![]() ![]() Recreational fishermen use hook-and-line gear that has minimal impacts on habitat.Gear types, habitat impacts, and bycatch:.Peak recreational harvest occurs from May through October with over 70 percent of the catch in July and August.Florida, North Carolina, and New Jersey account for the largest percentage of the recreational bluefish harvest.In 2021, recreational anglers landed 12.8 million pounds of bluefish, according to the NOAA Fisheries recreational fishing landings database.In 2021, commercial landings of bluefish totaled more than 2.4 million pounds and were valued at $2.2 million, according to the NOAA Fisheries commercial fishing landings database.Oceanic birds prey on juvenile bluefish.Bluefish make up a major part of the diet of shortfin mako sharks and are also very important in the diets of swordfish.Sharks, tunas, and billfishes are typically the only fish predators large and fast enough to prey on adult bluefish.They eat squid and fish, particularly menhaden and smaller fish such as silversides.Bluefish have razor-sharp teeth and shearing jaws that allow them to ingest large parts, increasing the maximum size of the prey they can eat.They feed voraciously on their prey, eating almost anything they can catch and swallow. They exhibit feeding behavior called the “bluefish blitz,” where large schools of big fish attack bait fish near the surface, churning the water like a washing machine.Bluefish spawn multiple times in spring and summer.Depending on their size, females can have between 400,000 and 2 million eggs.They are able to reproduce at age 2, when they’re 15 to 20 inches in length.They grow fast, up to 31 pounds and 39 inches. ![]()
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