Date of Award

Summer 8-2015

Degree Type

Masters Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Coastal Sciences, Gulf Coast Research Laboratory

Committee Chair

Chester F. Rakocinski

Committee Chair Department

Coastal Sciences, Gulf Coast Research Laboratory

Committee Member 2

Richard S. Fulford

Committee Member 2 Department

Coastal Sciences, Gulf Coast Research Laboratory

Committee Member 3

Gary Walter Ingram, Jr.

Committee Member 3 Department

Coastal Sciences, Gulf Coast Research Laboratory

Abstract

Bycatch in the shrimp fishery became of particular concern in the 1980s during the peak of shrimp harvest in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Shrimp bycatch is of major importance because the majority of catch in the fishery is not intended target species of commercial shrimp, and most of the additional bycatch is returned to the sea dead or dying, inducing higher rates of mortality. This study was developed to assess the potential ecosystem effects of shrimp harvest on thirty selected species/species groups commonly encountered within the shrimp fishery as bycatch. Delta-lognormal modeling (DLM) was used to determine the relative abundance of these species over a twenty-three year time period from 1987-2009 using SEAMAP survey data collected by the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Six covariates were used in each submodel during the DLM process and additional type III tests for the effects of shrimp effort were conducted (p

In addition, three of the selected Sciaenids were aged, but only Micropogonias undulatus was able to be used for a comparative analysis to available historic data to determine changes in age and growth from the peak of shrimping in 1985 (Barger) to 2009. There was a statistical difference in age and growth parameters (p

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