The temporal stability
observed over a 4-year period in samples taken from
Charleston Harbor but not in Louisiana, and the small
amounts of local and short-term variation indicating minor
local transitory drift result almost certainly from high
reproductive variance. These data do not reveal genetic
effects of the overfishing indicated by fishery data, but this
is unsurprising in light of theoretical and empirical observations
that loss of genetic diversity occurs over a span of
decades (e.g. Ruzzante et al. 2001; Hauser et al. 2002; but see
Chapman et al. 1999). In addition, lack of strong genetic
differentiation in these populations of L. setiferus does
not imply that migration would be sufficient to replenish
depleted stocks in a neighbouring overfished area, and
clearly appropriate management requires consideration of
other biological data.