BOSTON, MASS. — At one time, a little fish called menhaden was so plentiful that schools of them would cover a square half-mile of ocean, providing a bounty for the predator fish that leapt among them.
Terry Gibson, a charter boat operator in Florida, recalled the scene from his childhood. Nowadays, he said, schools of menhaden might fill 20 or 30 square yards — if that.
“Kids now think that that’s a big school of menhaden. It’s not,” he said. “It’s a story that’s played out from Maine to Key West. They’re disappearing.”
Gibson was one of the speakers during a telephone conference earlier this month, regarding the management of the menhaden fishery. The teleconference was held in conjunction with the latest meeting of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which subsequently approved new management measures aimed at boosting the abundance of menhaden and its spawning stock biomass.
The measure came in the form of Addendum V to Amendment 1 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Menhaden.
According to a press release from the ASMFC, the new measure will result in harvest reduction. Just how much of a reduction is involved has not yet been worked out, the release said.
According to the ASMFC, overfishing of menhaden is occurring.
According to a press release from the Pew Environment Group, which hosted the teleconference, menhaden is often called “the most important fish in the sea.”
Read the full article at the Bar Harbor Times.
Analysis: The article is not entirely correct in saying that the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) says overfishing is occurring. It is true that, in its 2010 stock assessment, the ASMFC concluded that overfishing did occur in 2008. However, this was not enough for the ASMFC to declare the fishery overfished; the overfishing in 2008 only slightly exceeded the mortality threshold, and egg production in the fishery was still at target levels.
Also misleading is the quote that the menhaden population is at "10 percent of what it was historically." That estimate refers to menhaden's Maximum Spawning Potential (MSP), which is an estimate of the size of a theoretical unfished population, not an historical measurement. Menhaden are fished to around 10 perent of their MSP, but this is not a sign that they are overfished; the population has historically been able to rebuild at that level, and MSP is poorly correlated with menhaden recruitment.
The article also overestimates menhaden's role as a filter feeder. Recent studies have found that menhaden have little impact on overall water quality.