March 1, 2019 — NMFS recently released an update to the the U.S. National Bycatch Report, adding to the document overall bycatch trends for major U.S. fisheries for 2014 and 2015. Bycatch trends remain the same, but the agency continues to add fisheries data to enhance the scope of the project.
The report was first published in 2011 and has seen three updates. The report is designed to track overall bycatch trends and inform fishery monitoring priorities.
In 2014, the fisheries included in the national bycatch report landed approximately 6.78 billion pounds and discarded an estimated 840 million pounds. The fisheries included for 2015 landed approximately 6.54 billion pounds and discarded an estimated 814 million.
In each region, NMFS collects data used for bycatch estimation by collecting information from fishermen and through observer programs.