Striper Spawning Success is still a Disaster.
The 2025 numbers are in for both the Chesapeake Bay and the Hudson River. More bad news. The last decent year class in the Bay was back 7 years ago in 2018. Crazy. This year as a crack better than last coming in at a YOY of 4, still far below the long term average of 11.
This flies in the face of the fact that the spawning stock biomass is actually healthy! What the hell is going on here? Meanwhile the Hudson River reported a good run of spawning striper. Yet the resulting juvenile bass did not mature properly. In fact, the overall spawning success in both locations has been called “abysmal”.
We are in a very dangerous situation, similar to the one we saw back in the end of the 1970s. Worse yet, no one has been able to firmly put their finger on the cause of the present spawning failure. Possible problems put forward include the lack of menhaden and the ever increasing rise in water temperature. The lack of menhaden is something the ASFMC could tackle although, they have often failed to bring the commercial fishery under control. Pray they find the balls to do it! On the other hand, if rising water temperatures are the problem, there is zero easy answer.
If you love striped bass, like I do, you need to be deeply concerned.
