several approaches for estimating proxies of F_MSY suggested that fishing mortality values corresponding to 30 and 40% spawning potential of the unfished population ( F_30% and F_40%) are suitable as limit and target reference points. Management recommendations for data poor situations and research recommendations for improving data collection are proposed.