Red snapper discards in Texas coastal waters : a fishery dependent onboard pilot survey of recreational headboat discards and landings

Prepared for Gulf & South Atlantic Fisheries Foundation, Inc.GASAFFI no. 70-06-21807/11165December, 1999This fishery dependent pilot study determined the quantity and characteristics of red snapper recreational headboat discards and landings from three ports (Galveston, Port Aransas, and Port Isabel) along the Texas coast during the months of August and early September 1999. Mean fishing depth during 42 trips was 23.7 fathoms (range, 7.3 -- 52.2, 11.3 s.d.). Reels sampled were 36.5% of reels in use. A total of 3,863 snapper were sampled during the study period. Snapper <18 inches made up 92.3% of snapper caught, those <15 inches made up 75.5% of the catch. When brought on board, 70.1 % of snapper appeared normal and 26.1 % had their stomach protruding. When discarded, 52.8% of snapper were released alive & swam down, 19.9% swam erratically, 13.2% floated, 1.3% were dead, and 12.9% were kept. Fish released either dead or floating were caught at greater depths than fish which swam down or erratically. Galveston had the largest discard:landing ratio (218:1), smallest mean weight per fish (1.5 pounds), and the smallest mean fish total length (13.2 inches). Port Aransas had the lowest discard: landing ratio (5.2: 1) along with the largest mean weight per fish (2.1 pounds), and mean total length per fish (15.2 inches, 2.5 s.d.).Marine Scienc

Review of red snapper (Lutjanus campechanus) data in Texas

The purpose of this report is to identify and review currently available Texas data on red snapper (Lutjanus campechanus) from federal, state, and other sources. These data are compared to information necessary for stock assessment according to NMFS methodology, and indicate that some of the necessary data are at this time unavailable for Texas. It is hoped that this information will be used to develop scientific research in support of the Texas red snapper stock assessment, working towards the goal of more effective and fair management of the red snapper fishery in Texas waters.March, 2000Marine Scienc

AN ANALYSIS OF NONMETROPOLITAN GROWTH IN MINNESOTA

Community/Rural/Urban Development,

Hypnosis and the Law

Hypnosis and the law have a rather tedious history. Courts all over the country consistently have held inadmissible statements of a defendant, made out of court, while under hypnosis. The rationale is not too difficult to comprehend. Critics of hypnosis as an investigative tool belittle its reliability. They will present cases in which evidence gained through hypnosis turned out to be unreliable. This reluctance to acceptance still may be fostered by antiquated notions. In short, hypnosis was once looked upon as a kind of vaudeville gag, or worse, as a demonic device to control a person\u27s mind. And while reliability is a legitimate concern for hypnosis as an investigative tool, reliability should not preclude its total abandonment. More importantly, the issue of reliability alone should not feed the fires of a tainted perception of what hypnosis is and what it can accomplish

Two-region model for positive and negative plasma sheaths and its application to Hall thruster metallic anodes.

An asymptotic presheath/sheath model for positive and negative sheaths in front of a conducting electrode, with a continuous parametric transition at the no-sheath case, is presented. Key aspects of the model are as follows: full hydrodynamics of both species in the presheath; a kinetic formulation with a truncated distribution function for the repelled species within the sheath; and the fulfillment of the marginal Bohm condition at the sheath edge, in order to match the two formulations of the repelled species. The sheath regime depends on the ratios of particle fluxes and sound speeds between the two species. The presheath model includes the effect of a magnetic field parallel to the wall on electrons. An asymptotic, parametric study of the anode presheath is carried out in terms of the local ion-to-electron flux ratio and Hall parameter. The drift-diffusive model of magnetized electrons fails in a parametric region that includes parts of the negative sheath regime. In the case of the Hall parameter vanishing near the electrode and a weakly collisional plasma, a quasisonic, quasineutral plateau forms next to the sheath edge

Problem-Solving Courts: From Innovation to Institutionalization

The phenomenal growth of drug courts and other forms of problem-solving courts has followed a pattern that is characteristic of many successful innovations: An individual or small group has or stumbles upon a new idea; the idea is put into practice and appears to work; a small number of other actors adopt the innovation and have similar experiences; if there is great demand for the innovation – for example, because it responds to a widely-perceived crisis or satisfies an institutional need and resolves tensions within organizations that adopt it – the innovation rapidly diffuses through the networks in which the early adopters interact. Eventually, what was originally an innovation becomes institutionalized. Three institutional imperatives gave rise to the diffusion of drug courts. First was the docket pressure created by intensification of the war on drugs in the 1980s. Second was the perception shared by the public and legal elites that the crush of drug cases led to a crisis in the courts, characterized by an ineffective system of punishment and a revolving door that recycled offenders without reducing either their drug use or criminality. Third was discomfort among some trial court judges with the restricted sentencing discretion in drug laws enacted during this same period, creating incentives for experimentation with sentencing alternatives. At the same time, the popular demand for punitive responses to control what was perceived as a runaway epidemic of drugs and collateral social problems focused the courts on solutions that blended judicial control with therapeutic interventions. Drug courts provided a structure and philosophy that promised to resolve each of these tensions. Whereas the public at large tended to view drug-addicted criminals chiefly as a social menace, judges and other legal actors were more comfortable treating (nonviolent) offenses committed by drug addicts as a medical problem. Indeed, because drug courts emphasized both the individual responsibility of drug addicts and the disease model of addiction, they enabled persons with widely divergent views about drug policy to find common ground. They were, in short, an innovation well suited to the times

Problem-Solving Courts: From Innovation to Institutionalization

The phenomenal growth of drug courts and other forms of problem-solving courts has followed a pattern that is characteristic of many successful innovations: An individual or small group has or stumbles upon a new idea; the idea is put into practice and appears to work; a small number of other actors adopt the innovation and have similar experiences; if there is great demand for the innovation – for example, because it responds to a widely-perceived crisis or satisfies an institutional need and resolves tensions within organizations that adopt it – the innovation rapidly diffuses through the networks in which the early adopters interact. Eventually, what was originally an innovation becomes institutionalized. Three institutional imperatives gave rise to the diffusion of drug courts. First was the docket pressure created by intensification of the war on drugs in the 1980s. Second was the perception shared by the public and legal elites that the crush of drug cases led to a crisis in the courts, characterized by an ineffective system of punishment and a revolving door that recycled offenders without reducing either their drug use or criminality. Third was discomfort among some trial court judges with the restricted sentencing discretion in drug laws enacted during this same period, creating incentives for experimentation with sentencing alternatives. At the same time, the popular demand for punitive responses to control what was perceived as a runaway epidemic of drugs and collateral social problems focused the courts on solutions that blended judicial control with therapeutic interventions. Drug courts provided a structure and philosophy that promised to resolve each of these tensions. Whereas the public at large tended to view drug-addicted criminals chiefly as a social menace, judges and other legal actors were more comfortable treating (nonviolent) offenses committed by drug addicts as a medical problem. Indeed, because drug courts emphasized both the individual responsibility of drug addicts and the disease model of addiction, they enabled persons with widely divergent views about drug policy to find common ground. They were, in short, an innovation well suited to the times