ALBANY June 1, 2012 — The days of anglers taking as many herring as they can catch from the Hudson River, something that dates back to the Colonial era, may be coming to an end. Faced with plummeting numbers of herring in the river and elsewhere along the Atlantic seaboard, the state Department of Environmental Conservation is proposing a first-ever limit on how many of the popular baitfish can be caught.
Under the proposals, anglers would be able to land no more than 10 herring a day between March 15 and June 15, when hundreds of thousands of the small fish come from the Atlantic up the river as far north as the Troy Dam to spawn. Anglers commonly catch herring to use as bait for striped bass, a popular sport fish that also comes up the river in the spring and feeds on herring.
"It's about time," said Chris Van Deusen of CJ Outdoors in Scotia, which runs charter fishing trips for stripers on the Hudson. He said some anglers routinely catch dozens of herring, and dump out dead fish from their bait wells at the end of the day.
"As someone who has been fishing the Hudson since 1981, and who has witnessed this slaughter of herring, I can tell you there has definitely been a reduction in their numbers," he said. "This is a wake-up call to the striper fishermen. We have to change our slovenly ways. If they were to ever ban fishing for herring completely, it could end most recreational fishing on the river."
DEC is acting to protect herring under orders from the federal Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which in 2009 ordered 15 Atlantic states to come up with plans to reverse the rapid decline of herring.
Recent studies found that blueback herring, one of the two herring types in the Hudson, are at about 1 percent of levels found in 1950, according to the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies.
New York, along with Maine, New Hampshire, North and South Carolina all proposed catch limits, said Kate Taylor, fisheries management plan coordinator for the commission. Herring fishing is banned completely in the other 10 states, including Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut, which voluntarily ended herring fishing before the 2009 federal order.