An interesting study looking at the responses of nesting smallmouth bass to various levels of angling intervention during nesting, and comparing this response across latitudes. Southern US (Missouri) SMB had 100% nest abandonment under simulated tournament (ST) conditions vs. 50% abandonment by northern and southern Ontario SMB. Controls across all latitudes were 7-10% with a range of response across all latitudes for brief angling with immediate "in water" release (CR) and exhaustive angling with 3 minutes of air exposure before release (AE) of 0-10%.
In summary from the paper: "In light of this information, there is clearly a need to determine whether there are system productivity differences that compensate for such individual-level impacts..."
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