Saving Seafood

Menhaden industry group pushes back on forage fish claims

October 2, 2026 — The debate over menhaden’s role in coastal ecosystems and fishing communities continues, as an industry group pushes back on claims linking commercial harvest to predator declines and questions arguments about the fishery’s economic value.

The American Small Pelagics Network (ASPN), which represents fishermen, processors, suppliers, and communities connected to fisheries including menhaden, responded to a Sept. 22 Washington Examiner op-ed by Forage Fish Campaign executive director Whit Fosburgh. In its response, ASPN challenged several of Fosburgh’s arguments surrounding menhaden management, predator needs, commercial fishing jobs, and the ownership of Omega Protein.

The response comes as menhaden management remains under scrutiny on both the Atlantic and Gulf coasts and as new research into Chesapeake Bay osprey reproduction has added another layer to the debate.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Washington Examiner Op-ed Gets the Facts Wrong on Menhaden, American Jobs and Fisheries Management

October 1, 2026 — The following was released by the American Small Pelagics Network:

A September 22 Washington Examiner op-ed by Forage Fish Campaign Executive Director Whit Fosburgh continues to perpetuate the campaign’s false narrative. Fosburgh ignores the science governing the fisheries, generations of American working-waterfront history, and the U.S. fishermen and workers whose livelihoods depend on them.

The op-ed portrays Louisiana and Mississippi as Gulf outliers because they permit menhaden purse seine fishing, while not mentioning their history of successful menhaden management. The most recent Gulf menhaden stock assessment found the stock is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring. Louisiana regulates the fishery through coastal buffers, bycatch limits, reporting requirements and other operating rules and commissioned a 2024 season-long scientific study of purse seine bycatch. That study found total bycatch to be about what fisheries managers had expected and was followed by voluntary fleetwide gear changes intended to further reduce red drum mortality.

Like its Atlantic counterparts, Louisiana’s menhaden fishery also supports American fishermen, processing workers, shipyards, mechanics, welders, truck drivers and suppliers across the coast. The fact that Louisiana and Mississippi permit purse seine fishing is not evidence that the fishery is unsustainable, poorly regulated or contrary to American economic interests. The insinuation that Louisiana and Mississippi are acting irresponsibly unfairly discounts the science-based work of their fisheries professionals and is insulting to Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and Wildlife and Fisheries Secretary Tyler Bosworth, as well as Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves and Department of Marine Resources Executive Director Joe Spraggins.

On the Atlantic Coast, menhaden are managed as both a harvested species and prey. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) uses ecological reference points designed to account for predator needs while allowing for a sustainable harvest. When the ASMFC adopted that system in 2020, Fosburgh himself called it a “landmark decision” and “a new era in fisheries management.”

The 2025 Atlantic menhaden assessment found the stock is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring. Revised natural mortality assumptions lowered historical stock estimates compared with prior assessments, but the assessment shows that biomass increased in recent years and the update did not show that managers had allowed years of excessive harvest. The ASMFC reported that the adopted 2026 catch level had a modeled zero-percent probability of exceeding the ecological overfishing threshold.

Fosburgh’s argument about the predator-prey relationship goes beyond the evidence. The ASMFC modeling shows that even eliminating all menhaden fishing would not, by itself, rebuild striped bass to their biomass target. In 2022–2023, recreational harvest and recreational release mortality accounted for 89 percent of striped bass removals. And an April 2025 ASMFC review of eight datasets covering 298,232 striped bass found that Fulton’s Condition Factor (a measure of fish body condition) remained above the 0.8 stress threshold and concluded the fish “are not starving and would be considered healthy.” This is an important distinction because individual striped bass can be in healthy body condition even while the stock remains below its biomass target. While striped bass feed opportunistically, eating many species in addition to menhaden, the evidence is consistent with the determination that the ecological reference points are leaving sufficient menhaden in the water for predators.

Recent Chesapeake Bay osprey research documents reproductive problems and food stress but does not establish commercial menhaden harvest as the cause. Lead author Dr. Bryan Watts has said his paper did not attempt to link poor osprey reproduction to menhaden harvest. The U.S. Geological Survey has also reported osprey reproductive problems elsewhere along the East Coast and in the Pacific Northwest.

The claim that menhaden are simply “worth more in the water” than when harvested is not an established economic fact. That argument was popularized by the 2012 Lenfest-funded Little Fish, Big Impact report, which relied on global ecosystem modeling rather than an economic valuation of Atlantic or Gulf menhaden, the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem or striped bass fishing. Subsequent peer-reviewed research challenged applying that conclusion as a general rule because predator responses to forage abundance vary by species, ecosystem conditions and spatial relationships.

Menhaden harvested within science-based limits create value through fishing, processing, wages, suppliers, aquaculture, animal and human nutrition, fish-oil products, and providing bait to recreational anglers and commercial fisheries. Recreational anglers may benefit from game fish feeding around concentrated menhaden schools, but that does not establish that every unharvested menhaden creates more economic value for Americans than a harvested one.

The op-ed’s Canadian-ownership argument is equally inaccurate. Omega Protein’s parent company, Cooke Seafood, is headquartered in Canada, but Atlantic menhaden vessels are operated by Ocean Harvesters, a U.S. company employing American union fishermen represented by UFCW Local 400. The Reedville, Virginia menhaden industry dates to the 1870s and has supported generations of Northern Neck families. His continued use of this framing is especially difficult to reconcile with the fact that he worked directly with these companies on these issues from 2015 to 2020 during the development of ecological reference points and has longstanding familiarity with the fishery, its management, and the companies involved. It is further evidence that Fosburgh and the Forage Fish Campaign are willing to present a misleading account in pursuit of their advocacy objectives.

Today the fishery provides family-supporting union jobs in a rural region where comparable employment can be difficult to replace. The operation employs one of the largest minority workforces in Northumberland County, and a 2023 collective bargaining agreement increased base pay, incentive rates and performance bonuses. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference has also warned that proposed restrictions could disproportionately affect African American workers, union families and rural communities, citing labor, wages, race, rural economic opportunity and the dignity of work.

The claim that most of the fishery’s economic value leaves the country is also inconsistent with available sales information. It falsely recasts menhaden management as a story about Canada taking an American resource. For marine ingredients, Omega Protein reports that 70 percent of its 2025 sales went to U.S. customers, 83 percent remained within the United States, Canada and Mexico, and only 17 percent went overseas. The company also reports that no products made from Atlantic menhaden are supplied to Cooke operations. Of the menhaden harvested for bait, 85 percent is sold to domestic U.S. recreational and commercial customers, while just 15 percent goes to Canadian customers, primarily lobster harvesters. The sales data directly contradict this scare-tactic framing.

It is a false economic comparison to compare roughly 250 direct jobs at one Reedville processing facility with the entire economic footprint of recreational striped bass fishing. Fosburgh’s 250-job figure also does not comport with the employment figures cited by ASMFC economists reviewing the reduction sector, who referenced earlier estimates of approximately 519 full- and part-time jobs in Maryland and Virginia, including 347 in Northumberland County alone. Those economists also warned that plant economics can create a shutdown threshold at which employment losses become much larger than a simple proportional reduction.

Finally, the assertion that reduction fishing was “pushed out” of every Atlantic state except Virginia rewrites the industry’s history. The historical record documented by the ASMFC shows a decades-long consolidation of the Atlantic reduction industry shaped at different times by changes in menhaden distribution and abundance, plant consolidation, operating capacity, environmental requirements and individual plant closures. By the early 1970s, the remaining Chesapeake reduction plants were already located in Reedville; by 2006, Reedville was the sole Atlantic reduction processing location. Some states later restricted or prohibited purse seining, but those policies do not explain a consolidation already well underway before the later restrictions. The history of plant consolidation on both the Atlantic and Gulf coasts does not support the narrative that consolidation resulted from states rejecting an unsustainable menhaden fishery. Reedville, Virginia; Moss Point, Mississippi; and Abbeville and Empire, Louisiana, have all been longstanding centers of the menhaden industry, with processing infrastructure, skilled workforces and fishing expertise around which the industry developed and consolidated.

A struggling predator does not by itself prove a menhaden harvest problem. Canadian ownership of a processor does not make American fishermen Canadian. Industry consolidation does not prove states rejected an unsustainable fishery. And self-serving recreational advocacy to displace sustainable commercial fisheries is not an economic analysis.

At least one part of the Forage Fish Campaign’s presentation is accurate: it is a campaign, not an independent research effort or a neutral accounting of the facts. Its arguments repeatedly rely on selective framing and misleading characterizations to influence its audience rather than presenting the full record in context.

Atlantic and Gulf menhaden should continue to be managed through stock assessments, applicable state and interstate rules, targeted research and transparent economic analysis—not by false advocacy narratives that omit the management record, the science and the American workers tied to these fisheries.

About the American Small Pelagics Network

The American Small Pelagics Network represents fishermen, processors, suppliers, and coastal communities connected to fisheries such as menhaden, mackerel, herring, squid, and butterfish. ASPN advocates for sustainable fisheries management that supports critical fish species, while maintaining economic opportunities for fishermen and fishing communities.

Washington Post Osprey Story Blurs the Line Between Science and Special Interests

September 30, 2026 — The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

The Washington Post on September 27 published a story by Mark Robichaux under the headline “Ospreys are disappearing along the East Coast. Scientists think they know why.”

The osprey breeding failures reported in the story are serious and warrant further study. The reporting, however, repeatedly places the commercial menhaden fishery at the center of a causal question that the scientists themselves say remains unresolved, while omitting key details on menhaden management and the fishery’s economic impact.

The article does acknowledge that Dr. Bryan Watts of William & Mary’s Center for Conservation Biology describes the evidence as an association rather than proof that commercial menhaden harvest caused osprey nesting failures. That critical limitation should have guided the rest of the account.

 

The headline blurs what scientists know and what remains uncertain
 

Researchers have identified food stress as the immediate cause of many Chesapeake Bay osprey nesting failures. They have also associated that food stress with reduced delivery of menhaden to some nests. But the Center for Conservation Biology says the underlying causes of reduced menhaden availability are not clear. It lists commercial harvest as one possible factor, alongside climate change, changing distribution and delayed entry of forage species into the Bay. The headline attempts to draw in readers on a false premise.

The distinction is even more important beyond the Chesapeake. In its 2026 compilation of monitoring from 65 study areas, the center says the underlying cause of low reproductive performance at other Atlantic Coast sites is less clear. It says, “we should view ospreys as sentinels for the marine ecosystem rather than a species imperiled.” It also states, “ospreys appear to be secure throughout much of their range but are struggling within some coastal sites.” The Post’s coastwide headline is broader than those findings.

 

The article treats an unmeasured Bay-wide condition as a premise
 

The story states, without attribution, that menhaden are not present when birds and fishermen need them. Researchers have documented reduced menhaden deliveries at some osprey nests, and fishermen describe difficulty finding dependable concentrations in some locations, while abundant concentrations are observed elsewhere and mass fish kills involving mostly juvenile menhadenhave occurred in North Carolina. Those contrasting observations do not measure adult menhaden abundance throughout the Chesapeake Bay or establish a uniform coastwide shortage.

The article also calls menhaden the principal prey of Chesapeake ospreys. Menhaden are an important prey species, particularly in saltier parts of the Bay, but the peer-reviewed study cited in the story says osprey diet composition shifts with salinity: pairs in higher-salinity waters appear to rely on menhaden, while pairs in low-salinity waters depend primarily on catfish and gizzard shad. A USGS study of osprey diets across Chesapeake Bay sites and a USGS presentation to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) summarizing the site-specific results provide the underlying geographic detail. Catfish and gizzard shad accounted for 77 percent and 20 percent of the diet reported for the Susquehanna, respectively, and 52 percent and 28 percent in upper-Bay estuarine areas. At Poplar Island, striped bass accounted for 48 percent and menhaden 44 percent; in lower-Bay estuarine areas, spotted seatrout accounted for 29 percent and menhaden 24 percent. Those data do not support a single Bay-wide description of menhaden as the principal prey.

The 2026 peer-reviewed osprey study says there is no fishery-independent monitoring of adult menhaden in the Bay. According to the authors, that information gap prevents a direct assessment of the relationship between local menhaden abundance and osprey reproduction. They also say the effect of harvest on adult menhaden abundance in the Bay remains unresolved.

 

The Louisiana passage leaves out regulatory and scientific context
 

The article also turns to Louisiana’s separate Gulf menhaden fishery. It reports the 2023 net failures and later enforcement improvements, but omits existing rules governing coastal buffers, release reporting, gear retrieval, vessel tracking and penalties. Following those incidents, the fishery also moved toward stronger purse seine nets and standardized improved bycatch excluder devicesintended to keep larger fish out of the pumping system.

Robichaux also omits the Louisiana wildlife agency’s summary of a state-commissioned, season-long study of the 2024 fishery, which estimated total bycatch at approximately 3.6 percent of catch by weight. In its 2015-2024 comparison, the agency reported that dead menhaden fishery bycatch accounted for 9.9 percent of red drum removals by weight and 2.7 percent of spotted seatrout removals; directed recreational anglers accounted for the remainder, 90.1% and 97.3%, respectively. The aggregate rate does not resolve every species-specific concern, but the results are material context for evaluating the fishery.

 

Claims from advocates and fishermen are observations and policy positions
 

Robichaux quotes Virginia Saltwater Sportfishing Association chairman Steve Atkinson asserting that the Bay no longer contains enough menhaden to support the current reduction fishery and a healthy ecosystem. While there is little doubt that Atkinson made that statement, the scientific record cited in the story does not establish it, and it is presented without challenge.

The ASMFC’s Chesapeake work group expressly did not determine whether the supply of menhaden is sufficient to meet predator demand in the Bay. Nor has the commission determined that a 50 percent reduction in the Bay cap—the policy Atkinson supports—would improve osprey reproduction. The range from no reduction through 50 percent consists of management options under consideration, not measured biological remedies. At no point has the ASMFC provided any scientific rationale for a reduction in the Bay harvest.

Anecdotal accounts like charter captain Chris Newsome’s about difficult fishing deserve to be heard, but Robichaux takes that one named Chesapeake captain’s experience and turns it into an unsubstantiated coastwide conclusion. The story cites no coastwide survey, abundance index, standardized fishing data, additional named fishermen or geographic examples to support its assertion that anglers and fishermen throughout the Atlantic Coast are seeing the same pattern. An unspecified collection of anecdotes is not evidence of a coastwide biological trend. By presenting it that way, Robichaux seeks to create the appearance of broad corroboration while giving readers no way to assess how many people were consulted, where they fish or whether their experiences are representative.

 

The article omits important evidence of sustainable management
 

Robichaux reports that the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission finds Atlantic menhaden not overfished, with overfishing not occurring, but he does not tell readers that the ASMFC already uses ecological reference points designed to account for menhaden’s role as prey or that it reduced the coastwide catch limit by 20 percent for 2026. It also omits that the U.S. Atlantic menhaden purse seine fishery is certified by the Marine Stewardship Council, following independent assessment against the MSC Fisheries Standard.

 

The economic figures are not comparable measures
 

The article compares an estimated $804 million spent on Atlantic recreational fishing trips involving menhaden with roughly $300 million in reported annual sales from Omega Protein’s combined Atlantic and Gulf operations and approximately 260 direct Virginia jobs reported by the companies in the Atlantic menhaden fishery. But it does not explain that the ASMFC’s 2026 Committee on Economics and Social Sciences review expressly describes historical modeling showing that direct harvesting and processing jobs sustain additional non-fishing employment in mechanics, logistics and local services including fuel and lubricants, repairs and maintenance, shipping, vehicle operations, supplies and food, utilities and telephone service, insurance and security, real estate rent, county property taxes and healthcare benefits.

But when it came to the recreational fishing contribution, the story cited a Southwick Associates study commissioned by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership that casts a very wide net in its economic assumptions, counting all tangential spending on entire fishing trips on which an angler used menhaden as bait, chum or scent. This means they counted anything including transportation, fuel, food, hotels and other purchases as an economic contribution of recreational fishing.

In short, the story’s comparison of the industries’ economics is apples and oranges.

Robichaux mentions the direct Virginia jobs but says nothing about the workers who hold them. UFCW Local 400 says Ocean Harvesters’ crews are overwhelmingly local and unionized and that the operation employs one of the largest minority workforces in Northumberland County. The union has documented collectively bargained increases in base pay, incentive rates and bonuses, as well as health-and-welfare benefits. These are family-supporting union jobs that provide strong wages and full benefits to workers, including many without college degrees—opportunities that no other employer in the Northern Neck provides on a comparable basis. The bigger issue remains that the article never illustrates how a reduction in the Bay Cap would benefit recreational anglers, but reductions would almost certainly result in economic harm to menhaden fishermen and their families. 

The ASMFC’s Committee on Economics and Social Sciences identifies the reduction industry as an important part of the Reedville-area economy. It also warns that high fixed costs mean a small reduction in fishing quota could cause larger unemployment effects. That analysis is relevant to any discussion of workers and communities affected by additional restrictions.

The ASMFC’s economic advisers warn that job losses in the reduction sector could be lasting because comparable work may be hard to find locally.

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference raised that concern directly with Maryland Gov. Wes Moore. SCLC urged Maryland to consider how additional restrictions could disproportionately affect African American workers, union families and rural communities, and to weigh environmental stewardship together with economic justice and the consequences for workers and their families. Robichaux does not mention the union workforce or the civil rights organization’s intervention.

 

The February 18 letter does not show opposition to research
 

Robichaux introduces a February 18, 2025 letter from an industry government relations professional to Virginia Del. Betsy Carr and then immediately quotes Chesapeake Bay Foundation executive Chris Moore alleging that the industry is using scientific uncertainty to stall restrictions. CBF has repeatedly used this letter out of context to allege that the industry opposed research funding.

The companies explained to Robichaux that by February 18, the General Assembly was no longer considering the roughly $2 million needed for the full study; discussion had shifted to whether a reduced amount of funding could support useful interim work. The letter responded by proposing a two-year pilot to test aerial and hydroacoustic survey methods that had not yet been validated for estimating Chesapeake Bay menhaden abundance. It also called for a plan and budget for a peer reviewed research program and, as an alternative, recommended returning to the General Assembly in 2026. Read in full and in context, it proposed research under constrained funding and raised concerns about methodology.

What followed after February 2025 undercuts CBF’s characterization. When the 2025 Virginia session ended without funding the proposed comprehensive study, industry participants helped fund a Science Center for Marine Fisheries research roadmap involving VIMS, the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science and NOAA; supported a tagging feasibility study; and opened commercial vessels and processing operations to researchers. That record is inconsistent with Moore’s false claim about the industry’s motive.

The research effort gained substantial public funding in 2026: Virginia committed $2 million over two years, and Congress appropriated $2.5 million for Bay-specific research.

Commercial menhaden fishermen and processing workers support coastal communities and supply fishmeal, fish oil, nutritional products and bait to recreational and commercial fishermen from Maine to Louisiana. They deserve coverage that distinguishes observed osprey food stress from an unproven allegation of fishery causation, and that compares harvest and economic figures on an accurate basis.

 

Sources and documents cited

1. The Washington Post article addressed in this release, September 27, 2026.

2. William & Mary Center for Conservation Biology, 2026 Chesapeake Bay osprey breeding results and Atlantic Coast monitoring summary.

3. Peer-reviewed 2026 osprey study.

4. U.S. Geological Survey, Chesapeake Bay osprey diet study; USGS presentation to ASMFC, August 2024.

5. ASMFC, Chesapeake Bay Menhaden Work Group report, April 2025; Atlantic menhaden FAQs; and 2026 catch-limit announcement.

6. Marine Stewardship Council, U.S. Atlantic menhaden purse-seine fishery listing.

7. Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, 2026 commercial fishing regulations and summary of the 2024 menhaden bycatch study.

8. ASMFC Committee on Economics and Social Sciences, updated employment and economic review, July 2026.

9. Southwick Associates, Atlantic menhaden recreational-fishing economic report, June 2026.

10. UFCW Local 400, menhaden workforce account and collective-bargaining announcement.

11. Southern Christian Leadership Conference letter to Maryland Gov. Wes Moore.

12. February 18, 2025 letter to Virginia Del. Betsy Carr and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s statement discussing the research dispute.

13. Virginia Institute of Marine Science, Atlantic menhaden research and funding overview.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition (MFC) is a collective of menhaden fishermen, related businesses, and supporting industries. Comprised of businesses along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition conducts media and public outreach on behalf of the menhaden industry to ensure that members of the public, media, and government are informed of important issues, events, and facts about the fishery.

The Fisherman’s Jim Hutchinson Misrepresents Key Evidence and Attacks Respected New Jersey Scientist’s Objectivity

September 29, 2026 — In The Fisherman’s September 24, 2026 NJ/DE Bay Region Fishing Forecast, New Jersey/Delaware Bay Edition Editor Jim Hutchinson, Jr. pressed for deeper Chesapeake Bay menhaden restrictions while repeating a broader narrative about the fishery that leaves out or conflicts with key parts of the scientific and management record. His report encourages viewers to see the reduction fishery as the cause of Maryland’s bait fishery problems and as a central answer to striped bass concerns, while giving little weight to the current menhaden stock assessment, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s (ASMFC) ecological reference points, the history of the Bay Cap, the Commission’s own scientific uncertainty, or analyses that challenge the so-called “gauntlet” theory.

He questioned fisheries scientist Peter Himchak’s objectivity without noting that his own publication had honored Himchak in 1987 with The Fisherman magazine’s Sportsman of the Year award for his work on striped bass restoration and conservation.

The video was published on YouTube and promoted on Facebook, in addition to appearing on TheFisherman.com as part of the magazine’s September 24 report.

We spoke directly with Himchak for his response. He rejected the suggestion that leaving New Jersey’s Division of Fish and Wildlife for industry work changed his scientific standards.

Read the full release at Access Newswire 

VIRGINIA: Young fishing voice joins Chesapeake Bay menhaden debate

September 24, 2026 — Hundreds of Northern Neck residents turned out Saturday as Virginia’s commercial menhaden community urged fisheries managers to hold off on further Chesapeake Bay harvest restrictions while several new studies of the fishery are underway.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) is considering changes to the Chesapeake Bay reduction fishery cap through Draft Addendum II to the Atlantic Menhaden Fishery Management Plan. Options include cutting the current 51,000-metric-ton cap by as much as 50 percent and potentially tying it to the coastwide total allowable catch.

According to WHRO Public Media and Rappahannock Record, 439 people attended the Sept. 19 public hearing at Northumberland High School, where many speakers called on managers to wait for additional scientific research before reducing the cap.

The turnout included employees and families connected to Ocean Harvesters and Omega Protein’s Reedville processing operation, as well as other members of the Northern Neck community.

Among those addressing fisheries managers was 13-year-old Charlotte Blackwell, whose father is a fishing boat captain.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

VIRGINIA: With three menhaden fish studies funded, Reedville asks state managers to hold off on catch cuts

September 23, 2026 — Virginia is among the 15 states commissioned to manage fisheries along the Atlantic Coast. There are now three studies set to look at commercial fishing and other impacts on menhaden, a schooling fish with both ecological and industrial importance. The Atlantic State Marine Fisheries Commission is considering slashing the commercial catch and spread out fishing days in the Chesapeake Bay.

The majority of that catch goes to the Reedville-based Canadian company that turns the fish into a variety of products. The fleet and factory sustains the Northern Neck community. So, the commission went there to hear them out.

On Saturday morning, 439 people, many with babies and kids in tow, gathered at the Northumberland County school auditorium to ask the fisheries commission to wait for the science. There were teachers, a grocery store manager, and a museum director, but mostly families of those who work for Ocean Harvesters fishing fleet and factory workers for Omega Protein.

Those who spoke, patiently stood in line, some for two hours, waiting their turn for 3 minutes before officials from the commission. Among them was 13-year-old Charlotte Blackwell and her brother Dawson.

“Our dad is a fishboat captain and we have many family members who also work in this industry,” Charlotte told the board. “My question for this board, what bay-specific science shows that another reduction is necessary? Right here at Northumberland Middle School, we are taught how science works. We are taught to ask questions, examine evidence, separate facts from opinions and let the evidence lead us to the conclusion. Please hold yourselves to that same standard.”

Read the full article at WHRO

VIRGINIA: The Northern Neck has a lot to say on menhaden fishery

September 23, 2026 — Hundreds showed up to Northumberland High School on Saturday, September 19, to voice their opinions on potential action by Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) to further reduce the Chesapeake Bay Reduction Fishery Cap (bay cap) through the Atlantic Menhaden Draft Addendum II.

If enacted, the bay cap could be cut by up to 50% from its current 51,000 metric tons (mt). Options show proposed caps ranging from 45,900 mt to 25,500 mt as well as linking the bay cap to the total allowable catch (TAC), which is a coastwide quota set by ASMFC based on stock assessment models and divided among coastal states to provide their state quotas.

Read the full article at Rappahannock Record

Trump rescinds executive order coordinating Chesapeake Bay restoration over “rain taxes”

September 21, 2026 — U.S. President Donald Trump has rescinded a 17-year-old executive order directing federal agencies to coordinate restoration of the Chesapeake Bay, claiming that it’s been used to improperly justify stormwater management fees – or rain taxes – implemented by municipalities.

The president went on to state that enough progress has been made on improving the water quality and environmental health of the Chesapeake Bay watershed that the executive order issued by then-U.S. President Barrack Obama is no longer needed.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

NEFSA questions link between menhaden harvest and osprey declines

September 18, 2026 — The New England Fishermen’s Stewardship Association (NEFSA) is pushing back on efforts to link commercial menhaden harvest to historically poor osprey reproduction in portions of the Chesapeake Bay, arguing that the research has documented food stress but has not established fishing as the cause.

In a Sept. 17 op-ed in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, NEFSA director of advocacy Jason Joyce, a commercial fisherman from Maine, questioned the conclusions drawn from recent Chesapeake Bay osprey research.

“It presents a simple story: commercial fishermen catch menhaden, osprey lose their food, and chicks starve,” Joyce wrote of recent coverage of the issue. “It is compelling. It just is not what the science proves.”

His comments follow the release of new monitoring from the Center for Conservation Biology at William & Mary, which found historically low osprey reproduction in higher-salinity portions of the Chesapeake Bay.

Researchers monitored 937 osprey pairs across 23 study areas from March through August. In saltier portions of the Bay, average productivity fell to 0.25 young per pair, well below the roughly one young per pair researchers say is needed to maintain a stable population.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

NEFSA’S JASON JOYCE: Before blaming fishermen, Chesapeake Bay needs better menhaden data

September 17, 2026 — The following is an excerpt from an op-ed published today in the Richmond Times Dispatch by Jason Joyce, director of advocacy for the New England Fishermen’s Stewardship Association:

As a commercial fisherman from Maine, I was troubled by the Washington Post’s article about menhaden and starving osprey chicks in the Chesapeake Bay. It presents a simple story: commercial fishermen catch menhaden, osprey lose their food, and chicks starve. It is compelling. It just is not what the science proves.

The Chesapeake Bay osprey study found that osprey nesting in high-salinity areas are struggling, while birds in low-salinity areas are successfully raising young. But the researchers did not show that commercial fishing depleted adult menhaden at the study sites. The authors acknowledge that there is no independent survey measuring adult menhaden abundance in the Chesapeake Bay, and that they lack the data needed to determine the relationship between harvest and menhaden availability. That is a critical gap before fishermen are blamed, and their livelihoods are restricted.

Ospreys are opportunistic predators. They do not only eat menhaden. The study reports that osprey in low-salinity areas relied primarily on catfish and gizzard shad. Those birds produced more than 1.3 young per pair, while high-salinity sites produced only 0.08 to 0.90 young per pair. In plain English, the osprey successfully raising chicks lived where menhaden were not their primary food. Menhaden matter, but osprey reproduction depends on a broader food web than the article suggests.

Salinity may be the largest unanswered question. The study found a strong association between salinity and reproductive success, but classified sites using the average surface salinity from 1985 through 2018, rather than conditions measured during each nesting season. A 33-year average cannot tell us what changed between successful years in the 1980s and 2024. Was there less rainfall or freshwater discharge, more drought, warmer water, lower dissolved oxygen, poorer water quality, different plankton conditions or fewer alternative prey fish?

The researchers identify plankton, freshwater discharge, predation, competition, temperature, salinity and water quality as possible influences on menhaden and the Bay’s food web. Those variables cannot be acknowledged and then ignored when policy is proposed.

Menhaden are highly migratory. Their abundance in one place cannot establish the condition of the coastwide population. Fishermen throughout Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts report extraordinary concentrations, with many describing abundances not seen in decades. That does not prove why fewer menhaden may be available to Chesapeake osprey, but it is consistent with redistribution rather than coastwide depletion.

Read the full opinion piece at the Richmond-Times Dispatch