Southeast Region Headboat Survey-Catch Records

The Southeast Region Headboat Survey (SRHS), administered by National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) Southeast Fisheries Science Center (SEFSC) personnel based at the Beaufort, NC NOAA Laboratory, has operated along the southeast U.S. Atlantic coast since 1972 and along the U.S. Gulf of Mexico coast since 1986. The survey is the longest continuous time series of recreational fisheries data from federal waters on the U.S. east coast, and second longest on the U.S. Gulf of Mexico coast (behind the NMFS Marine Recreational Fisheries Statistics Survey / Marine Recreational Information Program, initiated along the Gulf Coast in 1981). The Headboat Survey provides many products to fishery managers through its data collection programs. Annual landings estimates, by species, area and month are provided for all species encountered in the survey. These fishery dependent estimates were used by stock assessment scientists in all SEDARs in both the south Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico in all stock assessments both before and after the SEDAR process began.The logbook data is used to derive a long-term fishery dependent index of abundance used by stock assessment scientists in assessing long-term health of the populations.