Saving Seafood

Virginia Menhaden Fishery Welcomes VIMS Dean Derek Aday’s Call for Science to Guide Chesapeake Bay Decisions

November 6, 2026 — Dr. Derek Aday, director and dean of William & Mary’s Virginia Institute of Marine Science and the Batten School of Coastal & Marine Sciences, has offered a thoughtful and timely call for rigorous, unbiased science to guide decisions about Atlantic menhaden and the Chesapeake Bay.

In a column in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Aday described how research supported by Virginia’s newly approved budget will help scientists and managers better understand menhaden abundance, their availability to predators and fishing patterns in the Bay.

“The Chesapeake Bay is too important to manage by assumption,” Aday wrote.

“Dr. Aday has put the focus exactly where it belongs: on rigorous, independent science that can give decision-makers the information they need,” said Monty Deihl, CEO of Ocean Harvesters. “We appreciate his leadership and his recognition that these decisions affect both the Chesapeake Bay and the lives and livelihoods of coastal Virginians. The men and women who work on the Bay want healthy waters, strong fisheries and decisions grounded in sound science, and we are grateful to Dr. Aday and the scientists at VIMS and the Batten School for their commitment to finding answers.”

His message deserves the attention of everyone participating in the menhaden debate. Aday brings scientific expertise, a commitment to independent research and an appreciation of the stakes for Virginia’s fisheries and coastal communities. His clear explanation of why reliable data matter offers a constructive path forward for the Bay and the people who depend on it.

Aday’s leadership and the work at VIMS and the Batten School are welcome. His call for rigorous, independent science reinforces why policymakers should allow the research supported by Virginia, the federal government and the menhaden industry to be completed before imposing further restrictions on a fishery that supports working families and communities across the Northern Neck—especially since Draft Addendum II does not establish a biological problem that its proposed restrictions would solve.

Aday points to the long-term research behind the management of blue crabs and the restoration of eelgrass and bay scallops as examples of the value of establishing baselines, measuring results and letting evidence guide decisions. His column makes a compelling case for bringing that same commitment to the questions surrounding menhaden.

The menhaden industry has invested directly in finding answers. Through the Science Center for Marine Fisheries (SCEMFIS), the industry supports a research roadmap identifying practical methods and studies that can produce the information needed for a scientifically defensible Chesapeake Bay harvest cap. Scientists from the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, VIMS and NOAA are reviewing existing research and developing approaches for filling information gaps. That work, and the separately funded federal research and the Commonwealth of Virginia’s investment in VIMS research should be completed and their findings considered before additional restrictions are enacted.

The families who fish and process menhaden have a direct stake in the outcome. Their future depends on a healthy Bay, thriving fish and birds, and a sustainable fishery they can pass on to their children and grandchildren. For generations, the fishery has supported union jobs, wages and benefits for Northern Neck families, including many African American workers.

In a letter to Gov. Abigail Spanberger, Virginia NAACP President the Rev. Dr. Cozy Bailey urged the Commonwealth to maintain the existing Chesapeake Bay harvest cap while Virginia-funded scientific research is completed. He emphasized that the fishery provides wages, health insurance, retirement benefits and stability for African American workers and union families, and that comparable jobs cannot simply be assumed to replace them.

UFCW Local 400, which represents menhaden fishermen, has called on lawmakers and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission to refrain from additional Chesapeake Bay restrictions until ongoing research establishes their necessity. The union has also called for working people to have a voice in decisions affecting their livelihoods and communities.

Aday’s commitment to healthy waters, strong fisheries and decisions grounded in sound science is an example for everyone involved in the menhaden discussion. His leadership, and the work of scientists at VIMS and the Batten School, will help provide the answers needed to guide the Bay’s future.

About Ocean Harvesters

Ocean Harvesters owns and operates a fleet of more than 30 fishing vessels in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of America. The company’s purse-seine fishing operation is exclusively engaged in the harvest of menhaden, a small, nutrient-dense fish used to produce fish meal, fish oil, and fish solubles. Both its Atlantic and Gulf Menhaden fisheries are certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council. Committed to responsible fishing operations, Ocean Harvesters is proud to be heir to a fishing legacy that extends nearly 150 years.

Shark Finning Bans Aren’t Stopping Shark Mortality. Here’s Why.

November 5, 2026 — For decades, in some fisheries, the most valuable part of that animal was not its body… but its fins. A fisher would remove the fins, keep them and throw the rest of the shark back overboard in a practice known as “shark finning,” which is both wasteful and devastatingly painful for the animal on the receiving end of the blade. It did make economic sense in a grimly practical way, as fins took up far less space than whole sharks, leaving valuable room onboard for other species. But in a bid to end the cruel practice, global countries introduced regulations requiring sharks to be landed whole, with their fins naturally attached, attached to the carcass with ropes or wires, or landed according to prescribed fin-to-carcass ratios. On paper, this seems like a straightforward conservation solution. Stop finning, and you remove the incentive to kill sharks for their fins.

But what happens next? A new global analysis suggests the answer is not nearly as simple as we might hope.

Researchers examined shark trade across 188 countries between 2007 and 2020 using the Aquatic Resource Trade in Species, or ARTIS, database. Rather than looking only at whether countries had regulations, they asked if introducing shark-finning regulations actually changed how much shark product countries exported, imported or consumed. They then used a statistical approach called difference-in-differences, allowing them to compare countries before and after they introduced regulations with countries that had not yet introduced them. It is a useful way of getting closer to the question of causation rather than simply observing that two things happened at the same time. The headlining result is surprisingly undramatic: on average, finning regulations did not produce statistically significant changes in shark exports, imports or domestic consumption. Countries with regulations eventually exported about 351 metric tonnes less shark product per year than they might otherwise have been expected to export, while imports were about 142 tonnes higher. Domestic consumption was estimated to be lower by about 1,672 tonnes per year, but this effect was also not statistically significant.

Read the full article at Yahoo! News

Six Fish These Small Sound-Emitting Tags Are Helping Save

November 5, 2026 — An app tells beachgoers in Massachusetts and Maine if a shark has entered the area. Fishermen in Delaware check their phones to avoid accidentally catching endangered Atlantic sturgeon. Dwindling American shad, once cut off from their spawning grounds by dams, are returning in droves.

Each of these stories became possible in part because of tiny “acoustic telemetry” tags and a vast network of researchers deploying them along the East Coast of the U.S. With acoustic telemetry technology, each tag emits a unique, ultrasonic “ping.”  Along the Eastern seaboard, thousands of electronic receivers are listening for those pings, ready to detect any tagged animal that swims within about half a kilometer.

Researchers in the Atlantic Cooperative Telemetry Network, or “ACT” for short, have been tagging animals for over two decades. Now managed by the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, the network unites scientists from over 120 organizations from Maine to North Carolina. Together, they’ve tagged more than 17,000 animals and 92 species. By sharing data from all of their receivers, they’re making discoveries about animal movement no single team could have made on their own.

“Many fish migrate long distances,” says Matt Ogburn, a senior scientist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC). “The ACT Network supports researchers by making it easy and efficient to exchange data across projects as the fish they tagged move along the coast or even across oceans.”

This fall the network published a new paper, its first to highlight  how acoustic telemetry is shaping real-world conservation. From sturgeon to sharks (a lot of sharks), here are six fish the ACT scientists and their tags are helping preserve.

Read the full article at Smithsonian Magazine

US data shows shark depredation tripled in Gulf, Southeast Atlantic over 20 years

November 5, 2026 — A NOAA Fisheries analysis shows increased depredation by sharks in the Gulf of Mexico and the Southeast Atlantic.

The analysis looked at data from the Southeast Fisheries Science Center’s Bottom Longline Survey, which focuses on sharks, red snapper, yellowedge and red grouper, and golden tilefish from Brownsville, Texas, to Cape Hatteras, North Carolina.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Advancing Active Acoustics: How Scientists Use Sound to Monitor a Three-Dimensional Ocean

November 3, 2026 — The ocean is a three-dimensional world. Life moves vertically and horizontally through the water, often across large areas and at depths scientists cannot easily observe. Active acoustic technology gives researchers a tool to sample what’s hidden under the surface, gathering information that nets and other sampling gear cannot capture.

The use of sound to study the ocean is not new. After the Titanic sank in 1912, scientists and engineers began developing ways to use sound to detect shipwrecks and other objects beneath the surface. Fishermen soon found another use: Early underwater sounders could reveal where fish were. By the 1920s and 1930s, fishermen in Europe were using sounders to direct their fishing efforts.

What began as a practical fishing tool is now an important part of fisheries science. Today, our researchers use active acoustics to survey large areas of the ocean and study the distribution of fish and other organisms. The technology extends the reach of fisheries surveys and complements other forms of data collection, such as biological sampling. The resulting insights provide fisheries managers with the information needed to sustainably manage fish populations that support our nation’s seafood industries and the coastal economies that depend on them.

Dr. Michael Jech, a research fishery biologist at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center, has spent nearly three decades advancing the use of underwater acoustics. Since joining the center’s emerging acoustic program in 1998, his contributions to the field have helped refine techniques and expand their applications in fisheries research. “The trick is in the interpretation of the electronic signals,” Dr. Jech explains. “That challenge has shaped much of my career.”

Dr. Jech’s work helped launch acoustics from a specialized technology toward a broader tool for observing fish, plankton, and marine ecosystems. As the former chair of the international Working Group on Fisheries Acoustics, Science, and Technology, his work continues to connect Northeast fisheries research with the international acoustics community. For more than 50 years, the working group has brought together fisheries and plankton acoustics researchers from across the globe to advance methods, technology, and applications for active acoustic technology. Their most recent meeting convened researchers from 26 countries representing all inhabited continents.

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries

Satellite tagging offering NOAA better understanding of red king crab migration patterns

November 3, 2026 — Research led by NOAA Fisheries found that red king crab migrations off the coast of Alaska are impacted by environmental factors, implying that regulators need more flexible tools to effectively manage the species.

In order to research why red king crab populations in Bristol Bay, Alaska, U.S.A. were migrating at certain times of year, researchers conducted satellite tagging research from the late spring of 2021 to the fall of 2024.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

NOAA seeks public input on Gulf of Mexico fish spawning research permit

November 2, 2026 — NOAA Fisheries is seeking public input on a proposed cooperative research project that would study fish spawning aggregations throughout the Gulf of Mexico, including identifying key spawning locations and monitoring when and where commercially and recreationally important species gather to reproduce.

The agency is accepting comments through Nov. 12 on an application for an exempted fishing permit (EFP) that would allow participating commercial fishermen and recreational charter captains to conduct targeted sampling trips as part of the four-year research effort.

The project aims to verify, characterize, monitor and model multi-species fish spawning aggregations. Researchers hope the findings will help improve scientific understanding of spawning activity and provide information to support fisheries management decisions.

The proposed study would involve up to 120 sampling trips over four years, or approximately 30 trips annually. Trained professional captains would conduct the trips without scientists aboard, working as part of a designated study fleet.

The project also would establish advisory groups and work with fishermen to identify priority spawning locations for research. An initial group of potential sites was identified during a workshop funded through the Restore Science Program. Additional locations would be identified through meetings with small groups of fishermen in 2026 and 2027, as well as throughout the project using information from monitoring databases, bathymetric data, published and unpublished research, seasonal patterns and fishermen’s knowledge.

Read the full story at Gulf Coast Media

MAINE: Maine plans survey around offshore wind sites

October 30, 2026 — The Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR) is planning a winter bottom trawl survey around the state’s long-planned offshore wind energy research project, aiming to understand how floating wind turbines may affect the ocean ecosystem and commercial fishing.

After major offshore wind proposals succumbed to opposition from the Trump administration, the modest Maine Research Array Wind Energy Area – a lease area of almost 15,000 acres in the Gulf of Maine – remains in limbo, since a potential developer bowed out in March 2026 over that uncertainty about federal policy.

Maine researchers are still working to build a knowledge base around future wind power and fisheries.

The 55-foot dragger Northern Lights is scheduled to set out from Portland to work from around Jan. 11 through Feb. 28, with 37 sampling tows over nine days. The time frame is weather-dependent and could extend into March, according to an agency statement.

The sampling will help researchers examining fish and invertebrate populations “to establish baseline data that they will then compare with findings collected during the construction and operation” of a floating turbine array, according to the DMR.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Satellite Tags Reveal Red King Crab Migrations Are Linked to Environmental Conditions

October 30, 2026 — The Bristol Bay red king crab fishery was once one of the largest and most valuable crab fisheries in the world, but it collapsed in the early 1980s. Managers established closure areas to help the population rebound, but the boundaries of these closure areas are fixed and cannot adapt to changing environmental conditions and shifting crab distributions. Previous research has documented northward movements of the Bristol Bay red king crab population. Changes in their seasonal migration patterns may limit the effectiveness of static closure areas like the Red King Crab Savings Area.

In response to this pressing management need, a new satellite tagging study tracked and modeled movements of mature male red king crab in Bristol Bay from late spring through the fall during 2021–2024. The research team’s “movement models” predicted that red king crab generally moved to the west or southwest by the fall—into deeper and cooler areas in central Bristol Bay. In years with warmer bottom water temperatures, crab moved further west. The model’s predictions were validated by commercial catches from the fall Bristol Bay red king crab fishery and researchers are currently applying this approach to other seasons.

Future applications in the winter and spring may provide important insights about movements during mating and molting. These are the times of the year when the crab are more vulnerable. This information will help fishery managers evaluate current closure area boundaries and inform future boundary changes that may be needed to better align with present and projected seasonal migration patterns.

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries

US State Department launches university-led Fish Innovation Lab

October 30, 2026 — The U.S. Department of State has launched a new Fish Innovation Lab led by Mississippi State University’s (MSU) Global Center for Aquatic Health and Food Security (GCAHFS).

Starting with USD 8 million (EUR 7.2 million) in federal funding for the first year of the five-year award, the lab will focus on developing and scaling research-based solutions for improving aquatic food systems.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource