Saving Seafood

Stock Assessment Update Indicates River Herring Remain Depleted on a Coastwide Basis Though Improvements Have Occurred in Several River Systems

August 4, 2017 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Shad and River Herring Management Board reviewed the results of the 2017 River Herring Assessment Update, which indicates river herring remain depleted and at near historic lows on a coastwide basis. The “depleted” determination was used instead of “overfished” and “overfishing” because many factors, not just directed and incidental fishing, are contributing to the low abundance of river herring.

Alewife and blueback herring (collectively referred to as river herring) are anadromous species, spending the majority of their life at sea and returning to their natal streams to spawn. While at sea, mixing is believed to occur among multiple river-specific stocks and the incidental catch of river herring in non-targeted ocean fisheries is known to include both immature and mature fish.

The stock assessment update applied the same approaches used in the previous benchmark stock assessment with the incorporation of additional years of data (2011-2015). Of the 54 river herring stocks for which data were available, 16 experienced increasing abundance trends, 2 experienced decreasing abundance trends, 8 experienced stable abundance, 10 experienced no discernible trends in abundance due to high variability, and 18 did not have enough data to assess recent abundance trends (see Table 1, below).

While status on a coastwide basis remains unchanged, there are some positive signs of improvement for some river systems, with increasing abundance trends for a number of rivers in the Mid-Atlantic throughout New England region. While abundance in these river systems are still at low levels, dam removals and improvements to fish passage have had a positive impact on run returns. Since the completion of the 2012 assessment, NOAA Fisheries in partnership with the Commission have worked to provide state and local agencies with restoration project funding, leading to dam removals and fish passage improvement projects.

River herring are managed through Amendment 2 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Shad and River Herring, with the goal of conserving and protecting river herring along the coast. The Amendment prohibited state waters commercial and recreational fisheries beginning January 1, 2012, unless a state or jurisdiction had a Sustainable Fishery Management Plan (SFMP) approved by the Board. SFMPs must clearly demonstrate that the state’s or jurisdiction’s river herring fisheries meet sustainability targets which must be achieved and maintained. Amendment 2 also required states to implement fisheries-dependent and independent monitoring programs, and contains recommendations to member states and jurisdictions to conserve, restore, and protect critical river herring habitat. As of June 1, 2017, the Shad and River Herring Management Board approved sustainable fishery management plans for Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, and South Carolina. Upon receiving the results of the Stock Assessment Update, the Board did not take any management action at this time.

For a more detailed overview of the River Herring Stock Assessment Update go here –http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file/598371e1RiverHerringAssessmentUpdateOverview_Aug2017.pdf.  The Overview is intended to aid media and interested stakeholders in better understanding the Commission’s stock assessment results and process.  The River Herring Stock Assessment Update will be available on the Commission website, www.asmfc.org, on the Shad and River Herring webpage under stock assessment reports. For more information, please contact Kirby Rootes-Murdy, Senior Fishery Management Coordinator, at krootes-murdy@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.        

Maine’s river herring making dramatic comeback, a godsend for the food chain

July 17, 2017 — Motorists crossing the bridge over the Kennebec this spring and early summer were afforded dramatic views of one of Maine’s mightiest rivers, a chain of islands and warships under construction at Bath Iron Works.

But one of the most awesome sights was hidden from view: millions of fish swimming under the bridge in a pilgrimage from the Atlantic Ocean to their spawning grounds in lakes, rivers and ponds scattered over hundreds of square miles of southern, central and western Maine.

River herring – in the midst of a dramatic comeback in Maine’s rivers with the recent removal of dams that blocked their spawning runs for decades – had a banner spring run this year, with millions of fish traveling up the Kennebec and Penobscot and the best run in decades recorded on the St. Croix. This was despite heavy rains this spring that created extra challenges for the fish.

The recovery of the small schooling fish is having dramatic secondary effects, as they represent a perfect food source for everything from bald eagles to Atlantic cod, and researchers anticipate future benefits as the herring’s numbers grow in the coming decade.

“You just don’t expect ecosystems to bounce back so quickly,” says Joshua Royte, a conservation scientist at The Nature Conservancy in Maine, which played a key role in a collaborative project to remove the Penobscot dams. “These rivers are coming back gangbusters and there will be children growing up now who will never know there was a time when you couldn’t run out to see fish running in these rivers.”

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

 

Is having a special week in Seattle enough to make Alaska herring cool again?

July 5, 2017 — Last week in Seattle, one kind of Alaska fish was served in dozens of restaurants around the city. It was in everything from pâté to tacos and piled high on open-faced sandwiches. One chef even used a pickled piece as a cocktail garnish. 

But it wasn’t Alaska’s famous wild sockeye salmon or Pacific halibut. It was Alaska herring — a small, oily fish — and it was all part of the third annual Alaska Herring Week in Seattle.

It’s part of an effort by a group of fishermen and the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute to try and revitalize a small Western Alaska fishery, which has been declining over the last decade.

Alaska Herring Week event coordinator Zachary Lyons said 54 restaurants and four grocery stores in the Seattle area participated in Herring Week this year. It started in 2015 with just eight restaurants, and 33 participated in 2016. This year’s event included The Whale and the Carpenter and Bar Melusine, restaurants both associated with Renee Erickson, winner of the 2016 James Beard Best Chef Northwest Award.

Lyons, who spent last week eating herring at up to five restaurants a day, said some consider the fish old-fashioned, destined to be canned or pickled on a shelf at the grocery store. But there are other culinary uses for the fish. Herring flesh cooks into a rich brown color and has a light fish flavor, similar to trout. No two herring dishes he ate during the week were alike, Lyons said.

“It’s really versatile,” he said. “It’s amazing to see what people are doing with it.”

Read the full story at Alaska Dispatch News

This year, a welcome switch on bait supply for Maine lobstermen

June 29, 2017 — Maine lobstermen are hitting the water late this year because of cold weather, but without the cloud of a looming bait crisis hanging over them.

Bait freezers along the coast are full of herring and pogies, and even alewives, which means that bait is not only available, it is also much less expensive than last year when herring cost as much as 60 cents a pound, said Pat Keliher, commissioner of the state Department of Marine Resources. This year the lobstermen’s go-to bait costs about half as much.

That’s still not a great price, Keliher said. Herring fetched about 18 cents a pound at the start of the 2015 lobstering season.

“I won’t say we’re in great shape, but we are in a heck of a lot better shape than we were last year,” Keliher said.

He attributed the strong start to basic supply-and-demand economics. When the supply of bait fish is high and demand is low, lobstermen do well.

Fishermen caught herring in the deep waters off Georges Bank earlier this year than they did in 2016, Keliher said. Although they’ve landed a little more than last year – about 19.9 percent of their quota, compared with 19.1 percent at the same time last year, according to this week’s federal landing reports – this year’s catch came early enough in the season to keep prices low.

The inshore herring fishery in the Gulf of Maine opened this month. The state is applying the same restrictions it implemented last year to stretch out this local supply of fresh herring deep into the summer, when the lobster season starts to peak. These measures include weekly landing limits, a limit on how many days a week herring can be landed, and a prohibition on the use of carrier-only fishing vessels.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Atlantic Herring Area 1A Trimester 2 Effort Controls and Meeting Notice

June 28, 2017 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s (Commission) Atlantic Herring Section members from Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts revised the effort control measures for the 2017 Area 1A Trimester 2 (June 1 – September 30) fishery as follows. The revised measures are underlined. Please note the time and passcode for the next Days Out Meeting on July 12th have changed. The meeting will begin at 1:30 PM and the new passcode is 222918.

Days Out of the Fishery

  • Vessels with a herring Category A permit that have declared into the Trimester 2 Area 1A fishery may land herring four (4) consecutive days a week. One landing per 24 hour period. Vessels are prohibited from landing or possessing herring caught from Area 1A during a day out of the fishery.
    • Landing days in New Hampshire and Massachusetts begin on Monday of each week at 12:01 a.m.
    • Landings days in Maine begin on Sunday of each week at 6:00 p.m.
  • Small mesh bottom trawl vessels with a herring Category C or D permit that have declared into the Trimester 2 fishery may land herring seven (7) consecutive days a week.

Weekly Landing Limit

  • Vessels with a herring Category A permit may harvest up to 600,000 lbs (15 trucks) per harvester vessel, per week.
  • 80,000 lbs out of the 600,000 lb weekly limit can be transferred to a carrier vessel (see below).

At-Sea Transfer and Carrier Restrictions (no changes were made)

The following applies to harvester vessels with a herring Category A permit and carrier vessels landing herring caught in Area 1A to a Maine, New Hampshire or Massachusetts port.

  • A harvester vessel cannot transfer herring at-sea to another catcher vessel.
  • A harvester vessel is limited to making at-sea transfers to only one carrier vessel per week.
  • Carrier vessels are limited to receiving at-sea transfers from one catcher vessel per week and can land once per 24 hour period. A carrier vessel may land up to 80,000 lbs
  • (2 trucks) per week.  The carrier limit of 2 trucks is not in addition to the harvester weekly landing limit. Carrier vessel: a vessel with no gear on board capable of catching or processing fish. Harvester vessel: a vessel that is required to report the catch it has aboard as the harvesting vessel on the Federal Vessel Trip Report.

The initial Area 1A sub-annual catch limit (ACL) is 31,115 metric tons (mt) after adjusting for a carryover from 2015 and the research set-aside. The Section allocated 72.8% of the sub-ACL to Trimester 2 and 27.2% to Trimester 3. After incorporating the 295 mt fixed gear set-aside and the 8% buffer (Area 1A closes at 92% of the sub-ACL) the seasonal quotas are 20,625 mt for Trimester 2 and 7,706 mt for Trimester 3.

These effort controls are projected to extend the Trimester 2 fishery through mid-September. Landings will be monitored closely and the fishery will be adjusted to zero landing days when the trimester’s quota is projected to be reached.

The Atlantic Herring Section members from Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts are scheduled to reconvene via conference call to review fishing effort the following days:

  • Wednesday, July 12 at 1:30 PM
  • Wednesday, July 26 at 10:00 AM
  • Wednesday, August 9 at 10:00 AM

To join the calls, please dial 888.394.8197 and enter passcode 222918 as prompted.

Fishermen are prohibited from landing more than 2,000 pounds of Atlantic herring per trip from Area 1A until June 4 or 5, 2017, depending on the state.  Please contact Ashton Harp, Atlantic Herring Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at aharp@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740 for more information.

Following the Fish: Where New England’s Catch Goes and Why It Matters

June 20, 2017 — The following was released by NOAA:

Ever wonder where the fish landed at the dock ends up, and what it is used for? For some species the trip is short and direct and for one purpose, while other species travel thousands of miles to their final destination and have multiple uses. Besides food for humans, seafood could be used as bait for other fisheries, in pet food, as fertilizer, or in nutraceuticals – products derived from a food source that claim to have a health benefit.

As the public becomes more interested in where the food they eat comes from, NEFSC’s social scientists have followed the fishery supply chain from harvest to its final destination. They looked at where fish and other seafood are caught, where they go after they are landed, how they get there, and what they are used for. Following the fish means following a route that can be local, regional, national or international, depending on the species. It leads to a better understanding of the sustainability of regional fisheries and their social, economic and cultural relationships.

“Many fish species caught in New England are primarily used for food,” said Patricia Pinto da Silva, a social policy specialist in the Center’s Social Sciences Branch and one of the study authors. “Some are processed and distributed nationally and internationally, such as scallops, while others are sold in parts or whole in more limited markets, such as monkfish. Groundfish is one of the few fisheries that is primarily consumed regionally.”

Pinto da Silva and colleagues looked at species in the New England Fishery Management Council’s fishery management plans. They examined self-reported fisheries data and data collected by at-sea observers as well as data from dealers. They also spoke with fishermen, seafood dealers, staff at processing plants and others with knowledge of different aspects of the fishery, including harvest, processing and distribution.

Current and historical Information about each fishery, the gear types used, its supply chain, emerging markets, and how the information was gathered and from whom were included in a summary of each fishery along with a map of its supply chain. The only exception was American lobster, due to a lack of the kind of data that were available for the other fisheries.

“This study is a first step in characterizing New England fisheries, including where fish are caught, what they are used for, and where they go once they are landed,” Pinto da Silva said. “We did not include aquaculture or the regional recreational harvest, which is something we would like to do in the future.”

Fish caught in New England vary widely in where they are sold and how they are used. Monkfish, for example, is primarily sold as a food fish, and largely destined for an international market. Vessels supply a small domestic market through restaurants, wholesalers and small retail fish markets, but most monkfish is exported to Europe and Asia by container ship and airplane, with parts of the fish sold for different uses in different countries.

Atlantic herring, once a canned food product supporting a regional canning industry that has since disappeared, is now primarily used as bait for the regional lobster fishery. Some herring is also used as bait in the tuna or longlining fisheries, and a few herring are pickled or smoked for specialty products or sold as pet food.

One of the highest valued fisheries in the nation, Atlantic sea scallops are sold as food in domestic and international markets. Most are shucked at sea and generally only the adductor muscle is harvested and sold.  Only a small percentage of landings remain in the region, where local dealers sell directly to the public and to small regional retailers and restaurants. More often, large scallop processors sell directly to large industrial food companies that sell to grocery stores and restaurants nationwide. Flash-frozen scallops are sold to domestic and European export markets.

Many of New England’s groundfish, including cod, haddock, pollock and several flounders, are used as food fish, sold to local restaurants and fish markets and to domestic grocery stores. Depending on the species, groundfish that stays local travels from the boat to a dealer to fish markets, local restaurants and community supported fisheries.

Most of the groundfish caught in the Northeast stays in the Northeast, but it is also trucked to large seafood markets on the East Coast or shipped by air to the Midwest and other distant markets. Processors export some groundfish species to Europe, Canada and Japan for use there or to be processed and re-imported to the U.S. Use varies by species, but includes processing as fillets, for fish and chips, salted or smoked, or used for bait, in pet food, fertilizer or in nutraceuticals.

While many fish species are landed in the Northeast, the high demand for fish means much of it is imported from other countries, or caught in the U.S., exported to another country for processing, then imported back into the U.S. for sale.

“More than 90 percent of the fish consumed in the U.S. is imported, much of it farm-raised or aquacultured salmon and shrimp, and canned tuna,” Pinto da Silva said.  “In some ways we know more about tracing our imports than we do about the fish caught in our own federal waters. This study was an attempt to describe the broader food system in the region beyond harvesting so we are more aware of all the connections between fishing, markets, and communities and can begin to address the socially-valued outcomes from fisheries management.”

In addition to Pinto da Silva, other authors of the study were Julia Olson, Sharon Benjamin, Ariele Baker and Meri Ratzel from the NEFSC’s Social Sciences Branch.

Read the full release here

NEFSC Seeks Atlantic Herring, Sea Scallop SAW Working Group Applicants

June 22, 2017 — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:

The Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC) is seeking qualified applicants to serve on two different Stock Assessment Workshop (SAW) Working Groups for upcoming benchmark stock assessments for Atlantic herring and Atlantic sea scallops.  The deadline for submitting questionnaires for use in the selection process is June 30, 2017.

RESPONSIBILITIES:  The SAW is a formal scientific peer review process for evaluating and presenting stock assessment results.  SAW Working Groups prepare benchmark stock assessments that are peer reviewed by a Stock Assessment Review Committee and then published.  

BENCHMARKS:  The benchmark stock assessments for Atlantic herring and Atlantic sea scallops will be conducted in the first half of 2018.  Preparations are underway.

SELECTION PROCESS:  The Northeast Regional Coordinating Committee (NRCC) recently developed new guidelines related to the formation of SAW Working Groups and the selection of participants.  As part of the new format, all candidates — other than the Working Group chair and lead stock assessment scientist — now are required to fill out a questionnaire.  The questionnaires will be used to guide the rest of the selection process.  Final selections will be made by a NRCC selection committee.

CRITERIA:  The selection committee will consider, among other criteria, the independence, expertise, and education of candidates.  The size, composition, and balance of the SAW Working Groups also are factors.  NEFSC stated, “Effective assessment workgroups typically consist of 4-8 members with a broad range of skills and proficiency and should include individuals from several disciplines.  Applicant qualifications should be directly relevant to the particular stock they wish to assess.”

TIMELINE:  The deadline for submitting completed questionnaires is June 30, 2017.  A short list of selected SAW Working Group candidates is expected to be announced by July 11, 2017.  The NRCC will review the short list and make final recommendations to the science center.  A public announcement of the final decisions and working group compositions is targeted for July 24, 2017.

APPLICATION QUESTIONNAIRE:  Additional information and the application questionnaire are available at SAW Working Groups.

QUESTIONS:  Completed forms should be emailed to Sheena Steiner at sheena.steiner@noaa.gov.  Sheena also is available by phone at (508) 495-2177 to answer questions. 

Hundreds of dead fish prompt call for changes at Ellsworth dam

June 16, 2017 — River herring are dying in droves this month in Ellsworth after passing through Leonard Lake Dam, according to a Maine conservation group calling for safer passage for the fish.

“Community members have reported seeing hundreds of dead fish floating down stream below the dam and the Route 1 bridge on multiple occasions over the past 12 days,” said Brett Ciccotelli of the Downeast Salmon Federation. “Dead fish have been seen as far downstream as the city’s Harbor Park.”

Some of those fish appeared to have parts chopped off, while others suffered slashes across their sides or were missing eyes, indicating they struck turbines in the dam, according to the group.

The federation says “thousands” of adult river herring have been killed since early this month while returning from their spawning grounds farther upriver. The group made similar claims following another large-scale fish kill back in October.

“Their life history — needing fresh water to lay their eggs and returning to the same rivers year after year — makes dams without safe downstream passage particularly dangerous to river herring,” Ciccotelli said.

Brookfield Renewables, the parent company that owns the Ellsworth dam, is in the midst of a five-year process for renewing its federal license for the dam for another 30 years.

Ciccotelli argued that one requirement of that renewal should be an upgrade to the fish passage through the dam to reduce the number of fish kills.

Brookfield did not immediately return messages Friday requesting comment.

In October, Brookfield said in a news release that it was “constantly working to minimize the potential environmental impacts associated with our operations and activities.”

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

Alaska city residents worry about herring population decline

May 25, 2017 — The value of commercial landings in Alaska was unchanged from 2014 to 2015, according to a federal report, but some popular fisheries such as herring were down.

The Peninsula Clarion says the report released this month by the National Marine Fisheries Service shows the value of all commercially fished species in the North Pacific was $1.7 billion in 2015, virtually unchanged from the previous year.

The salmon market remains troubled because of an ongoing embargo on selling to Russia and was down 24 percent from 2014.

The value of the herring fishery was down 39 percent and also hurt by the Russia embargo. The Clarion reports a cut in the Sitka Sound herring sac roe fishery by about half affected total landing values.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at KTVA

What did your lobster eat before you ate your lobster? And why should you care?

May 23, 2017 — If you like lobster – and care about maintaining the fishery as both a cultural and economic resource in Maine – should you care what it ate before it made it to your plate?

Lobsters get a bad rap for being scavengers, says veterinarian scientist Robert C. Bayer, executive director of the University of Maine’s Lobster Institute in Orono. In fact, they have rather discerning chemosensory apparatus housed in the short antennae on their heads and tiny sensing hairs all over their bodies.

With a sense of smell more akin to a dog’s than a human’s, lobsters can sniff out a single amino acid that tags their favorite food. For Maine lobsters, that’s herring. So lobstermen favor it as bait up and down the coast.

In 2016 the state’s lobster fishery hit record numbers in volume (over 130 million pounds) and value ($530 million). With so many traps in play, herring became the second-most valuable fishery in Maine, weighing in at $19 million last year. The hike in its value corresponded with the demand from hungry lobsters just as there was a drop off in herring landings in New England.

Earlier this month, interstate marine fisheries regulators approved new rules to avoid another bait shortage. To space out the catch, herring fishermen are now subject to a weekly limit on the amount they can bring to shore. Bayer says it takes one pound of herring to produce one pound of lobster. That same input/output ratio, when used in fin fish aquaculture, has been rendered an unsustainable practice.

Read the full story at CentralMaine.com