December 6, 2012 — The following is from the Coastal Conservation Association website.
Friday, Dec. 14, is the day when all recreational anglers can stand up for the “most important fish in the ocean” and have an impact on the future of fishing in the Chesapeake Bay. That’s the date when the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) will meet to determine the future of menhaden.
ASMFC’s Menhaden Management Board is expected to act on Amendment II to the Atlantic Menhaden Fishery Management Plan, and, if adopted, it could the be first step in restoring the abundance of menhaden. Menhaden are a primary food source for every marine predator on the East Coast and are currently overfished.
“Working with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and other groups, CCA Maryland is striving to bring busloads of concerned conservationists who want to see menhaden managed properly,” said Tony Friedrich, CCA MD executive director. “We understand that the union representing workers at Omega Protein are planning to fill the ASMFC meeting room. It’s essential that members of the conservation community attend this meeting in force.” (Omega Protein is the company that harvests menhaden to produce Omega-3 and has had a major influence in reducing the menhaden stock.)
CCA Maryland and the other groups will provide buses to take conservationists to the meeting in Baltimore. The buses will leave the Riva Road Park-N-Ride lot (Harry S. Truman Prkwy and Riva Road) at 7:15 a.m. on Dec. 14. An early bus will leave the meeting around the lunch hour for those who need to return early, and another bus will leave at 3 p.m. The meeting will run from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Best Western Plus Hotel and Conference Center in Baltimore. We will also provide breakfast, lunch, refreshments and even a “Save the Menhaden” long sleeve t-shirt with artwork by Jay Fleming. If your schedule prevents you from taking the bus, we'd still love to see you at this meeting.
“Those supporting us at the meeting will not be asked to make comments, but it’s imperative that a large number of individuals supporting Amendment II are there,” Friedrich said. The future of menhaden is at stake. Countless hours of work from dozens of groups is culminating on one meeting on one day. December 14, 2012 can be a day we all look back on as a landmark victory for our fisheries. Can you please help us, help menhaden, and help our treasured Chesapeake Bay by attending this one meeting?
You must RSVP for a seat on one of the buses. Contact tony@ccamd.org with the subject line "menhaden". All we need are the names of those attending and we will take care of everything else.
Read the full article from the Coastal Conservation Association
Analysis: While the Coastal Conservation Association writes, "Omega Protein is the company that harvests menhaden to produce Omega-3 and has had a major influence in reducing the menhaden stock," examing over 50-plus years of menhaden data shows that commercial fishing is far from the greatest influence on the size of the menhaden stock.
This data instead shows that menhaden biomass depends on the strength of menhaden recruitment (the number of menhaden that are born), which varies from year to year and is influenced by a number of factors, perhaps most importantly environmental conditions. For example, the early 1980s was a period of strong menhaden recruitment influenced by favorable environmental conditions, which led to high biomass. Since then, environmental conditions have been much less favorable, resulting in lower recruitment and a smaller population. The reduction in menhaden cited in the article is part of this natural variation, as the current size of the menhaden population is similar to the size of the population in the late 1960s.
That environmental factors are perhaps the strongest influence on menhaden recruitment is recognized by both the ASMFC and NOAA. NOAA states on its menhaden webpage that “menhaden recruitment appears to be independent of fishing mortality and spawning stock biomass, indicating environmental factors may be the defining factor in the production of good year classes.” The ASMFC, similarly concluded in its 2010 stock assessment that fluctuations in menhaden abundance may be, “almost entirely driven by non-fishery sources.”