The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a federal agency that oversees saltwater fisheries, has agreed to spend a year collecting information on alewives and blueback river herring to see if they require federal protection under the Endangered Species Act.
"There are 24 active municipal alewife and blueback fisheries in Maine," said Kate Taylor at Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC). Commercial harvesting will continue in Maine for now because the state has submitted a sustainability plan to ASMFC. Most other Atlantic states have banned fishing for alewives and bluebacks in freshwater because the stocks are not at sustainable levels.
Alewives and bluebacks are sea-run fish collectively known as river herring. Unlike the more common Atlantic herring, a marine species that lives its whole life in the ocean, river herring live as mature fish in the ocean and return to freshwater streams to breed.
The river herring fishery is one of the oldest documented fisheries in North America, dating back over 350 years in some areas, according to NOAA. At one time historic runs from the Carolinas to the Maritimes brought millions of fish right into the backyards of colonial settlers, according to Nate Gray, a fisheries scientist with the Maine Department of Marine Resources.
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