NORTH AMERICAN BLACK BASS COALITION
Across North America, anglers who target black bass account for a greater percentage of the angling-generated revenue than any other species or species group - approximately $100 billion per year. Bass anglers are a highly organized group as well, with many local and regional bass clubs and tournament circuits that range from local to international in scale. Within fisheries management agencies, more effort is allocated for bass management activities than any other group.
However, even with all of this attention, controversies abound (e.g., culture vs. wild fish, impacts of tournaments, angling for spawning bass, closed seasons and sanctuaries, need for stocking, habitat loss, user group conflicts, animal rights pressures), and sometimes anglers, managers, scientists, and the fishing industry find themselves on opposite sides of a position. As a consequence, there is a tremendous need for education and information sharing among the various stakeholders.
CAMPAIGN PURPOSE
The goal of the North American Black Bass Coalition (NABBC) is to assemble representatives from the scientific, angling, management and business communities to work collaboratively toward overcoming challenges and threats to sustainable bass angling.
CAMPAIGN ACTIVITIES
Stakeholder Workshops: On December 8, 2009, at the Midwest Fish and Wildlife Conference in Springfield, IL, members of the North American Black Bass Coalition organized a symposium entitled "Population Regulation in Black Bass."
The symposium provided a forum for the sharing of current research findings examining forces that dictate the abundance and distribution of black bass. The topics of the different presentations included parental care variation in bass, impacts of angling on bass populations, bass population characteristics in large lakes, and habitat management for bass recruitment.
The speakers included David Philipp (University of Illinois), Mike Allen (University of Florida), Geoff Steinhart (Lake Superior State University), David Sutter (Humboldt University, Berlin), Mike Siepker (Missouri Department of Conservation), Jim Breck (Michigan DNR), Cory Suski (University of Illinois) and Sandy Clark-Kolaks (Indiana DNR).
Best Handling Practices: The NABBC will coordinate the production of a scientifically sound set of best handling practices and develop a strategy for disseminating that information to anglers and biologists alike through multiple pathways (media, internet, governmental agencies, extension offices, etc.).
Education and Outreach: This campaign is in the process of sponsoring a task force that will identify ways in which the NABBC could help existing management activities protect and enhance bass habitat, as well as develop education and outreach programs that increase public awareness regarding activities with the potential of negatively impacting bass habitat or creating user conflicts between stakeholders.
Recruitment: In March 2009, members of the NABBC recruitment task force convened to begin discussions of what we really know about bass and their reproductive ecology and recruitment dynamics. The goal of this program is to build a conceptual model that could explore when angling for nesting bass could have negative impacts, as well as when it may have no effect.
PAST ACTIVITIES
AUGUST 2008 WORKSHOP Click here for summary
CONTACT INFORMATION
You can contact the NABBC campaign leadership by sending an email to:
nabbc at fishconserve.org