Triple tail limit coming

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by biggun

Guys I found this article from 2009..

Researchers Jim Franks and Read Hendon in the University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Coast Research Lab's Center for Fisheries Research and Development have made new findings about tripletail as part of ongoing biological studies of this unique species.
They include:

-- The species occurs seasonally in northern Gulf waters.
-- They can be found in offshore, marine waters or in brackish, estuarine waters throughout the summer.
-- They appear to use estuarine waters as feeding grounds.

From a Franks study of fish in Mississippi waters of the Mississippi Sound, they discovered:
-- They spawn from June through August with a peak in July in Mississippi waters.
-- It is assumed they migrate offshore to spawn. No females collected within the Mississippi Sound during the study were in imminent spawning condition, which means they would spawn within the next 24 hours from the time observed.
-- 50 percent of all female tripletail collected were sexually mature at 17cm HALF inches total length.

-- 100 percent of females were sexually mature at 19cm TQTR inches total length.


-- It has been difficult to adequately age tripletail due to difficulties in "reading" annular rings on otoliths (ear bones) — the standard measure by which all fish with such bones are aged.



My question is what percentage of fish caught ARE females?

I have NO PROBLEM with a 5 fish limit..

But I would like to see say; (5 over 12") to start then go from there..

Or why not a slot limit???

So according to this study........a female triple tale is sexually mature at 19cm which is about 8 inch long. Not the 18" length that has been used in other post.

OR......if you look closer at what is said above.....it actually says, INCHES.

[AceArcher]

yeah that's a bit confusing...

is it 19 cm? or is it 17 inches...

but good find

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by biggun

Guys I found this article from 2009..

Researchers Jim Franks and Read Hendon in the University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Coast Research Lab's Center for Fisheries Research and Development have made new findings about tripletail as part of ongoing biological studies of this unique species.
They include:

-- The species occurs seasonally in northern Gulf waters.
-- They can be found in offshore, marine waters or in brackish, estuarine waters throughout the summer.
-- They appear to use estuarine waters as feeding grounds.

From a Franks study of fish in Mississippi waters of the Mississippi Sound, they discovered:
-- They spawn from June through August with a peak in July in Mississippi waters.
-- It is assumed they migrate offshore to spawn. No females collected within the Mississippi Sound during the study were in imminent spawning condition, which means they would spawn within the next 24 hours from the time observed.
-- 50 percent of all female tripletail collected were sexually mature at 17cm HALF inches total length.

-- 100 percent of females were sexually mature at 19cm TQTR inches total length.


-- It has been difficult to adequately age tripletail due to difficulties in "reading" annular rings on otoliths (ear bones) — the standard measure by which all fish with such bones are aged.



My question is what percentage of fish caught ARE females?

I have NO PROBLEM with a 5 fish limit..

But I would like to see say; (5 over 12") to start then go from there..

Or why not a slot limit???

All I could find on this lead was:

http://www.al.com/outdoors/mobilereg...130.xml&coll=3

Unfortunately, a news article is not a citable source for sound scientific information, and the uncertainty in the length units for sexual maturity is a key issue.

I've searched both authors CVs and lists of publications. Unfortunately, there are no scientific publications listed that contain the same information as the new web site. Scholarly search engines also come up empty. Read Hendon is listed as completing his PhD this year. Maybe it is in his thesis.

[biggun]

It was an article using Dr. Franks findings???

Another GOOD question I'd like to know before I'd be in favor of a 18" size limit is the following:

What percentage of trips ARE FEMALE VS MALE???

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by Duck Butter

MG:
This is junk science. First of all, there is no description of the study design, sample sizes, or actual data. There is just a comparison of recapture rates with "other game fish." Which "other game fish?" Were there comparable delays and comparable recapture efforts with the TT and the "other game fish?"

DB:
You are going to have to get a link to these studies and that will answer your questions, I am sorry you were not in the loop of the peer review process, but neither were 99.9% of fishermen

MG:
Furthermore, a relatively high recapture rate does not necessarily imply vulnerability to over fishing. It simply means that the specimens that are captured once are more likely to be captured again. This does not indicate that the entire population is subject to likely capture in the first place. There may be large parts of the population that are not subject to easy capture (due to habitat or feeding preferences).

DB:
All speculation, you are going to have to speak with the publisher of the paper(s). He/she will probably tell you everything you want to hear. A high capture rate (ease of capture) is exactly what is raising concern.

I've been working hard tracking down this purported tag study, finally contacting the scientists themselves that were mentioned by name in a newspaper article on tripletail tagging.

There are no published papers by these authors (or any other authors) in the scholarly literature on the tagging of tripletail in the last decade.

The data, methodology, results, and interpretation remain unpublished and unavailable for peer-review or open discussion. All we have is the hearsay report of a 2.5 the recapture rate of tagged tripletail compared with other game species.

The LWF Commission should not be implementing much more restrictive tripletail harvest regulations until the science is better understood, including publication and open review and discussion of purported data and scientific results that are cited in support of more restrictive regulations.

[Montauk17]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

I've been working hard tracking down this purported tag study, finally contacting the scientists themselves that were mentioned by name in a newspaper article on tripletail tagging.

There are no published papers by these authors (or any other authors) in the scholarly literature on the tagging of tripletail in the last decade.

The data, methodology, results, and interpretation remain unpublished and unavailable for peer-review or open discussion. All we have is the hearsay report of a 2.5 the recapture rate of tagged tripletail compared with other game species.

The LWF Commission should not be implementing much more restrictive tripletail harvest regulations until the science is better understood, including publication and open review and discussion of purported data and scientific results that are cited in support of more restrictive regulations.

Seems like that is the way of the world these days....just like they promised a transparent government yet we have the exact opposite.

[boatdriver]

I'll chime in with one post and that's it. On the day when myself and two other buddies caught 94 in one day, I can honestly say that we MIGHT have caught 2% of tripletail tha we actually saw. The rip we were fishing was literally miles long. We only went 1.3 miles along the rip to catch what we caught. On the second day, my boat caught 51. Of the three boats, there were 101 fish caught. On the second day, the rip had dipersed, so the fish were scattered and skittish. Those 2 days were unreal. To say it'll happen again, who knows? Everything was perfect, NO wind, awesome rip, perfect water, and mainly, fish cooperation. To say we need a limit, I think not. As stated before, there are not enough anglers that target them enough to have a limit, in my opinion. When I fished the lake everday, I looked for them every single day after May, and some days I caught 2-4, and a whole lot of days I caught 0000000.