Small Stripers Hold Our Future
When you catch a small striper, you hold our angling future in your hands. The chart below tells you why. It shows striped bass reproductive success in Maryland, the principal spawning grounds. As you can see 2019, 2020 and 2021 were very poor years. So right now the only halfway decent year class is the one born back in 2015.
If there is any good news the 2015 year class is bigger than the 1982 year class, the one we saved under amendment 3 and lead to the boom years in the early 1990s. If we can protect the 2015 class there is hope.