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Reproduction <br />Males may be sexually mature in 1 year; females in 3 years (Morgan and <br />Gerlach 1950; Lewis 1962; Ware 1971). More commonly, however, males are <br />sexually mature as 2-year-olds (Raney 1954; Mansueti 1956; Tagatz 1961; <br />Mansueti and Hollis 1963; Ware 1971; Kohlenstein 1981) and females as 4- to <br />6-year olds (Scofield 1931; Uladykov and Wallace 1938; Merriman 1941; Jackson <br />and Tiller 1952; Lewis 1962). The annual production of eggs increases with <br />age and size of the female, ranging from about 65,000 as a 4-year-old to <br />4,500,000 as a 13-year-old (Jackson and Tiller 1952). <br />Streams suitable as striped bass reproductive habitat generally have a <br />large volume of swift, turbulent water flowing over a substrate of rock and/or <br />fine gravel (Pearson 1938; Raney 1952; Fish and McCoy 1959; Fish 1960; Mansueti <br />and Hollis 1963; Kornegay and Humphries 1976; Combs 1979). The distance of <br />the spawning site upstream from the river mouth varies by location and from <br />year to year within the same river system. Spawning .occurs 171.1 km (106 mi) <br />upstream from the mouth of the Apalachicola River, Florida, (Crateau et al. <br />1980); 80 to 100 km (50 to 60 mi) above Santee-Cooper Reservoir, South Carolina <br />(Scruggs 1957); 48 to 64 km (30 to 40 mi) above the headwaters of Kerr <br />Reservoir, Virginia (Neal 1976); and 70 to 150 km (43 to 93 mi) above Keystone <br />Reservoir, Oklahoma (Combs 1979). Persons and Bulkley (1982) reported that <br />striped bass spawned in or near the mixing zone of Lake Powell, Utah, and the <br />Colorado River. Gustaveson (1984) provided evidence of in-reservoir spawning <br />by striped bass in Lake Powell. <br />Spawning is apparently cued to a rise in temperature in late winter or <br />early spring (Hardy 1978) and also may be cued to the photoperiod (Crance <br />1985). Spawning begins as early as mid-February or early March in Florida <br />(Barkuloo 1961, 1970) and may last until early July (Raney 1954) in some <br />locations, depending on latitude and other factors. Dudley and Black (1978) <br />reported three spawning peaks during a season. <br />The low and high temperatures at which spawning occurred in the Roanoke <br />River, North Carolina, during a 5-year period were 12.8° C {55° F) and 21.7° C <br />(71° F), respectively {Shannon and Smith 1968). The optimal spawning tempera- <br />tures were about 16.7 to 19.4° C (62 to 67° F). These ranges approximate <br />temperature data associated with striped bass spawning reported by Calhoun <br />et al. (1950), Farley (1966), and Talbot (1966). <br />Eggs are deposited near the water surface (Merriman 1941; Raney 1952). <br />The incubation period is about 34 hours at 21° C (70° F) (Shannon and Smith <br />1968), 51.8 hours and 62 hours at 18° C (64.4° F) and 15.0° C (59.0° F), <br />respectively (Rogers et al. 1977), and about 70 to 74 hours at 14.4 to 15.6° C <br />(58 to 60° F) (Surber 1958) . <br />General-Habitat Requirements <br />Self renewing inland stocks of striped bass generally require two major <br />types of habitat: (1) riverine habitat for reproduction; and (2) lacustrine <br />or estuarine habitat for foraging, growth, and development by the larvae, <br />juveniles, and adults. <br />6 <br />