SEDAR 75-WP-01: Gray Snapper Abundance Indices from Inshore Surveys of Northeastern Gulf of Mexico estuaries (1996-2020)

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Fish and Wildlife Research Institute (FWRI), has conducted estuarine surveys since 1989 (seasonally) and since 1996 (monthly) in estuarine systems along the northern Gulf of Mexico. In SEDAR 51, monthly fisheries independent collections of Age 0 (<= 100 mm SL, 1998-2015) and Age 1 (101-250 mm SL, 1996-2015) Gray Snapper (Lutjanus griseus) were used to develop abundance indices that were included in the final stock assessment (SEDAR 2018). Appropriate estuarine systems and gears, as determined by abundance of defined size classes, were combined for each index by using a weighting factor that accounts for differences between the proportion of available area and the proportion of sets completed within each sampling universe. The analyses presented here use the same analytical methods employed in the previous working paper for SEDAR 51 (FlahertyWalia et al. 2017).

Flaherty-Walia, Kerry E., Amanda J. Tyler-Jedlund, and Theodore S. Switzer. 2022. Gray Snapper Abundance Indices from Inshore Surveys of Northeastern Gulf of Mexico estuaries (1996-2020). SEDAR75-DW-01. SEDAR, North Charleston, SC. 14 pp