NEWS RELEASE

Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

June 7, 2000

CONTACT: David Yeager (850) 957-6175

STRIPERS MAKE A COMEBACK

Like the water, the causes were a little murky but fisheries biologists noted in the 1970s that striped bass had vanished from the Blackwater, Yellow and Escambia rivers. Thanks to a successful restocking program, lots of striped bass, including some that measure four-feet in length, are once again cruising the depths of the westernmost rivers in the panhandle.

Fisheries biologist Dave Yeager of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) said this spring that Milton angler Dale McCreless landed a 31.8-pound striper from the Blackwater, the largest striper apparently caught from the river by an angler in decades. Just a year ago an Escambia County fisherman brought in a 34-pounder from the Escambia River.

Yeager said fish surveys show big stripers are in the Yellow River as well.

He said the stripers' reappearance began with a successful stocking effort of small fish in the Blackwater in 1987. In 1990 he said they began releasing fish in the Yellow River and have released some fish almost every year since then.

Yeager, who has spent his career studying and working with striped bass under the old Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission and now the FWC, said the big 30-pound(+) stripers being caught are at least 10 years old, and perhaps even some of the original fish released in 1987.

Although striped bass reduce their movement and activity as water temperatures climb, they still can be caught late in the afternoon, at night and around daylight by anglers who have figured out their habits. Yeager said the best baits are live finger mullet, menhaden or shad fished near the surface, or plugs that mimic these food sources.

Striped bass have grown to more than 70-pounds in Lake Seminole but fisheries biologists are unsure how large they'll grow in western panhandle waters.