A good understanding of stock recruitment is essential for accurate stock assessment and good fisheries management. But recruitment and how it is used can be difficult to understand. This publication uses a recent Florida spotted seatrout stock assessment as an example to show how the stock-recruit relationship allows managers to determine whether or not a given fish population is overfished.

The Gulf of Mexico red snapper fishery has been caught in a spiral of more restrictive regulations and disputed management. Current management measures have failed to reduce fishing mortality, owing in part to derby style fishing. A harvest tag system could potentially better limit fishing mortality without decreasing harvest seasons. In 2019/20 we surveyed 766 recreational anglers who fish in Florida with private boats to ascertain their preferences for regulation changes, and how they would alter their fishing effort if a harvest tag was implemented. Respondents were heterogeneous in terms of their preferences for harvest tags versus current management approaches, with most respondents preferring to maintain their current effort under the existing management approach of bag, size, and season limits. Respondents who preferred harvest tags indicated that they might increase or decrease fishing effort. Our findings suggest that more stringent regulations using current management approaches will not secure angler satisfaction or reduce fishing pressure on the red snapper stock. Harvest tags, though not preferred by all respondents, may allow regulators to better manage the number of anglers in the fishery and to rebuild the stock, although implementing this program will pose some challenges.

Objective: Competition over resource access can drive conflict between commercial fishers and recreational anglers, especially when fish stocks are declining. This study presents a spatially explicit integrative assessment of Northern Pike Esox lucius fisheries across five major brackish lagoons around Rügen Island (Germany) in the southern Baltic Sea, combining social and ecological indicators of status and trends. Methods: We combined an extensive mark–recapture-based approach with catch-curve analysis to estimate spatially differentiated, user-group-specific fishing mortality rates, as well as natural mortality rates acting on the coastal pike across five lagoons. Using surveys, we assessed the preferences of fishers and anglers for different lagoons as a measure of their social desirability. Additionally, we examined long-term commercial landings as a coarse indicator of stock trends. Finally, we formed a composite index combining spatially explicit social–ecological use and status indicators to provide an integrative perspective. Results: Current fishing pressure on pike as assessed by captures was similar for anglers and commercial fishers, with an annual potential instantaneous fishing mortality rate F of 0.10 (∼9.5% per year) for each sector. However, when considering only retained fish due to widespread catch-and-release practices by anglers, commercial fishers removed approximately twice as many pike as anglers did during the study period (2020–2022). Spatial analyses revealed pronounced differences in fishing and natural mortality rates among lagoons, while the long-term trend in commercial landings suggested a declining pike population. Integration of the various indicators revealed that the largest lagoon in the study area, the Greifswalder Bodden, exhibited the largest number of threats. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that a combination of lagoon-specific management measures tailored to either commercial or recreational fisheries, embedded in an ecosystem-based management approach, may be necessary to recover the pike fishery, which is currently showing strong stock declines. Implementing such measures can reduce conflicts between user groups, protect and recover pike stocks, and ensure sustainable benefits for both commercial and recreational fisheries.