A single wrasse works for around four hours a day, and in that time, it can inspect more than 2,000 clients. The wrasse are remarkably savvy about how they perform their services.

From the start, he had hoped his cleaner-wrasse research would enrich the general appreciation of fish intelligence. Now he felt that there were other lessons too—and other points to score.

Based on the report's 2015 numbers, New Jersey’s saltwater recreational fishing industry generated the most jobs 16,100 jobs, sales at $1.8 million and took the most fishing trips at 4.3 million ...

Mr. Eidman, who also operates fishing charter boats out of Monmouth County, N.J., said Chesapeake Bay was an important source of game fish like striped bass throughout the Atlantic coast.