Saving Seafood

Learning About Menhaden: A Journey to Reedville

January 27, 2017 — The following is excerpted from an article by Emily Liljestrand, a master’s student in the University System of Maryland’s Marine Estuarine Environmental Sciences program. It was published Tuesday by Maryland Sea Grant:

Atlantic menhaden, though completely unpalatable to all but the most desperate diners, can be found in many commercial products. They are processed into omega-3, fatty-acid-rich nutritional supplements as well as aquaculture feed and fertilizer. People have utilized them for hundreds of years. The name “menhaden” even comes from the Native American word “munnawhatteaug,” which means “that which fertilizes.”

To get from this one-foot-long, oily, bug-eyed creature to the myriad of products we use them for requires several steps of fishing and processing. Most of which we got to witness first-hand on our trip to Reedville.

We were welcomed by the Omega Protein staff who guided us to a cozy conference room where we watched a video that demonstrated the fishing operation. Delightful as it might have been, having nine students and faculty go out on a fishing vessel that can often spend days offshore is a bit impractical.

But in the video we got to see the whole fishing process. Spotter planes take off across the Chesapeake Bay and nearshore Atlantic waters, looking for the telltale sign of a menhaden school – darkened bubbling waters where menhaden were being targeted by predatory fish and sea birds. Pilots can estimate with a high degree of accuracy not only the size of a school but also the average size of menhaden within that school.

The fishing vessel charges onto the scene and once in position, deploys two smaller seine boats that together use a single net to rope up as much of the school as they can. Once the bottom “purse string” gets pulled, it’s only a matter of hauling everything up onto the larger vessel and/or vacuuming menhaden into the hold. If done efficiently, the whole process may take no longer than half an hour.

Our guided tour around the on-shore facility in Reedville showed us how the processing continues onshore. The school of menhaden (or multiple schools, collected over several days) are deposited into a large holding vat and cooked at extreme temperatures. This procedure breaks down the fish and creates a sort of menhaden “slurry.” Through a series of heating, cooling, and further chemical processing, the lighter liquid oil gets separated from the harder, denser meal.

Omega Protein told us about its efforts to make its processing operations sustainable. It uses recycled/reclaimed water extracted from the menhaden themselves as a cooling agent, which has saved about 18 million gallons of water annually, and safely disposes of nitrogen byproducts. Omega’s fossil fuel consumption has dropped by 80 percent since 2012 thanks to several plant renovations.

Read the full story at Maryland Sea Grant

MONTY DEIHL: What The Virginian-Pilot gets wrong about menhaden

January 13, 2017 — THE PILOT gets one thing absolutely right in its Dec. 28 editorial on menhaden management (“Let scientists manage menhaden approach”): Menhaden is important to the Chesapeake Bay, and the species and the fishery that depend on it deserve proper management.

Unfortunately, the editorial’s proposals are based on a flawed and incomplete understanding of menhaden science and management.

The Pilot urges fisheries managers at the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission to adopt ecosystem-based reference points as it considers Amendment 3 to the Menhaden Fishery Management Plan.

While almost everyone supports ecosystem-based management in the long run, no such system is ready to be implemented. The ASMFC’s best fisheries scientists are currently developing new ecological reference points specifically for menhaden, which are expected to be completed in the next few years.

In the meantime, fisheries managers should not reach for unproven, improper management practices when they lack the necessary science to guide the process.

In supporting new reference points, the editorial offers an ill-informed indictment of the current management approach, calling it a “tragedy of the commons.” But the ASMFC’s latest stock assessment found that menhaden fishing mortality is at its lowest level on record — hardly the “tragedy of the commons” that The Pilot suggests.

Read the full opinion piece at the Virginian-Pilot

CHRISTI LINARDICH: Fishing isn’t the problem

January 12, 2017 — “Let scientists manage menhaden approach” (editorial, Dec. 28) perpetuates the belief that so many people seem to have lately — that the largest impact on striped bass populations is lack of menhaden to eat.

According to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, menhaden biomass was lowest during the mid-1990s to mid-2000s, but during that time (1993-2004, to be exact) striper recruitment was strong.

This is not easily explained, but neither is the simplified belief that taking a sustainable amount of menhaden out is magically taking striper off the end of people’s fishing lines.

Critics conveniently ignore the fact that the Chesapeake Bay and associated rivers, which striper depend on to complete their reproductive cycle and menhaden rely on for nursery grounds, has been severely altered by humans through dams and pollution.

Read the full letter to the editor at the Virginian-Pilot

VIRGINIA: Derelict pots killing 3.3 million crabs annually in the Bay

January 3, 2017 — When Virginia closed its winter dredge fishery in 2008, waterman Clay Justis turned his attention from catching crabs that season to collecting the gear that captures them.

He was one of several watermen hired under a program that taught them to use sonar to find and remove lost and abandoned fishing gear, primarily crab pots, littering the bottom of the Bay.

“As a waterman, I knew there was stuff on the bottom, but when I turned the machine on, I was like, ‘Wow!’” said Justis, who fishes out of Accomack on the Eastern Shore.

Out of sight in the Bay’s often murky water, crab pots lay scattered all over the bottom, the sonar showed — along with other fishing gear such as gill nets, and all manner of trash, even a laundry machine.

But the so-called “ghost pots” are a special concern because the wire mesh cages with openings to draw crabs in but not let them out can continue to catch — and kill — crabs and fish for years. They are taking a bite out of both the crab populations and the wallets of watermen. More often than not, Justis noted, the derelict pots he pulled up had something in them. “You’ve got fish, you’ve got crabs, you’ve got ducks. All kinds of things,” he said. But, he added, “most of the time, they are dead.”

Concern about delict crab pots in the Bay has been growing for a decade, and a new report for the first time attempts to estimate their Baywide impact. It found that more than 145,000 pots litter the bottom of the Bay — a number the report authors consider to be conservative.

Each year, the report estimated that those pots kill about 3.3 million crabs, 3.5 million white perch, 3.6 million Atlantic croaker, and smaller numbers of other species, including ducks, diamondback terrapins and striped bass.

The number of crabs killed amounts to 4.5 percent of the 2014 Baywide harvest, the report said. Nor is the problem limited to the Bay. Studies have found similar problems with fisheries that use “trap” devices to catch crabs and lobsters globally.

“It’s an issue that, around the country, folks may not be aware of unless you live close to an area where commercial fishing is a way of life,” said Amy Uhrin, senior scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program, which funded the study. “It is one of those ‘out-of-sight, out-of-mind’ issues.”

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

BEN LANDRY: Menhaden are flourishing

December 28, 2016 — A recent column by Chris Dollar (“Outdoors: The more menhaden the better,” Dec. 3) cites claims from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation that the current management of menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay has left the stock running low. The column also echoes the foundation’s position that the menhaden harvest cap should be lowered. The science suggests the opposite to be the case.

In 2012, based on fears of overfishing, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission implemented a menhaden quota. Soon after the quota was implemented, scientists found the concerns of overfishing were misplaced. Further research found that menhaden are prospering coastwide. In fact, the ASMFC declared conclusively that menhaden are neither “overfished nor experiencing overfishing.”

The ASMFC has recently expressed its confidence in the health of menhaden by voting to raise the coastwide quota by 6.45 percent. This decision was backed up by a commission analysis based on nearly 9,000 simulations that found that an increase in the menhaden quota would have an almost zero percent chance of leading to overfishing.

Read the full letter to the editor at The Baltimore Sun

Derelict pots killing 3.3 million crabs annually in the Chesapeake Bay

December 28, 2016 — When Virginia closed its winter dredge fishery in 2008, waterman Clay Justis turned his attention from catching crabs that season to collecting the gear that captures them.

He was one of several watermen hired under a program that taught them to use sonar to find and remove lost and abandoned fishing gear, primarily crab pots, littering the bottom of the Bay.

“As a waterman, I knew there was stuff on the bottom, but when I turned the machine on, I was like, ‘Wow!’” said Justis, who fishes out of Accomack on the Eastern Shore.

Out of sight in the Bay’s often murky water, crab pots lay scattered all over the bottom, the sonar showed — along with other fishing gear such as gill nets, and all manner of trash, even a laundry machine.

But the so-called “ghost pots” are a special concern because the wire mesh cages with openings to draw crabs in but not let them out can continue to catch — and kill — crabs and fish for years. They are taking a bite out of both the crab populations and the wallets of watermen. More often than not, Justis noted, the derelict pots he pulled up had something in them. “You’ve got fish, you’ve got crabs, you’ve got ducks. All kinds of things,” he said. But, he added, “most of the time, they are dead.”

Concern about delict crab pots in the Bay has been growing for a decade, and a new report for the first time attempts to estimate their Baywide impact. It found that more than 145,000 pots litter the bottom of the Bay — a number the report authors consider to be conservative.

Each year, the report estimated that those pots kill about 3.3 million crabs, 3.5 million white perch, 3.6 million Atlantic croaker, and smaller numbers of other species, including ducks, diamondback terrapins and striped bass.

The number of crabs killed amounts to 4.5 percent of the 2014 Baywide harvest, the report said. Nor is the problem limited to the Bay. Studies have found similar problems with fisheries that use “trap” devices to catch crabs and lobsters globally.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

Got brook trout? Then you’ve also got a healthy stream

November 2, 2016 — “A wild trout in its native habitat is a compact example of the Earth working well.” — Christopher Camuto

The brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) is a small, brilliantly colored freshwater fish native to clear, cold streams and rivers in the headwaters of the Bay watershed. It’s also the state fish of New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.

Brook trout are recognized by their dark green back covered with lighter, worm-shaped markings. These markings, resembling the pattern created when the sun shines through rippled water, help to camouflage brook trout from predators such as larger fish and herons and even fly fishers. Bluish sides are sprinkled with yellow spots and red spots surrounded by blue halos. The brook trout’s fins are starkly edged in white, which again is unique among other common trout.

These fish thrive in clear, silt-free, well-shaded freshwater streams with numerous pools and a substrate made of mixed gravel, cobble and sand. Because brook trout are not tolerant of water temperatures above 75 degrees Fahrenheit, they are rarely found in developed areas.

Brook trout are not picky eaters and eat a wide variety of food. Opportunistic feeders, they will eat whatever they can find, including: aquatic insects, like mayflies, caddisflies and stoneflies; land insects that fall into the water, like ants and beetles; small crayfish; and even small fish and minnows, but only when they are easy to catch.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

Chesapeake Bay Foundation Shamefully Fundraises off of Inaccurate Menhaden Claims

October 28, 2016 — The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

A September 27 fundraising email from Rob Beach, the Director of Community Building and Digital Media at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, misrepresented accepted scientific conclusions about the health of the menhaden stock in the Chesapeake Bay in order to gain funding for the organization.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation repeatedly described menhaden in the Bay as being “under threat from industrial fishing.” The most recent science on Atlantic menhaden shows that this is wrong.

In 2012, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC), which manages Atlantic menhaden, released the species’ latest updated stock assessment. Due to problems with the assessment model, the assessment suggested the menhaden stock was being overfished, a conclusion that has subsequently been found to be incorrect. As a result of this flawed assessment, the ASMFC slashed the annual menhaden catch by 20% as a precautionary measure.

Between 2012 and 2015, the menhaden stock assessment model was thoroughly reevaluated and updated with new tools and information that was previously unavailable. Consequently, when the 2015 benchmark stock assessment was released, it had reached a far different conclusion. It found that menhaden are neither overfished nor experiencing overfishing. This is a pattern that held for decades: in the assessment’s analysis, menhaden have not been overfished for nearly a half-century. Furthermore, the assessment found fishing mortality to be at an all-time low. This is especially significant, as it means that the impact of the commercial menhaden fishery is at its lowest point, and that regulators are already successfully managing the fishery.

In an effort to purposely mislead, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation claims that increasing the menhaden quota would change that reality. The science tells a different story. Recently, the ASMFC ran a comprehensive series of simulations to test the potential impact of various quota raises. The Commission concluded that raising the quota as high as 40% has a 0% chance of leading to overfishing.

Chesapeake Bay Foundation staff regularly attends meetings of the ASMFC; in fact, the group’s Director of Fisheries, Bill Goldsborough, has served in various roles with the ASMFC for nearly 25 years. It is shameful this fundraising campaign knowingly perpetuates misconceptions and inaccuracies about the health of a significant Bay fishery. It is using false fear to spur contributions.

Fearmongering for financial gain should be beneath the dignity of an organization that claims to be dedicated to “science-based solutions.”

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition
The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition is a collective of menhaden fishermen, related businesses, and supporting industries. Comprised of over 30 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.

VIRGINIA: VIMS developing tool to help anglers avoid unproductive ‘dead-zone’ water

August 26, 2016 — The Chesapeake Bay is often plagued with oxygen-poor “dead zones.” These dead zones occur more frequently in the warmer months of the peak fishing season.

These low-oxygen areas are avoided by fish. It would help anglers to know where these zones are so that they can avoid them also. The Virginia Institute of Marine Science is developing a tool to help with that. The VIMS’ daily dead-zone forecast will help anglers avoid unproductive water.

Read the full story at the Daily Press

Maryland aquaculture leasing streamlined

August 19, 2016 — Federal regulators unveiled this week a new, “more streamlined” process by which Maryland oyster farmers can lease places in the Chesapeake Bay for raising their shellfish.

The revised permitting procedures announced by the Baltimore District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers come in response to long-voiced complaints from oyster farmers – backed up by Maryland’s U.S. senators – about delays and red tape in obtaining aquaculture leases.

The Corps said it is replacing a regional general permit, which it issued in 2011, with what it calls a Nationwide permit, which the agency says provides a “more streamlined” way to authorize new aquaculture activities.

The new process, which took effect Aug. 15, includes allowing unlimited acreage to be leased, and speeding up handling of proposed aquaculture projects by having federal and state officials review plans at the same time rather than sequentially.

Until now, oyster farmers were limited to leasing 50 acres if raising shellfish loose on the bottom, five acres if rearing them in cages and three acres if keeping them in floats near the water surface. If a grower wanted more, he or she had to apply for an individual permit, which required more review, more public notice and a hearing.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal