
%0 Journal Article
%A Ennis, G. P. 
%A Fogarty, M. J. 
%T Recruitment overfishing reference point for the American lobster, <emph type="2">Homarus americanus</emph>
%J Marine and Freshwater Research
%D 1998/03/23
%V 48
%N 8
%P 1029-1034
%K 
%R https://doi.org/10.1071/MF97201
%U https://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/MF97201 
%X A 21-year series of annual estimates of egg production and recruitment in a Newfoundland lobster population indicates similar asymptotic relationships for recruitment to the fishery and to the adult population, both derived from legal stock estimates. Lines with slopes equal to the 90th-percentile and median survival ratios drawn through the origin of the egg production&#8211;adult recruitment scatterplot were examined as potential recruitment overfishing reference points for the Arnold&#8217;s Cove lobster stock. If the inverse of the estimated lifetime egg production per recruit (E/R) for a given exploitation rate exceeds the slope of the selected reference point, the risk of recruitment overfishing is high. For the Arnold&#8217;s Cove stock, the E/R level at a nominal 90% exploitation rate is estimated at 4.2% of the unfished population, compared with 2.5% for the overfishing reference point corresponding to the median survival ratio. Female lobsters at Arnold&#8217;s Cove mature at sizes below the minimum legal size, providing a buffer against high exploitation rates. Small, scattered refugia of large lobsters could also help to explain how heavily exploited populations of this species persist at such a low level of egg production. 
