Effects of Juvenile and Adult Mortality on the Recovery Efforts of Striped Bass in the Neuse River

Striped bass Morone saxatilis historically supported important commercial and recreational fisheries within the Neuse River system in North Carolina, however, post 1960s abundance greatly declined due to  factors including high harvest and habitat degradation.  In response, effort has been made to recover the population including the implementation of strict harvest limits, dam removal and stocking.  However, the population has experienced no substantive increase in abundance or size distribution, nor is there evidence of natural recruitment.  Information on mortality at different life stages is an important component of determining mechanisms underlying this lack of recovery.  We used telemetry techniques paired with external high reward tags to track striped bass at different life stages, and we used a multistate capture-recapture model to estimate mortality rates of stocked juveniles (natural) and adults (natural, hook-and-release and harvest).  We then estimated population abundance and conducted a life-stage simulation analysis to identify mortality rates with the greatest influence on population abundance.  We found total discrete annual mortality = 0.87 +/- 0.05 and =0.261 +/- 0.082 for juveniles and adults respectively.  Additionally we found adult natural mortality to have the greatest influence on population abundance of the system.