Discard mortality played a major role in the loss of 10 billion juvenile scallops in the Mid-Atlantic Bight: Reply to Hart & Shank (2011).

The author discusses the disappearance of 10.4 billion sea scallops Placopecten magellanicus from the Mid-Atlantic between 2003 and 2004 and the hypothesis that the disappearance was caused by incidental fishing mortality particularly discard mortality where small scallops were captured, exposed to lethal surface water and air temperatures then discarded. He argues against claims of D. R. Hart and B. V. Shank who suggested that crab predation is the more like cause of the mortality. He maintains that discard mortality had a major role in the decrease of juvenile scallop abundance in the Mid-Atlantic between 2003 and 2004 and suggests real-time, spatially specific information and rapid responses by management to avoid similar losses.