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GBOUTDOORS, you are arguing a completely different point. If you need to see the scientific papers regarding fecundity and egg viability in order to believe the summaries and conclusions, you should read the PDFs that Labrax and I posted and then look at all the references they cited. Those references are all scientific papers. Start with Googling "Zastrow et al. 1989" and "Monteleone and Houde 1990" and read those papers if you want.
What you are hanging your hat on, and I suspect is at the root of the long-held misconception of older stripers losing fecundity, is the notion of Spawning Potential. Spawning potential is a made-up figure that some scientists like to use to try to get their population dynamic theories to work. In the real-world of fisheries management, it has no place. If you allow Spawning Potential to figure into your analysis, you would look at a 15-pound striper next to a 40-pounder and correctly conclude that the 15-pounder has greater spawning potential than the 40. That may be true, until a seal eats the 15-pounder you were looking at. I have the potential to become the world's richest man, but my potential is less than my 6 year old's simply because he has, in theory, longer to work at it. Doesn't mean that I won't win the lottery tomorrow or that he may decide to go to art school and make $16k for his entire career.
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