Species

The following table summarizes the changes in recreational and commercial landings of the selected species on the left in the years from 1993 to 2003. Clicking on the name will take you to two charts, one displaying the commercial and recreational landings and their linear trend lines, the other displaying the change in the proportion of recreational landings to total landings in the particular fishery.

	Species	Rec. Share of Fishery	Dominant landings 1993-2003	Dominant Landings 2003	Trend/Commercial	Trend/Recreational
1	Amberjack	Increase	Split	Recreational	Down	Down
2	Atlantic Mackerel	Decrease	Commercial	Commercial	Up	Level
3	Black Drum	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Up	Up
4	Black Seabass	Decrease	Recreational	Recreational	Up	Down
5	Bluefish	Decrease	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Down
6	Cobia	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Up
7	Cod	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Down	Up
8	Croaker	Decrease	Commercial	Commercial	Up	Up
9	Dogfish	-	-	-	Down	-
10	Dolphinfish	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Down
11	King Mackerel	Decrease	Recreational	Recreational	Level	Down
12	Menhaden	-	-	-	Down	-
13	Monkfish	-	-	-	Down	-
14	Pompano	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Up
15	Pollock (Atlantic)	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Level	Up
16	Red Drum	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Up
17	Red Grouper	Decrease	Commercial	Commercial	Up	Down
18	Red Snapper	Decrease	Commercial	Commercial	Up	Up
19	Scup	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Down	Up
20	Spot	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Down	Down
21	Spotted Sea Trout	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Up
22	Striped Bass	Decrease	Recreational	Recreational	Up	Up
23	Striped Mullet	-	-	-	Down	-
24	Summer Flounder	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Down	Up
25	Swordfish	?	Commercial	Commercial	Down	Up
26	Tautog	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Down
27	Wahoo	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Up
28	Weakfish	Increase	Commercial	Commercial	Down	Up
29	Winter Flounder	Decrease	Commercial	Commercial	Up	Down
30	Yellowfin Tuna	Increase	Recreational	Recreational	Down	Up

Amberjack - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 2,307,858 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 2,390,742 pounds per year. While both recreational and commercial landings are trending downward, commercial landings are trending downward more steeply. The recreational share is increasing.

Atlantic Mackerel � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 29,487,600 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 2,746,695 pounds per year. Commercial landings have been trending upwards and recreational landings have been level. The recreational share is decreasing.

Black Drum � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 5,535,219 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 4,450,790 pounds per year. Recreational and commercial landings have both been trending upwards, but recreational landings have been doing so at a much greater rate. The recreational share is increasing. (Texas recreational landings, which are probably substantial, are not included. From the TPWD website "the black drum, a mainstay in the commercial fishery, has never been fully accepted as game fish by sport anglers. Annual harvest of black drum along the Texas coast is usually more than 1.3 million pounds by the commercial fishery and approximately three quarters of a million pounds by the sport fishery.")

Black sea bass - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 3,646,188 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 4,498,419 pounds per year. Commercial landings have been increasing and recreational landings have been decreasing during the time series. The recreational share is decreasing.

Bluefish - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 8,577,415 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 13,613,920 pounds per year. Both commercial and recreational landings are trending downward, with recreational landings trending downward slightly more steeply. The recreational share is decreasing.

Cobia � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 321,971 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 2,006,760 pounds per year. Recreational landings are trending upwards while commercial landings are trending downwards. The recreational share is increasing.(Texas recreational landings, which are probably substantial, are not included.)

Cod � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 23,599,993 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 5,405,002 pounds per year. Commercial landings have trended sharply downwards and recreational landings have been level. The recreational share is increasing.

Croaker - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 22,329,138 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 7,581,765 pounds per year. Recreational and commercial landings are both trending upwards, with commercial landings trending upwards more steeply. The recreational share is decreasing.

Dolphinfish (mahi mahi) - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 1,339,662 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 14,544,118 pounds per year. Both recreational and commercial landings are trending downward at the same rate. The recreational share is increasing. (Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

King Mackerel - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 5,249,463 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 8,702,030 pounds per year. Commercial landings trend line is flat and recreational landings are trending downward. (Note that the commercial landings are for king and cero mackerel combined). The recreational share is decreasing. (Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

Pompano � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 573,197 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 545,419 pounds per year. However, commercial landings in 2003 were at the lowest point in the time series (401,201 pounds) and recreational landings were at the highest (1,013,959 pounds). Commercial landings are trending steeply downward and recreational landings are trending more steeply upward. The recreational share is increasing. (Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

Pollock - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 10,568,781 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 206,095 pounds per year. Commercial landings have been level and recreational landings have trended upwards slightly. The recreational share is increasing.

Red Drum - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 230,343 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 12,486,849 pounds per year. Commercial landings are level at a minimal level and recreational landings are trending upwards. The recreational share is increasing.(Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

Red Grouper - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 6,455,416 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 1,610,290 pounds per year. Commercial landings are trending upwards and recreational landings are trending downwards. The recreational share is decreasing.

Red Snapper - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 4,424,778 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 4,003,935 pounds per year. Commercial and recreational landings are trending upwards, with commercial landings trending upward more steeply. The recreational share is decreasing.(Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

Scup - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 6,760,784 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 3,191,509 pounds per year. In 2003 recreational landings were at their highest level in the time series and commercial landings were at their third highest level. Recreational landings are trending up sharply while commercial landings are declining at about the same rate. The recreational share is increasing.

Spot � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 6,839,050 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 3,009,774 pounds per year. Recreational landings have been trending very slightly downwards while commercial landings have been trending downwards much more steeply. In 2003 recreational landings were at the highest point in the time series and commercial landings were at approximately two thirds of their highest level. The recreational share is increasing.

Spotted Sea Trout - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 1,077,597 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 12,096,467 pounds per year. In the time series recreational landings have been trending sharply upwards and commercial landings, though minimal, have been trending downwards. The recreational share is increasing.(Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

Striped Bass - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 5,318,803 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 14,588,750 pounds per year. Recreational landings in 2003 were the highest in the series (note that these data do not include catch and release mortality, which in the case of striped bass is estimated to equal the total commercial landings). While recreational and commercial landings were both trending upwards, recreational landings were doing so at approximately three times the rate of commercial landings. The recreational share is decreasing. While the recreational share has decreasedsince 1993, over the last twenty years is has increased significantly.

Summer Flounder - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 12,363,451 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 10,376,284 pounds per year. During the time period commercial landings have trended slightly downwards and recreational landings have trended upwards at a more rapid rate (Note that in spite of the fact that recreational landings are supposed to only 40% of the total landings, they exceeded commercial landings in four years.) The recreational share is increasing.

Tautog - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 352,424 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 3,391,003 pounds per year. During the time series both commercial and recreational landings have trended downwards, with recreational landings doing so more steeply. The recreational share is increasing.

Wahoo � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 231,309 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 1,238,703 pounds per year. During the time series recreational landings have trended upwards at approximately three times the rate that commercial landings have trended downwards. The recreational share is increasing.(Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)

Weakfish � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 6,081,166 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 2,590,446 pounds per year. In 2003 both commercial and recreational landings were at their lowest levels in the time series. Recreational landings have been trending upwards and commercial landings have been trending downwards at a more rapid rate.

Winter Flounder � From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 11,406,530 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 1,326,911 pounds per year. Commercial landings are trending sharply upwards and recreational landings are trending downwards less sharply. The recreational share is decreasing.

Yellowfin Tuna - From 1993 to 2003 commercial landings averaged 6,371,982 pounds per year and recreational landings averaged 9,773,710 pounds per year. Commercial landings have been trending downwards at approximately three times the rate that recreational landings have been increasing. The recreational share is increasing. (Texas recreational landings, which are substantial, are not included.)