Video narration
What can fish lengths tell you about a population-not just a catch? Look at a catch sorted by length. A catch with many small fish and few large ones is more than a description. That pattern hints at how quickly fish grow, when they mature, and how much they contribute to reproduction over their lifetimes. Interpret those lengths through growth, maturity, and fishing selectivity, and the catch becomes an estimate of reproductive capacity. LBSPR-length-based spawning potential ratio-compares today's estimated potential with a modeled unfished reference. Spawning potential means the reproductive output the population could produce across its lifetime. The result is a fraction, or percentage, of that reference still remaining. It is not an egg count, and it depends on growth, maturity, and selectivity assumptions. So what did the lengths reveal? Compared with the unfished pattern, they estimate how much spawning capacity this population has left.