flounder Archives - Page 22 of 23

Revised Supplemental Materials for the February 2, 2016 Summer Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass Management Board Meeting

January 28, 2016 — The following was released by Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

Supplemental materials document for the Summer Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass Management Board has been revised to include Draft Addendum XXVII for Public Comment (PDF pgs 7-36) and the Technical Committee Report on 2016 Black Sea Bass Recreational Fishery Proposals (PDF pgs 122-134). The supplemental materials link for that Board has been revised on the 2016 Winter Meeting page (http://www.asmfc.org/home/2016-winter-meeting) and is available at http://www.asmfc.org/files/Meetings/2016WinterMtg/SummerFlounderScupBlackSeaBassBoardSupplemental_revised.pdf. The combined file of all board/section supplemental meeting materials has also been revised and can be accessed at http://www.asmfc.org/files/Meetings/2016WinterMtg/SupplementalCombined_revised.pdf.

BANGOR DAILY NEWS: How a groundfish disaster today can spawn a different-looking fishery tomorrow

January 27, 2016 — The federal government declared the Northeast groundfish fishery a disaster in 2012. But disaster arguably struck the region’s groundfishing fleet, particularly in Maine, long before that.

In 1982, there were 328 vessels from Maine actively fishing for groundfish. By 2012, the number had fallen to 63 vessels participating in the first true industry that took root in colonial America — fishing for cod, haddock, flounder, pollock, hake and other ocean bottom dwellers. In 2014, 52 Maine vessels held groundfish permits.

The disaster declaration paved the way for Congress to provide disaster aid, and Congress followed suit in February 2014, granting $32.8 million to New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine.

But the funding the states have distributed so far has largely gone to those who have continued to land groundfish — not the dozens of vessels that have been forced out of the fishery, arguably those most affected by the fishery’s disastrous state. In Maine, 50 groundfish permit holders qualified for $32,500 each in disaster relief because they had caught at least 5,000 pounds of groundfish in at least one of the past four years.

In the coming weeks, Maine has a small opportunity to use its remaining disaster funds in a different way — to help set the groundfish fishery on a sustainable path for the future and make it a viable and affordable option for new and small players, including lobstermen looking to diversify beyond the booming crustacean.

Read the full editorial at Bangor Daily News

Supplemental Materials Now Available for ASMFC’s 2016 Winter Meeting

January 27, 2016 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

Supplemental meeting materials for the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s 2016 Winter Meeting have been posted at http://www.asmfc.org/home/2016-winter-meeting for the following Boards/Sections (click on “Supplemental” following each relevant committee header to access the information).

American Lobster Management Board – Preliminary Results of Claw Removal and its Impacts on Survivorship and Physiological Stress in Jonah crab (Cancer borealis) in New England Waters; NEFMC Correspondence on Jonah Crab Permit Holders; Jonah Crab Plan Review Team FMP Implementation Memo; MaineJonah Crab FMP Implementation Program

Atlantic Herring Section – Revised Draft Amendment 3 (please note this version has been revised from January 21^st draft); Public Hearing Summary; Written Comment (Summary and Submitted Comments); Advisory Panel Meeting Summary

Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass Management Board – Draft Addendum XXVII Public Hearing Summaries; Written Comment (Summary and Submitted Comments); Law Enforcement Committee Comments; General Public Comment

ACCSP Executive Committee (please note meeting materials are available through the main header not supplemental) – Draft Minutes from December 17, 2015; Draft Standard Operating Procedures; 2016 Meetings Calendar

ACCSP Coordinating Council (please note meeting materials are available through the main header not supplemental) – Draft Minutes from November 2, 2015

Executive Committee (please note these materials are the same as those provided for the ISFMP Policy Board) – Memo on Changes to Commission Guidance Documents; Draft ISFMP Charter; Draft Compact, Rules and Regulations; Draft Technical Support Group Guidance and Benchmark Assessment Process

Atlantic Menhaden Management Board – Law Enforcement Committee Report on Maryland and Potomac River Fisheries Commission Equivalency Proposals; Public Comment

Atlantic Sturgeon Management Board – 2016 FMP Review

Horseshoe Crab Management Board – Adaptive Resource Management Subcommittee Meeting Summary

Tautog Management Board – Decision Document for Draft Amendment 1; Law Enforcement Committee Report on Commercial Harvest Tagging Program Objectives

Winter Flounder Management Board – NEFMC Presentation on Overview of Federal Management Measures for Gulf of Maine and Southern New England/ Mid-Atlantic Stocks; Scientific and Statistical Committee Report

American Eel Management Board – Advisory Panel Report and Technical Committee Review on North Carolina’s Aquaculture Plan; Final version of North Carolina’s Aquaculture Plan; Public Comment

ISFMP Policy Board (please note these materials are the same as those provided for Executive Committee) – Memo on Changes to Commission Guidance Documents; Draft ISFMP Charter; Draft Compact, Rules and Regulations; Draft Technical Support Group Guidance and Benchmark Assessment Process

As a reminder, Board/Section meeting proceedings will be broadcast daily via webinar beginning at 9:00 a.m. on February 2^ndand continuing daily until the conclusion of the meeting (expected to be 3:45 p.m.) on February 4^th. The webinar will allow registrants to listen to board/section deliberations and view presentations and motions as they occur. No comments or questions will be accepted via the webinar. Should technical difficulties arise while streaming the broadcast, the boards/sections will continue their deliberations without interruption. We will attempt to resume the broadcast as soon as possible. To register for the webinar, please go to https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/86228471613051649.

Congressman Frank Pallone Calls for Less Restrictive Policies for Summer Flounder and Sea Bass

January 25, 2016 – The following was released by the office of Congressman Frank Pallone:

LONG BRANCH, NJ – Today, Congressman Frank Pallone, Jr. (NJ-06) sent a letter to Kirby Rootes-Murdy, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator for the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, regarding the Commission’s Draft Addendum XXVII to the Summer Flounder, Scup and Sea Bass Fishery Management Plan. In the letter, Pallone called for fair and less restrictive policies relating to two important fisheries in New Jersey: summer flounder and sea bass.

“My district has thousands of private anglers and attracts individual anglers from all over the nation. These anglers support local small businesses and drive the coastal economy of my home state,” Pallone wrote in the letter. “It is critical for New Jersey to receive fair treatment in the development of restrictions placed on key recreational species.”

Regarding summer flounder, Pallone requested that the Commission enable New Jersey to become its own region and allow anglers to have a more equitable size limit within the Delaware Bay area. With respect to sea bass, he expressed his support for a less restrictive quota than the proposed 23% reduction included in the draft addendum for recreational harvest. He also once again called for more reliable data collection to ensure that recreational anglers in New Jersey and along the Atlantic Coast have fair quotas based on sound science.

Read the full text of the letter here.

Public hearing set on fluke and sea bass regulations

January 4, 2016 — A public hearing on summer flounder and sea bass regulations will be held at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 7 at the Stafford Township Municipal Building.

What’s on the table is Draft Addendum XXVII to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Summer Flounder, Scup, Black Sea Bass Fishery Management Plan.

There will be a cutback of 30-percent of the coastwide harvest of summer flounder in 2016 from 23 million pounds to 16 million pounds but it may not impact recreational regulations because anglers fished under their 2015 quota.

Read the full story at Asbury Park Press

NORTH CAROLINA: Environmental issues roll into 2016

January 1, 2016 — Offshore drilling draws opponents

After a year of growing opposition from coastal communities against offshore drilling off the North Carolina coast, close watch will be kept on decisions in Washington in the upcoming year.

The Obama Administration is expected to release its proposed Atlantic oil leasing plan in early 2016.

To date, 93 communities along the Atlantic coast have gone on record against offshore oil and gas exploration activities.

That number includes several in the local area:

In Onslow County, the towns of Holly Ridge, Swansboro and Surf City have adopted resolutions.

In Carteret County, Emerald Isle, Morehead City and Beaufort have adopted resolutions opposing offshore drilling; and Atlantic Beach councilmen agreed to a resolution to be formally adopted this month. The Carteret County Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Development Authority have also taken a stance against it.

Read the full story at Jacksonville Daily News

More absurdness from the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries

December 31, 2015 — On January 1 we will have imposed on commercial fishermen (those who fish with nets) and people who like fresh seafood bought either from the local fish market or prepared in a local restaurant an example of the worst kind of government. That is, the imposition of regulations for the sake of regulation, without valid or reliable science or even common sense. The Division of Marine Fisheries will impose absurd regulations on the catching of flounder in North Carolina’s coastal waters.

The purpose of the regulations, plus the mission of the DMF in general in recent years, could be said to extinguish commercial fishing in the state’s waters.

Here’s how WECT-TV reports it:

The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission voted in late November to put new restrictions on catching Southern Flounder into place beginning Jan. 1, 2016.

Marine Fisheries Commission voting on new southern flounder regulations Thursday

Living on the Coast many of you enjoy catching and eating fresh southern flounder, but soon that fish might be harder to get. For almost a year, the Division of Marine Fisheries has been talking about changing the regulations on Southern Flounder.

Read the full opinion piece at Beaufort Observer

AUDIO: Cause of Action & Plaintiffs Discuss At-Sea Monitoring Lawsuit

December 10, 2015 (Saving Seafood) — This afternoon, Cause of Action, a government accountability organization “committed to ensuring that decisions made by federal agencies are open, honest, and fair,” held a media call with David Goethel and John Haran, the plaintiffs in a lawsuit filed against the Department of Commerce to overturn the Department’s decision to have the commercial fishing industry pay for the cost of at-sea monitoring.

According to Cause of Action, “a large majority” of the commercial fishing operations in New England “will be forced to shut down if the government forces those who fish for cod, flounder and other ‘ground fish’ to pay out of pocket for at-sea monitoring, a program the government has traditionally funded.” The industry is expected to begin paying for the cost of at-sea monitors sometime in 2016.

According to Cause of Action, NOAA estimates that up to 60 percent of the groundfish fleet will be unable to afford the cost of at-sea monitoring. Among other reasons for the challenge, Cause of Action noted that “Congress has directed NOAA to use its appropriated funding to cover the cost of these at-sea monitors,” and “NOAA is specifically required by statute to implement regulations that allow fishing communities sustainable prosperity and ‘minimize adverse economic impacts on such communities.'”

Listen to the call here

Overfishing is Getting Filleted by Markets

December 9, 2015 — Overfishing is a serious threat to the nearly 200 million people who depend on the world’s oceans for sustenance. After all, nearly one in five people around the world consume fish as their primary source of protein and overfishing has deleterious cascade effects on other marine ecosystems.

Illegal and excessive fishing are to a degree inevitable because oceans, rivers and many lakes are publicly administered. This gives fishermen an incentive to take from them as much as is legally possible. Yet, market-based resource management is offering a concrete solution to this “tragedy of the commons” and has already begun alleviating strains on U.S. fish stocks.

The U.S. economy is intertwined with the fate of the high seas. By conservative estimates, commercial and recreational fishing alone account for 1.3 million jobs and nearly $60 billion in economic activity. Overfishing has pernicious effects on Americans’ livelihoods: commercial anglers can lose out on up to 80 percent of potential revenue when local fish species see drastic population decline, as was the case in New England when cod, flounder, and halibut populations were unexpectedly low in 2009.

With market-based resource management, data from September 2015 show that the total number of wild stocks placed on the “overfishing” watch list has fallen to its all-time lowest level since 1997. Since the 2007 reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, annual catch limits (ACLs) have allowed the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to reduce the number of overfished U.S. stocks by nearly 75 percent since 2007 alone (from 41 in 2007 to only 10 in 2014). ACLs create total tonnage allotments based on a series of population growth factors specific to certain fish species.

Read the full story at Economics 21

Supplemental Materials Now Available for the ASMFC’s 74th Annual Meeting

October 27, 2015 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

Supplemental meeting materials for the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s 74^th Annual Meeting have been posted at http://www.asmfc.org/home/2015-Annual-Meeting for the following Boards/Sections (click on “Supplemental Material” following each relevant committee header to access information).

American Lobster Management Board – Report for the Southern New England (SNE) Subcommittee’s October 2^nd Meeting; Update on SNE Stock Projections Presented at the Subcommittee Meeting; Relationship Between Fishing Effort and Fishery Exploitation; Incidental Bycatch of Jonah Crab by Non-trap Gear; and Revised Advisory Panel Nominations

Atlantic Herring Section – Issues and Options Under Development and Consideration for Inclusion in Draft Amendment 3; Technical Report on Gonadal-Somatic Index-based Monitoring System for Atlantic Herring Closures; and Advisory Panel Meeting Summary

Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass Management Board – Delaware Bay Summer Flounder White Paper; Black Sea Bass Commercial Quotas; and 2015 FMP Reviews for Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass

Executive Committee – Executive Committee Recommended Changes to Commission Documents and Additional Issues for Consideration on Commission Guidance Documents

American Eel Management Board – Public Comment

Winter Flounder Management Board – Northeast Fisheries Science Center Stock Assessment Update on 20 Northeast Groundfish Stocks Through 2014 (This report has been modified to include information on winter flounder stocks only).

Atlantic Menhaden Management Board – Ecological Reference Point Recommendations for Draft Amendment 3 Development; Socioeconomic Study of Menhaden Fisheries – Request for Proposals Update; and Public Comment

Law Enforcement Committee – Revised Agenda

Tautog Management Board – Summary of Submitted Public Comment; Individual/Organization Comments; and Law Enforcement Subcommittee Review on Illegal Tautog Harvest

Spiny Dogfish Management Board – Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council Spiny Dogfish Motions and Selected Alternatives

Horseshoe Crab Management Board – 2015 FMP Review

South Atlantic State/Federal Fisheries Management Board – 2015 FMP Reviews for Spotted Seatrout and Spanish Mackerel

As a reminder, Board/Section meeting proceedings will be broadcast daily via webinar beginning at 8:00 a.m. on November 2^nd, continuing daily until the conclusion of the meeting (expected to be 1:45 p.m.) on November 5^th. The webinar will allow registrants to listen to the proceedings of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s management boards/sections during the Commission’s 74^th Annual Meeting, November 2-5, 2015. Registrants will also be able to view presentations and motions as they occur. For a detailed agenda and meeting materials, go to http://www.asmfc.org/home/2015-Annual-Meeting. No comments or questions will be accepted via the webinar. Should technical difficulties arise during the streaming of the broadcast, the boards/sections will continue their deliberations without interruption. We will attempt to resume the broadcast as soon as possible. Board/Section summaries, presentations, and audio files will be available at http://www.asmfc.org/home/2015-Annual-Meeting the week of November 9^th.

View a PDF of the Supplemental meeting materials here