Saving Seafood

Regulators approve Maine elver quota

October 24, 2017 — NORFOLK, Va. — Interstate fisheries regulators voted last week to approve Maine’s elver landings quota for another year.

Meeting in Norfolk, Va., on Oct. 17, the American Eel Board of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission authorized Maine harvesters to land up to 9,688 pounds of elvers during the upcoming 2018 fishing season. That is the same quota the fishery has operated under for the past three years.

They also initiated an addendum to consider alternative allocations, management triggers and coastwide caps relative to the current management program for both the yellow and glass eel commercial fisheries starting with the 2019 fishing season.

Back in 2014, for the first time, the ASMFC established a quota for Maine’s glass eel (elver) landings. The quota governed the 2015 through 2017 fishing seasons. The regulators agreed to review that quota allocation before the 2018 season.

Read the full story at the Mount Desert Islander 

 

Elvers and out: Fishing season likely to end early

May 18, 2016 — Last year, legislative haggling delayed the start of the elver fishing season, cold weather delayed the arrival of elvers in Maine streams and by the time the season closed at the end of May harvesters still had not landed the total allowable quota of baby eels.

This year, the season was extended for a week to give the fishermen a better shot of filling their quotas, but the elvers paid no heed to the extension and were among the earliest snowbirds returning to Maine. One result of their early arrival is that it is likely that the Department of Marine Resources will shut the fishing season down several weeks early because the federally mandated annual harvest quota has been filled.

Two years ago, at the behest of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, the state adopted a statewide 9,688-pound overall landings quota for the elver fishery. The Legislature further allocated that quota among harvesters licensed by DMR and harvesters from each of the state’s four recognized Indian tribes.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American