Louisiana leads Gulf Coast in speckled trout harvest

Louisiana should get a gold star for its speckled trout management, which has resulted in excellent stock and excellent harvest numbers for anglers, according to a recent stock assessment.
“There are a variety of reasons the speckled trout (also known as spotted seatrout) harvest in Louisiana outpaces neighboring Gulf states,” said Jason Adriance, Finfish Program Manager for the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. “One reason is our incredibly productive habitat combined with liberal harvest limits.”
“Currently the Louisiana spotted seatrout stock is not overfished nor is it undergoing overfishing. That is typically considered healthy. The current status of the stock indicates that spotted seatrout harvest can continue at current size and bag limits. Having said that, LDWF continues to monitor the stock through our regular sampling programs.”
The fantastic fish news was presented to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Commission earlier this fall, and compared to all other Gulf Coast states -- Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida -- Louisiana leads the way in speckled trout harvest.
In 2013, Louisiana harvested 9 million pounds of speckled trout, which is almost twice what all four other states harvested combined. Florida was second in the speck sprint with a little over 2 million pounds harvested last year.
Since 1981, the LDWF has continuously collected stock data, and a stock assessment, when conducted, is rendered using the most recent year of complete and quality-checked data. The assessments involve looking at fisheries-dependent information garnered from interviewing anglers at docks and weighing their catch and fisheries-independent data collected by biologists using nets, trawls and seines.
“It takes from several months to over a year of hard work by stock assessment specialists to develop a new assessment,”Adriance added.
Adriance noted that while Louisiana has fewer saltwater anglers than Texas and Florida, anglers in all the other Gulf Coast states are only allowed to keep the equivalent of a fifth of a Louisiana bag limit sometimes and at much higher minimum size limits. 
“Both of those (bag limits and higher minimum size limits) have the effect of lowering the amount of fish brought home by anglers,” he said. “LDWF manages the speckled trout fishery for maximum sustainable yield, allowing anglers the largest amount of harvest while maintaining sustainability, while other states sometimes manage for larger fish, and to allow more adult fish to remain in the water.”
“Our assessment demonstrates that the current regulations are not impacting the ability of the Louisiana stock to maintain itself, but other states may have other goals for their stocks, and those do have an effect on the number of fish removed. It’s difficult to say just how much of the overall difference (in harvest numbers) is due to different management strategies, and how much is due to differences in the amount of available habitat.”
According to Adriance, Louisiana’s large amount of estuarine habitat, greater than other Gulf states, provides for the state’s highly productive spotted seatrout stock. If the habitat degrades or declines, trout populations would likely be impacted. 
Recreational anglers were surveyed statewide at public boat ramps and launches. 
“Before 2014, we obtained harvest data from a creel survey that had a statewide design, where the dockside surveys were conducted by Department personnel, but the survey design did not allow us to obtain estimates of harvest below the state-wide level,” Adriance said.
This year the department began the LA Creel recreational harvest survey program, and the program uses a different survey design for the dockside recreational angler interviews. The new design will allow for basin specific population estimates, but those numbers are still a ways away.
“It is likely several years down the road before we may able to conduct basin specific estimates as the LA Creel program is relatively new, and it will take time for us to accumulate enough years of information to be able to use both the new and the older creel survey designs in a single assessment,” Adriance said.  
Regionally, recreational angler surveys were conducted at the Vermilion Bay and Calcasieu Lake areas as well as other locations in the state as part of both the national program (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Marine Recreational Information Program) and the new LA Creel program. 
“One of the difficulties of using the national program, though was that so few samples were taken in the western portions of the state that it was very difficult to determine any specific trends or differences because of the low number of samples,” Adriance said. 
Fisheries-independent data for the assessment was collected by biologists using nets, trawls and seines, and the 2014 assessment was based on a single stock assessment for the statewide spotted seatrout population.
The assessment findings come as no surprise to saltwater angler and charter boat Captain Steve Smith of Lafayette.
“Speckled trout fishing in Vermilion Bay has been solid,” Smith said. “Calcasieu Lake has been a little slower the last few years. So far 2014 is a normal year, but three or four years ago, we had a really exceptional year on Vermilion Bay.”
“I fish about 125 days a year. The bite is steady and the size of fish is getting bigger. Fish are migrating back in from Gulf. We have a very stable population.”
Smith fishes from Delacroix to Sabine Lake, and he has dropped his line for speckled trout for 17 years, 10 of those professionally.
“At this time of year Vermilion Bay is one of the top two or three spots in the state for quality,” he said. “There are large fish in Vermilion Bay during the winter. Quantity is better to the west and east towards Houma and Cocodrie.”
The angler noted that adapting to where the fish are located is the best way to take advantage of the teeming trout population.
“Fish don’t necessarily stay in the same area, and recreational anglers suffer that way,” Smith said. “People fish the same spots where the fish were one day, but the fish could be in a different part of the bay another day.”
“Sometimes they are hard to find, but they are easy to catch. They are prolific and love to eat, but you have to find them. That’s the challenge.”
Smith said he is surveyed weekly or every two weeks by LDWF, and he lets them know how many fish were caught on his trips, where he fished on each trip and where he put his boat in the water.
“I think the state is doing a fine job managing the speckled trout population,” Smith said. “The limits are fair for anglers, and from the data I’ve seen, the population is healthy.”
“I think even with technology like GPS and the ability to see structures under water, anglers are not causing diminished reserves. There are not enough recreational anglers to damage the species.”