Student Subunit Florida Chapter Georgia Chapter Kentucky Chapter Louisiana Chapter Mississippi Chapter Mississippi State Univ. From the 1999 Southern Division of the American Fisheries Society Midyear Meeting held in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The location, characterization, and protection of critical spawning habitat, nursery grounds, and summer refugia for striped bass in coastal river ecosystems are essential to the recovery and management of this anadromous species. Investigations into potential spawning and thermal refuge habitat have been ongoing in the Pascagoula River and its tributaries. Adult bass have been previously captured in Black Creek, a tributary of the Pascagoula River located in Southeast Mississippi.
Few data are available on the status of striped bass populations in Black Creek.
We present spatial and temporal relationships of the fishes collected to physicochemical variables along the stream continuum. We conclude that there is available habitat in Black Creek that may provide potential spawning sites and seasonal refugia for striped bass, yet the numbers of striped bass using this tributary appear to be low.