The 36th annual meeting of the Tidewater Chapter of the American Fisheries Society (TAFS) was held in Solomons, Md., March 23-25, 2023. A total of 102 people attended the meeting, including 45 students. Given the Maryland meeting traditionally has lower attendance, we were very pleased that this year’s turnout— just slightly lower than that of 2022.
The meeting kicked off with the evening poster social at Chesapeake Biological Laboratory (CBL) where researchers featured 24 posters, 18 of which where students. The remainder of the meeting took place at the Chesapeake Ranch Club, located on a bluff above the Chesapeake Bay just north of Drum Point and the Patuxent River. Dr. Tom Miller, from the University of Maryland and Director of CBL, opened with a plenary reflecting upon his career and offering insight on the people and events that influenced him. He closed with career advice for the next generation of fishery scientists. The remainder of the day was filled with 12 student and 6 professional oral presentations covering a diversity of topics, from invasive species impacts, to climate change. Right after lunch, we also had two student lightning talks. The Friday evening dinner and social featured invasive Blue Catfish as
one of the entrees.
On the final day, we heard presentations from numerous fisheries professionals, including Jim Uphoff, a MD Dept. of Natural Resources fisheries biologist who is celebrating his 50th year of professional service with his agency. In sum, there were a total of 27 presentations over the two days.
Special thanks to our presenters and all who helped make this meeting a success! We had numerous sponsors, including Maryland Sea Grant and CCAMD. View our meeting program for a full listing. A special shoutout goes to Dr. Mike Wilberg and the many graduate students at CBL who gave so much of their time to set up, break down and otherwise participate in the meetings. Looking to the future, President-Elect Dave is hard at work making plans for the 2024 annual meeting in Virginia; more information will come via the listserv and website: www.tidewater-afs.org. If you have suggestions or wish to make a contribution in some way — volunteer, sponsor, donate raffle items — contact Dave Rudders at rudders@vims.edu. I wish you all a happy holiday season and hope to see everyone at the meeting, if not sooner!
