Components of Mortality within a Black Bass High-Release Recreational Fishery

Mortality after release can have a substantial impact on high-release recreational sport fishes, such as Largemouth Bass Micropterus salmoides. However, little work has explored the cumulative impact of catch-and-release mortality at the population level. We used a combined telemetry-tag return approach to estimate all components of total mortality, including instantaneous natural mortality ( M) and instantaneous fishing mortality ( F), for Florida Largemouth Bass M. salmoides floridanus ( hereafter, Florida Bass) within a popular fishing lake in northern Florida. Fishing mortality was subdivided into harvest ( F-H), recreational catch-and-release ( F-R), and tournament catch-and-release ( F-T) components. Over 2 years, we monitored the fates of 181 Florida Bass that were tagged with high-reward external dart tags and internal radio transmitters. An additional 345 fish were tagged with variable-reward external tags. Annual F-H values were seasonal, with an increase in F-H occurring in the spring of both years; F-H ranged from 0.17 ( SD = 0.04) in the first year to 0.60 ( SD = 0.09) in the second year. Estimated mean F-T ranged from 0.04 to 0.07, and mean F-R ranged from 0.03 to 0.05. Estimates of M were also seasonal, with annual M ranging from 0.29 ( SD = 0.06) to 0.46 ( SD = 0.09), and were within the expected range relative to other published estimates. Our results showed that although the total catch-and-release mortality ( F-R plus F-T) was low in comparison with the high rates of harvest ( F-H) for this Florida Bass fishery, it still made up 21% of total F. Our method combining passive tagging and telemetry tagging allowed for the estimation of all mortality sources, which can be important for high-release recreational fisheries in which harvest is not the only source of mortality.