Keeping tabs on one of the Chesapeake?s most valuable resources is no small feat.
A team of Department of Natural Resources biologists chartered a boat Wednesday morning on the Upper Bay Chesapeake to take samples of the spawning stock. It?s become part of a daily routine for the scientists, who make it out almost every morning during striped bass spawning season, which lasts from April to about mid-May, biologists said.
Biologists said preliminary research indicates this season?s spawning stock is healthy.
With wake-up calls as early 3:30 a.m. and some days spent waiting for fish that sometimes never come, the survey process isn?t a quick one.
“People don?t know how much work goes into it,” Beth Versak, a DNR biologist said Wednesday morning, squinting into the sunlight.
Versak and two other DNR biologists, plus a ship captain and a mate huddled onto the El-Sher-Don Wednesday morning, equipped with drift gill nets, scalpels, rulers and clip boards. The winds ripped and the scientists fretted that the clear conditions of the water might be an ominous sign for the day ahead.
When the water is clear, striped bass can see the drift gill nets and tend to stay away, said Lisa Warner, a DNR biologist on the survey.
Biologists spent about four hours on the water casting out nets, reeling in striped bass, and measuring the fish. They also scraped off a part of the scale to get data about the bass?s age and placed a small tag in its mouth to track it.
The tagging process doesn?t hurt the fish, according to biologists.
“It?s just like getting a piercing,” said Warner, as she marked down measurements with a pencil.
After the striped bass are measured and tagged, they are released back into the Chesapeake Bay.
Some days scientists only catch a few striped bass, but on others they can catch as many as 200 fish, Warner said.
Versak said all the effort is well worth it.
“Striped bass is one of the most important species in the bay,” she said, “All of us that work [at the DNR], we care about the bay and we care about the resources.”
