GC scientists’ red snapper study

OCEAN SPRINGS, Miss. - A team of university and government scientists, selected by an expert review panel convened by the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium, will conduct an independent study to estimate the number of red snapper in the Gulf of Mexico. The research team, made up of 21 scientists from 12 institutions of higher learning, a state agency and a federal agency, was awarded $9.5M in federal funds for the project through a competitive research grant process. With matching funds from the universities, the project will total $12M. Greg Stunz is the project leader and a professor at the Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. Some of the other team members include Sean P. Powers, University of South Alabama’s Dauphin Island Sea Lab; James Cowan of LSU; Marcus Drymon of Mississippi State University; Brett Falterman, Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries; Robert Leaf and Eric Saillant of the University of Southern Mississippi. The team will determine abundance and distribution of red snapper on artificial, natural and unknown bottom habitat across the northern Gulf of Mexico. Recreational anglers and commercial fishers will be invited to play key roles in collecting data by tagging fish, reporting tags and working directly with scientists onboard their vessels. (Source: Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium 11/17/17)