Saving Seafood

NOAA Fisheries Announces Changes to Management of Cobia in Federal Waters of the Atlantic

February 21, 2019 — The following was released by the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council:

KEY MESSAGE:

NOAA Fisheries announces the final rule to implement Amendment 31 to the Fishery Management Plan for the Coastal Migratory Pelagics of the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Region. This final rule removes Atlantic cobia from the fishery management plan. Atlantic cobia is now managed under the purview of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission because the majority of Atlantic cobia landings are in state waters.

WHEN RULE WILL TAKE EFFECT:

The final rule will is effective on March 21, 2019.

WHAT THIS MEANS:

  • Atlantic cobia is no longer managed under the Coastal Migratory Pelagics Fishery Management Plan.
  • Regulations in federal waters will be implemented through the Atlantic Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act.
  • Most existing management measures in federal waters for commercial and recreational harvest of Atlantic cobia from Georgia through New York do not change through this rule.
  • For the commercial sector, the minimum size limit is 33 inches fork length and the trip limit is two fish per person per day or six fish per vessel per day, whichever is more restrictive.
  • For the recreational sector, the minimum size limit is 36 inches fork length and the bag and vessel limits are one fish per person per day or six fish per vessel per day, whichever is more restrictive. For both sectors, persons harvesting Atlantic cobia must comply with more restrictive size limits, bag limits, and possession limits in the states where the fish are landed.
  • Fishermen should contact the state for regulations in state waters.

FORMAL FEDERAL REGISTER NAME/NUMBER: Final Rule: 84 FR 4733, published February 19, 2019.

This bulletin serves as a Small Entity Compliance Guide, complying with section 212 of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQs)

  • Why remove Atlantic cobia from the fishery management plan?
  • The majority of Atlantic cobia are caught in state waters.
  • NOAA Fisheries closed the 2016 and 2017 federal recreational fishing seasons because the current recreational accountability measure requires NOAA Fisheries to reduce the length of the fishing season in the year following an annual catch limit overage by the amount needed to prevent a similar overage from occurring.
  • Despite federal closures, recreational landings have still exceeded the annual catch limit and the combined stock annual catch limit.
  • The South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Councils and NOAA Fisheries have determined that management of Atlantic cobia by the states through the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission would be more effective at constraining harvest and preventing overfishing; thereby, offering greater biological protection to the population and decreasing adverse socioeconomic effects to fishermen.
  • The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has implemented an Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic cobia in state waters.

How does this change the regulations of cobia in federal waters?

  • Most management measures in federal waters for commercial and recreational harvest of Atlantic cobia in the exclusive economic zone from Georgia through New York do not change.
  • For the commercial sector, the minimum size limit is 33 inches fork length and the trip limit is two fish per person per day or six fish per vessel per day, whichever is more restrictive.
  • For the recreational sector, the minimum size limit is 36 inches fork length and the bag and vessel limits are one fish per person per day or six fish per vessel per day, whichever is more restrictive.
  • For both sectors, persons harvesting Atlantic cobia must comply with more restrictive size limits, bag limits, and possession limits in the states where the fish are landed.
  • Fishermen should contact the state for regulations in state waters.

Tide turns as striped bass stock falters

February 19, 2019 — Striped bass, a summertime favorite with fishermen and diners, has joined the ranks of New England’s overfished species.

A summary from the Feb. 6 meeting of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board stated that a computer population model revealed the species was overfished in 2017 and that fishermen were still catching too many fish to sustain the population.

The report is part of a scheduled deeper, peer-reviewed analysis by the commission and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries. Known as a benchmark assessment, it incorporates new information and gives fishery managers a more accurate picture of the status of a fish stock than an annual assessment. It’s a reality check, and while it isn’t official, the result of the striped bass assessment will likely be the same as the draft version when the final report is issued at their next meeting April 30, said Michael Armstrong, chairman of the striped bass board and an assistant director at the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries.

Declaring the species overfished does not mean a return to the 1980s, Armstrong said, when a coastwide moratorium was instituted after striped bass stocks collapsed due to overfishing and degraded environmental conditions, particularly in spawning areas.

“The sky is not falling,” he said. “Stocks don’t fall overnight.”

Even though recent species barometers have indicated a downturn in population, the stock remains at levels far above what they were nearly 40 years ago.

Read the full story from the Cape Cod Times at the New Bedford Standard-Times

Shrimpers hope industry lost to warm seas won’t be forgotten

February 19, 2019 — Glen Libby looks back fondly on his days as a Maine shrimp trawler, but he’s concerned about what seafood lovers will think if the shuttered fishery ever reopens.

“Shrimp? What are those?” he said. “There will be a market. But it depends how big of a market you’re talking about.”

Maine’s historic shrimp industry has been closed since 2013 due to a loss in population of shrimp off of New England that is tied in large part to warming oceans. And with a reopening likely several years away — if it ever happens at all — Libby and others who formerly worked in the business are grappling with how much of the industry they’ll be able to salvage if the time ever comes.

The state’s shrimp fishery was traditionally a winter industry, but it’s in the midst of its sixth straight season with no participation because of a government-imposed moratorium. Fishermen, wholesalers, distributors and others in the seafood business lament the industry wouldn’t be in a good position to return right away even if fishing for the little, sweet pink shrimp was allowed.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Idaho Statesman

Virginia dodges sanction on menhaden

February 13, 2019 — A threat to shut down Virginia’s menhaden fishery disappeared after an interstate commission decided it wouldn’t find the state out of a compliance with a new quota for the oily fish.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission cut the quota for menhaden caught in the Chesapeake Bay by purse-seine vessels by 42 percent back in 2017 — but the General Assembly balked this year and last at enacting that lower quota into state law.

This month, the commission indefinitely postponed taking any action to find Virginia out of compliance, a finding that could trigger a federal moratorium on the fishery.

Menhaden has made tiny Reedville the biggest U.S. fishing port, measured by pounds, outside Alaska. Reedville’s fleet of purse seine vessels — large former offshore oil service ships or former minesweepers — scoop up menhaden schools with giant nets, then deliver the fish to the Omega Proteins processing plant, where they’re turned into fish oil and animal feed.

The commission said that if the Reedville fleet catches more than 51,000 metric tons in the Bay — its current quota — it could still decide Virginia is out of compliance. But it noted that the Bay catch since 2012 has been below that level — Virginia’s noncompliance is strictly that it hasn’t enacted the commission’s cap into state law.

Read the full story at the Daily Press

 

Lobster industry willing to be ‘right-sized’ for right whales?

February 11, 2019 — Last week, there was much ado in the lobster industry, particularly in Maine where fishermen, regulators and legislators are discussing the possibility of loosening some of the permitting constraints to accelerate the pace of issuing new licenses in a classic old guard vs. new guard tableau.

On a more macro level, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission said its American lobster management board is considering new measures to reduce the amount of vertical fishing lines in the water as a further protection for right whales.

The goal, they said, is to remove as much as 40 percent of the existing lines and gear through a combination of gear changes, trap limits, area closures and other actions to make the waters safer for the highly imperiled right whales that probably are starting their migration north as we speak.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Menhaden Fishery Managers Won’t Pursue Punishment for Virginia

February 11, 2019 — Virginia’s menhaden fishery gets a major victory, as Atlantic fisheries managers decide not to hold the Commonwealth out of compliance with its most recent catch limits.

Back in fall of 2017, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) voted to reduce the maximum allowable harvest on the Chesapeake Bay from 87,216 metric tons to 51,000 metric tons a year.

Virginia’s legislature failed to adopt the reduced catch limits, after the East Coast menhaden fishery’s biggest player, Omega Protein, argued the reduction was unnecessary. Under law, the U.S. Department of Commerce can put an immediate moratorium on a state that doesn’t comply with catch limits.

ASMFC won’t seek a moratorium from the Department of Commerce, announcing it has “indefinitely postponed” action to find Virginia out of compliance. ASMFC explains, the Virginia fishery has stayed within the limits of a precautionary “Bay Cap” that was imposed to protect the small, oily fish as an important link in the Chesapeake Bay food chain.

In a statement, ASMFC writes, “This action is contingent upon the Chesapeake Bay reduction fishery not exceeding the cap. If the cap is exceeded, the Board can reconsider the issue of compliance. In making its decision, the Board took into account the fact that reduction fishery harvest within the Chesapeake Bay has been below the cap level since 2012, including 2018 harvest. “

Read the full story at Chesapeake Bay Magazine

Striped bass population in trouble, new study finds

February 8, 2019 — Striped bass, one of the most prized species in the Chesapeake Bay and along the Atlantic Coast, are being overfished according to a new assessment of the stock’s health — a finding that will likely trigger catch reductions for a species long touted as a fisheries management success.

The bleak preliminary findings of the assessment were presented to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, a panel of fisheries managers, on Wednesday. The full analysis was not available. Its completion was delayed by the partial government shutdown, which sidelined biologists in the National Marine Fisheries Service who were working to complete the report.

But, noted Mike Armstrong of the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, who also chairs the ASMFC’s Striped Bass Management Board, the final results “will likely be the same when [the report] comes out.”

The board asked its technical advisers to estimate the level of catch reductions needed to bring the stock above management targets at its May meeting, when the stock assessment is expected to be ready for approval.

“We know it is going to be pretty drastic,” said John Clark of the Delaware Division of Fish and Wildlife, a member of the board.

The findings of the assessment were a bit of a surprise. Though the overall population was known to be declining, striped bass are often considered a signature success for fishery management.

The overharvest of striped bass, also called rockfish, sent their population to critically low levels in the early 1980s, eventually leading to a catch moratorium. The population rebounded, allowing catches to resume, and by 1997 the population recovered to an estimated 419 million fish aged one year or more.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

Regulators to consider reducing lobstermen’s lines to protect right whales

February 8, 2019 — Regulators will consider removing up to 40 percent of the lines that link seabed lobster traps to buoys on the surface, taking the step in the hopes of protecting the endangered North Atlantic right whale and avoiding federal restrictions on the lobster fishery.

Fishermen who serve on the American Lobster Management Board of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission say the action is required to prevent the federal government from declaring the lobster fishery a threat to North Atlantic right whales, whose population has dwindled to 411 because of changes in habitat, low calving rates, ship strikes and entanglement in fishing lines. If the federal government places a “jeopardy” finding on the species, it would likely trigger far more burdensome restrictions on Maine’s $1.4 billion a year lobster industry, board members said.

Better that fishery participants decide what concessions they can live with than leave it up to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, they said.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

ASMFC 2019 Winter Meeting Press Releases, Summaries and Motions Now Available

February 8, 2019 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

Press releases, meeting summaries and motions from the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s 2019 Winter Meeting are now available at http://www.asmfc.org/files/Meetings/2019WinterMeeting/2019WinterMeetingSummary.pdf. The document can also be obtained on the Commission website on the Meeting Archives page at http://www.asmfc.org/home/meeting-archive. Presentations and audio files from this week’s meetings will be posted to the 2019 Winter Meeting page (http://www.asmfc.org/home/2019-winter-meeting) early next week.