Menhaden Fisheries Coalition Archives

Menhaden coalition warns Bay cuts could threaten fishing jobs

October 16, 2026 — The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition (MFC) is pushing back against a congressional effort to further restrict Atlantic menhaden harvest in the Chesapeake Bay, arguing that lawmakers should not make additional cuts before ongoing Bay-specific research is complete.

In an Oct. 15 statement, the coalition challenged an Oct. 9 letter led by Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., and Rep. Sarah Elfreth, D-Md., urging the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission to take additional action to protect menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay.

The coalition said further restrictions could significantly affect fishermen, processing workers, and communities tied to the Reedville, Va., reduction fishery. Ocean Harvesters and Omega Protein‘s Reedville operations provide approximately 250 to 300 jobs with benefits, according to the MFC.

The coalition also cited a review by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) Committee on Economics and Social Sciences that estimated more than 500 full- and part-time reduction fishery jobs in Maryland and Virginia, including hundreds in Northumberland County. The MFC said the Reedville workforce is predominantly minority and unionized, with many families having longstanding ties to the fishery.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Lawmakers Demand Menhaden Cuts Before Chesapeake Bay Science Is Complete, Ignoring Already Struggling Workers

October 16, 2026 – The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition is challenging an October 9 congressional letter, led by Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Representative Sarah Elfreth (D-Md.), urging the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) to impose additional restrictions on Atlantic menhaden fishing before critical Chesapeake Bay research has been completed.

The proposed restrictions threaten a predominantly minority, unionized workforce whose families have depended on the Reedville, Virginia fishery for generations. For more than a century, the industry has helped sustain Virginia’s Northern Neck communities, providing jobs that support families and send children to school and college. United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 400 has documented the importance of these jobs, including in a video featuring the fishermen themselves.

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) has raised concernsabout the disproportionate consequences of further restrictions for African American workers, union families and rural communities, calling for environmental stewardship and sound science alongside economic justice.

Ocean Harvesters and Omega Protein’s Reedville operations provide approximately 250 to 300 well-paying jobs with benefits. A review by the ASMFC’s own Committee on Economics and Social Sciences cites estimates of more than 500 full- and part-time reduction fishery jobs in Maryland and Virginia, including hundreds in Northumberland County. It also warns that further restrictions could threaten the viability of the entire Reedville operation.

The future of the menhaden fishery, and the families who depend on it, requires a healthy Chesapeake Bay. Nobody has a greater stake in protecting the Bay than the fishermen and processing workers whose livelihoods depend on it. The fishery has worked with regulators and scientists, adjusted its fishing practices, complied with regulatory harvest limits and supported new research to improve management.

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science confirms that scientists lack sufficient data to determine adult menhaden abundance or survival in the Chesapeake Bay. And there is no scientifically established Bay-specific harvest threshold or validated adult abundance index demonstrating that commercial fishing has depleted menhaden to an unsustainable level. Virginia has committed $2 million over two years to new Chesapeake Bay menhaden research. Senator Van Hollen helped secure another $2.5 million in federal funding for a Bay-specific menhaden survey. Yet he is now leading an effort to impose additional restrictions before the research he helped fund produces results.

Participants in the fishery are members of the Science Center for Marine Fisheries (SCEMFIS), a member of the National Science Foundation’s Industry-University Cooperative Research Centers program, and contributed financially to its Chesapeake Bay menhaden research roadmap. The roadmap identifies research needed to establish a scientifically defensible Bay harvest cap. The fishery is actively cooperating with researchers from the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, the Virginia Institute of Marine Science and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) as they develop that roadmap.

The congressional letter points to osprey breeding problems and declining Maryland bait landings as evidence of menhaden scarcity. Researchers have documented serious osprey reproductive problems, but have not established that commercial menhaden harvest caused them or that restricting the fishery would improve reproduction. Declining bait landings likewise do not establish declining Bay-wide abundance. Maryland fisheries scientists reported that explaining a recent decline in a local menhaden index through increased harvest would require an implausibly large increase in landings, suggesting other explanations, including migration, should be considered.

Maryland’s own Department of Natural Resources reported in October 2025 that juvenile Atlantic menhaden and bay anchovies were widespread in the Chesapeake Bay for the third consecutive year. The agency’s annual juvenile fish survey documented more than 36,000 fish representing 55 species. The survey does not measure adult abundance, but its findings challenge sweeping claims of Bay-wide scarcity.

The lawmakers call for ecosystem-based management, but the ASMFC already adopted ecological reference points (ERPs) in 2020, following years of work among the commercial fishery, recreational fishing interests, conservation organizations and scientists. Since 2021, those reference points have guided catch limits by accounting for the menhaden needed as prey. Striped bass was selected as the focal predator because the model found it most sensitive to menhaden harvest. The ASMFC’s 2025 ecosystem review also included osprey in the supporting full ecosystem model. The lawmakers have not explained why further restrictions would achieve benefits beyond this existing ecosystem-based system, or why it is inadequate.

Major recreational and conservation organizations helped advocate for the adoption of this system and publicly praised it when the ASMFC approved it. In an August 5, 2020 announcement, Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership President Whit Fosburgh called it a “landmark decision” and “a new era in fisheries management.” The American Sportfishing Association welcomed predator-sensitive quotas as “the science-based management we look for.” Coastal Conservation Association Maryland applauded “a more holistic approach,” and the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation called the decision a “significant step” in science-based fisheries management. The Marine Retailers Association of the Americas also endorsed the new approach. Their support explicitly extended to birds: a July 2020 coalition letter urging the ASMFC to adopt the reference points identified ospreys, bald eagles, common loons and brown pelicans among the species the new approach was intended to protect.

The ASMFC’s own ecological reference point analysis found that even ending all menhaden fishing would not, by itself, rebuild striped bass to its biomass target; sustainable recreational and commercial striped-bass fishing remains essential. And the ASMFC’s April 2025 Chesapeake Bay review analyzed eight datasets covering 298,232 striped bass and found, using Fulton’s Condition Factor, that the sampled fish “are not starving and would be considered healthy.” Their body condition does not directly measure menhaden abundance, but it provides strong evidence against widespread striped-bass starvation.

The signers of the congressional letter were misled into believing that Atlantic menhaden are overfished. The facts are clear: according to the ASMFC’s latest assessment, Atlantic menhaden are not overfished, and overfishing is not occurring. The Commission already reduced the coastwide catch limit by 20% for 2026. The Atlantic menhaden purse seine fishery is certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC). Whole Foods Market, an MSC partner since 1999, describes it as the world’s leading certification program for sustainable wild-caught seafood, involving independent review of fish populations, ecosystem impacts and responsible fishery management.

The existing Chesapeake Bay harvest cap was never based on a scientifically quantified biological threshold. During a May 2008 congressional hearing, then-ASMFC Executive Director Captain John “Vince” O’Shea reportedly described the cap as established “in response to a political problem” and said “there was not a science basis for the Cap,” as documented in published accounts of his testimony. His written testimony describes the cap as a precautionary response to public concern. In 2018, then-ASMFC Chairman James “Jim” Gilmore Jr., responding to Virginia’s appeal of the reduction to 51,000 metric tons, stated that “Leadership agrees the Amendment does not provide sufficient evidence to support such claims” — referring specifically to the argument that lowering the cap was necessary to protect the Bay as a nursery area. His statement is also reflected in the ASMFC’s published proceedings.

The lawmakers have not established that further restricting this fishery would produce those environmental benefits. The ASMFC should reject further Chesapeake Bay cap cuts and mandatory seasonal allocations until the research can establish their necessity and likely benefits. Hundreds of working families should not pay the price for restrictions unsupported by completed Bay-specific science.

Congressional signatories: The published letter bears the signatures of Senators Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.), Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), and Representatives Sarah Elfreth (D-Md.-3), Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.-6), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C., at-large delegate) and Bobby Scott (D-Va.-3). The accompanying press release also identifies Representative April McClain Delaney (D-Md.-6), although her signature is absent from the published letter.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition (MFC) is a collective of menhaden fishermen, related businesses, and supporting industries. Comprised of 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.

Washington Post Osprey Story Blurs the Line Between Science and Special Interests

September 30, 2026 — The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

The Washington Post on September 27 published a story by Mark Robichaux under the headline “Ospreys are disappearing along the East Coast. Scientists think they know why.”

The osprey breeding failures reported in the story are serious and warrant further study. The reporting, however, repeatedly places the commercial menhaden fishery at the center of a causal question that the scientists themselves say remains unresolved, while omitting key details on menhaden management and the fishery’s economic impact.

The article does acknowledge that Dr. Bryan Watts of William & Mary’s Center for Conservation Biology describes the evidence as an association rather than proof that commercial menhaden harvest caused osprey nesting failures. That critical limitation should have guided the rest of the account.

The headline blurs what scientists know and what remains uncertain

Researchers have identified food stress as the immediate cause of many Chesapeake Bay osprey nesting failures. They have also associated that food stress with reduced delivery of menhaden to some nests. But the Center for Conservation Biology says the underlying causes of reduced menhaden availability are not clear. It lists commercial harvest as one possible factor, alongside climate change, changing distribution and delayed entry of forage species into the Bay. The headline attempts to draw in readers on a false premise.

The distinction is even more important beyond the Chesapeake. In its 2026 compilation of monitoring from 65 study areas, the center says the underlying cause of low reproductive performance at other Atlantic Coast sites is less clear. It says, “we should view ospreys as sentinels for the marine ecosystem rather than a species imperiled.” It also states, “ospreys appear to be secure throughout much of their range but are struggling within some coastal sites.” The Post’s coastwide headline is broader than those findings.

The article treats an unmeasured Bay-wide condition as a premise

The story states, without attribution, that menhaden are not present when birds and fishermen need them. Researchers have documented reduced menhaden deliveries at some osprey nests, and fishermen describe difficulty finding dependable concentrations in some locations, while abundant concentrations are observed elsewhere and mass fish kills involving mostly juvenile menhadenhave occurred in North Carolina. Those contrasting observations do not measure adult menhaden abundance throughout the Chesapeake Bay or establish a uniform coastwide shortage.

The article also calls menhaden the principal prey of Chesapeake ospreys. Menhaden are an important prey species, particularly in saltier parts of the Bay, but the peer-reviewed study cited in the story says osprey diet composition shifts with salinity: pairs in higher-salinity waters appear to rely on menhaden, while pairs in low-salinity waters depend primarily on catfish and gizzard shad. A USGS study of osprey diets across Chesapeake Bay sites and a USGS presentation to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) summarizing the site-specific results provide the underlying geographic detail. Catfish and gizzard shad accounted for 77 percent and 20 percent of the diet reported for the Susquehanna, respectively, and 52 percent and 28 percent in upper-Bay estuarine areas. At Poplar Island, striped bass accounted for 48 percent and menhaden 44 percent; in lower-Bay estuarine areas, spotted seatrout accounted for 29 percent and menhaden 24 percent. Those data do not support a single Bay-wide description of menhaden as the principal prey.

The 2026 peer-reviewed osprey study says there is no fishery-independent monitoring of adult menhaden in the Bay. According to the authors, that information gap prevents a direct assessment of the relationship between local menhaden abundance and osprey reproduction. They also say the effect of harvest on adult menhaden abundance in the Bay remains unresolved.

The Louisiana passage leaves out regulatory and scientific context

The article also turns to Louisiana’s separate Gulf menhaden fishery. It reports the 2023 net failures and later enforcement improvements, but omits existing rules governing coastal buffers, release reporting, gear retrieval, vessel tracking and penalties. Following those incidents, the fishery also moved toward stronger purse seine nets and standardized improved bycatch excluder devicesintended to keep larger fish out of the pumping system.

Robichaux also omits the Louisiana wildlife agency’s summary of a state-commissioned, season-long study of the 2024 fishery, which estimated total bycatch at approximately 3.6 percent of catch by weight. In its 2015-2024 comparison, the agency reported that dead menhaden fishery bycatch accounted for 9.9 percent of red drum removals by weight and 2.7 percent of spotted seatrout removals; directed recreational anglers accounted for the remainder, 90.1% and 97.3%, respectively. The aggregate rate does not resolve every species-specific concern, but the results are material context for evaluating the fishery.

Claims from advocates and fishermen are observations and policy positions

Robichaux quotes Virginia Saltwater Sportfishing Association chairman Steve Atkinson asserting that the Bay no longer contains enough menhaden to support the current reduction fishery and a healthy ecosystem. While there is little doubt that Atkinson made that statement, the scientific record cited in the story does not establish it, and it is presented without challenge.

The ASMFC’s Chesapeake work group expressly did not determine whether the supply of menhaden is sufficient to meet predator demand in the Bay. Nor has the commission determined that a 50 percent reduction in the Bay cap—the policy Atkinson supports—would improve osprey reproduction. The range from no reduction through 50 percent consists of management options under consideration, not measured biological remedies. At no point has the ASMFC provided any scientific rationale for a reduction in the Bay harvest.

Anecdotal accounts like charter captain Chris Newsome’s about difficult fishing deserve to be heard, but Robichaux takes that one named Chesapeake captain’s experience and turns it into an unsubstantiated coastwide conclusion. The story cites no coastwide survey, abundance index, standardized fishing data, additional named fishermen or geographic examples to support its assertion that anglers and fishermen throughout the Atlantic Coast are seeing the same pattern. An unspecified collection of anecdotes is not evidence of a coastwide biological trend. By presenting it that way, Robichaux seeks to create the appearance of broad corroboration while giving readers no way to assess how many people were consulted, where they fish or whether their experiences are representative.

The article omits important evidence of sustainable management

Robichaux reports that the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission finds Atlantic menhaden not overfished, with overfishing not occurring, but he does not tell readers that the ASMFC already uses ecological reference points designed to account for menhaden’s role as prey or that it reduced the coastwide catch limit by 20 percent for 2026. It also omits that the U.S. Atlantic menhaden purse seine fishery is certified by the Marine Stewardship Council, following independent assessment against the MSC Fisheries Standard.

The economic figures are not comparable measures

The article compares an estimated $804 million spent on Atlantic recreational fishing trips involving menhaden with roughly $300 million in reported annual sales from Omega Protein’s combined Atlantic and Gulf operations and approximately 260 direct Virginia jobs reported by the companies in the Atlantic menhaden fishery. But it does not explain that the ASMFC’s 2026 Committee on Economics and Social Sciences review expressly describes historical modeling showing that direct harvesting and processing jobs sustain additional non-fishing employment in mechanics, logistics and local services including fuel and lubricants, repairs and maintenance, shipping, vehicle operations, supplies and food, utilities and telephone service, insurance and security, real estate rent, county property taxes and healthcare benefits.

But when it came to the recreational fishing contribution, the story cited a Southwick Associates study commissioned by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership that casts a very wide net in its economic assumptions, counting all tangential spending on entire fishing trips on which an angler used menhaden as bait, chum or scent. This means they counted anything including transportation, fuel, food, hotels and other purchases as an economic contribution of recreational fishing.

In short, the story’s comparison of the industries’ economics is apples and oranges.

Robichaux mentions the direct Virginia jobs but says nothing about the workers who hold them. UFCW Local 400 says Ocean Harvesters’ crews are overwhelmingly local and unionized and that the operation employs one of the largest minority workforces in Northumberland County. The union has documented collectively bargained increases in base pay, incentive rates and bonuses, as well as health-and-welfare benefits. These are family-supporting union jobs that provide strong wages and full benefits to workers, including many without college degrees—opportunities that no other employer in the Northern Neck provides on a comparable basis. The bigger issue remains that the article never illustrates how a reduction in the Bay Cap would benefit recreational anglers, but reductions would almost certainly result in economic harm to menhaden fishermen and their families.

The ASMFC’s Committee on Economics and Social Sciences identifies the reduction industry as an important part of the Reedville-area economy. It also warns that high fixed costs mean a small reduction in fishing quota could cause larger unemployment effects. That analysis is relevant to any discussion of workers and communities affected by additional restrictions.

The ASMFC’s economic advisers warn that job losses in the reduction sector could be lasting because comparable work may be hard to find locally.

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference raised that concern directly with Maryland Gov. Wes Moore. SCLC urged Maryland to consider how additional restrictions could disproportionately affect African American workers, union families and rural communities, and to weigh environmental stewardship together with economic justice and the consequences for workers and their families. Robichaux does not mention the union workforce or the civil rights organization’s intervention.

The February 18 letter does not show opposition to research

Robichaux introduces a February 18, 2025 letter from an industry government relations professional to Virginia Del. Betsy Carr and then immediately quotes Chesapeake Bay Foundation executive Chris Moore alleging that the industry is using scientific uncertainty to stall restrictions. CBF has repeatedly used this letter out of context to allege that the industry opposed research funding.

The companies explained to Robichaux that by February 18, the General Assembly was no longer considering the roughly $2 million needed for the full study; discussion had shifted to whether a reduced amount of funding could support useful interim work. The letter responded by proposing a two-year pilot to test aerial and hydroacoustic survey methods that had not yet been validated for estimating Chesapeake Bay menhaden abundance. It also called for a plan and budget for a peer reviewed research program and, as an alternative, recommended returning to the General Assembly in 2026. Read in full and in context, it proposed research under constrained funding and raised concerns about methodology.

What followed after February 2025 undercuts CBF’s characterization. When the 2025 Virginia session ended without funding the proposed comprehensive study, industry participants helped fund a Science Center for Marine Fisheries research roadmap involving VIMS, the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science and NOAA; supported a tagging feasibility study; and opened commercial vessels and processing operations to researchers. That record is inconsistent with Moore’s false claim about the industry’s motive.

The research effort gained substantial public funding in 2026: Virginia committed $2 million over two years, and Congress appropriated $2.5 million for Bay-specific research.

Commercial menhaden fishermen and processing workers support coastal communities and supply fishmeal, fish oil, nutritional products and bait to recreational and commercial fishermen from Maine to Louisiana. They deserve coverage that distinguishes observed osprey food stress from an unproven allegation of fishery causation, and that compares harvest and economic figures on an accurate basis.

Sources and documents cited

1. The Washington Post article addressed in this release, September 27, 2026.

2. William & Mary Center for Conservation Biology, 2026 Chesapeake Bay osprey breeding results and Atlantic Coast monitoring summary.

3. Peer-reviewed 2026 osprey study.

4. U.S. Geological Survey, Chesapeake Bay osprey diet study; USGS presentation to ASMFC, August 2024.

5. ASMFC, Chesapeake Bay Menhaden Work Group report, April 2025; Atlantic menhaden FAQs; and 2026 catch-limit announcement.

6. Marine Stewardship Council, U.S. Atlantic menhaden purse-seine fishery listing.

7. Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, 2026 commercial fishing regulations and summary of the 2024 menhaden bycatch study.

8. ASMFC Committee on Economics and Social Sciences, updated employment and economic review, July 2026.

9. Southwick Associates, Atlantic menhaden recreational-fishing economic report, June 2026.

10. UFCW Local 400, menhaden workforce account and collective-bargaining announcement.

11. Southern Christian Leadership Conference letter to Maryland Gov. Wes Moore.

12. February 18, 2025 letter to Virginia Del. Betsy Carr and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s statement discussing the research dispute.

13. Virginia Institute of Marine Science, Atlantic menhaden research and funding overview.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

Menhaden Fishermen Are TRCP’s Favorite Villains, But the Facts Don’t Fit

May 26, 2026 – The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

In a May 6 post by Jaclyn Lunaas, (“Fisheries Board Defers Advancing Plan to Address Chesapeake Bay Menhaden Management”), the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP) calls the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) Menhaden Board’s decision to form a work group on Draft Addendum II “another delay for Chesapeake Bay menhaden conservation,” then argues that cutting Chesapeake Bay menhaden harvest (and spreading it across the season) is needed to improve outcomes for predators like striped bass.

That framing misses the most important fact: striped bass are overfished because striped bass have been overfished for years, not because managers failed to squeeze menhaden hard enough. But when the ASMFC is asked to make unpopular decisions that directly affect striped bass anglers, TRCP’s rhetoric is very different.

1) ASMFC explicitly chose status quo for striped bass in 2026 because of socio-economic consequences

The ASMFC’s striped bass management history is clear: striped bass were declared overfished in 2019 and are under a rebuilding plan that requires rebuilding to the spawning stock biomass target by 2029. The ASMFC also notes that while the stock is no longer experiencing overfishing, it remains overfished.

At an October 2025 meeting, the ASMFC’s Striped Bass Management Board considered—and ultimately rejected—moving forward with a proposed 12% reduction in fishery removals for 2026. The ASMFC’s own summary explicitly cited “severe economic consequences” as a key reason the Board maintained current measures and quotas.

TRCP’s response to this decision? Deafening silence. Other than its repeated attacks on the menhaden fishery, Ms. Lunaas and TRCP have not published a comment directly addressing striped bass management since November 2023.

Sticking with the status quo for striped bass will make rebuilding harder and decreases the likelihood that the 2029 rebuilding target will be met, but the ASMFC weighed that against socio-economic harm to the recreational and commercial striped bass fisheries and the communities and businesses they support. That’s a legitimate policy tradeoff. But it’s exactly the tradeoff TRCP refuses to acknowledge when it comes to menhaden.

2) Silence on protecting striped bass access, no mercy for menhaden workers

TRCP’s post pushes menhaden cuts as if predator recovery depends on it, while staying quiet on the striped bass decision that delays rebuilding trajectories and was justified, in part, by economic impacts.

When the affected stakeholders are recreational striped bass anglers (and the coastal economies tied to that fishery), TRCP is aligned with a process that treats economic consequences as central. When the affected stakeholders are the menhaden fishery’s working families—a union workforce in a rural community, and one of the largest minority workforces in its area—TRCP’s tone shifts to “just do it,” even when many of their claims about menhaden fishing remain unproven.

3) TRCP overstates the evidence on seasonal quota periods and Maryland pound nets

TRCP implies that re-timing the Virginia reduction harvest via seasonal quota periods will improve availability for predators and other fisheries, including Maryland’s pound-net bait fishery.

But the ASMFC’s Plan Development Team (PDT) memo does not support the re-timing story as settled:

The PDT calls its work a preliminary analysis and recommends the Technical Committee as the proper avenue for a detailed test of the hypothesis.
Maryland pound-net landings fell sharply in 2023–2024, but the PDT found the data suggest the decline was “primarily driven by reduced effort” because catch per unit effort (CPUE) fell less dramatically than effort and catch.
For early-season weeks (13–26), the PDT says it is unlikely low pound-net CPUE in 2023–2024 was due to the reduction fishery because reduction harvest usually begins later—and in those years was delayed even further.
For 2024, the PDT says an effect is possible, but the data were inconclusive at the resolution evaluated, and a meaningful conclusion would require finer-scale analysis of movement and fishery dynamics.

So when TRCP pushes seasonal menhaden quota periods as a practical fix to protect other fisheries, it’s taking a hypothesis and selling it as if it were established.

Bottom line

Striped bass recovery won’t be achieved by blaming menhaden whenever recommended striped bass management proposals become unpopular. The ASMFC’s Striped Bass Board chose status quo for 2026, citing economic consequence, while striped bass remain overfished and the 2029 rebuilding requirement still exists but seems unlikely.

If TRCP wants any credibility, it should stop implying that menhaden cuts are a substitute for confronting the real driver of striped bass decline—a long period of excessive striped bass fishing mortality—and face up to the hard tradeoffs between rebuilding timelines and economic realities the ASMFC has repeatedly had to make to protect both the striped bass population and the striped bass fishery itself.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

Chesapeake Bay Foundation Peddles a False Menhaden Crisis—Not Science

May 14, 2026 – The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

A May 5 statement by David Sherfinski of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) misleadingly portrays the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) as ignoring “dire warning signs” in the Chesapeake Bay by delaying action on Draft Addendum II for menhaden. But the Commission’s decision is basic due diligence: the draft addendum is technically complex, and the Board acted responsibly by choosing to refine the proposal before launching public comment.

CBF’s statement, however, leans on alarmist language, including “dire warning signs,” “starving osprey chicks,” and “plummeting bait catches,” and implies those outcomes are caused by the commercial menhaden fishery. But the available evidence does not support this, and presenting these issues as settled cause-and-effect is exactly how public confidence in fisheries governance gets undermined.

1) CBF is spinning a responsible pause as a crisis

CBF suggests the Board “delayed protections” for menhaden. But the Board’s decision to pause and form a work group reflects the reality that Draft Addendum II involves complicated design choices and real-world implementation questions that should be addressed before a public process begins.

CBF Forage Campaign Manager Will Poston called the Board’s action a “frustrating delay,” but that’s exactly backwards. Sending a complicated draft back for further development is what responsible management looks like—especially when the addendum’s mechanics and underlying assumptions are still being debated. Treating due diligence as a failure castigates the Board for doing the careful work the public expects.

2) “Dire warning signs” is hyperbole, especially when CBF treats uncertainty as a verdict

Osprey reproduction and local bait availability deserve careful attention. But referring to “dire warning signs” while implying the menhaden fishery is operating irresponsibly is not supported by the record.

On ospreys: The U.S. Geological Survey and other agencies have emphasized that multiple stressors can affect osprey productivity, and that food availability is only one factor among others such as disease, climate conditions, and water quality.

On bait: Declines in local catch cannot, by themselves, be used to diagnose a stock. Catch trends can reflect many different factors, including participation and fishing effort, costs and labor constraints, weather, shifting fish distribution, and conditions that affect where fish can live and how catchable they are.

3) Maryland Commissioner H. Russell Dize rejected scapegoating

During the May 5 Board discussion, Maryland ASMFC Commissioner H. Russell Dize warned the Board against exactly the kind of one-cause narrative CBF is pushing.

He said the Board had “taken the reduction fishery and set them out like a white elephant,” and made clear: “You can’t tell me that that’s the only problem we got with menhaden not coming into Maryland, coming up the Bay.”

Commissioner Dize continued: “You’re still not going to find the problem until we look further into what’s causing it… It’s our responsibility to find that and not just… blame this one group.”

Reflecting on his own personal history in the menhaden industry, he concluded: “I just don’t think they’re the culprit… We got other problems.”

4) CBF’s “mismanagement” insinuation clashes with the oversight record and the fishery’s MSC sustainability recertification

CBF’s statement insinuates that the fishery is being managed recklessly and must be curbed immediately. But the ASMFC’s management framework for menhaden is already precautionary and incorporates the species’ forage role through ecosystem-based reference points and oversight.

In March, the Atlantic menhaden fishery was recertified as sustainable under the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) program. MSC is an international nonprofit that operates the widely recognized blue MSC ecolabel for wild-capture fisheries. MSC certification is based on an assessment against the MSC Fisheries Standard and carried out by independent third-party auditors. Certified fisheries have demonstrated that their fish stocks are sustainable, that they have minimized their environmental impact, and that they are managed effectively.

5) A serious policy debate requires a testable problem statement, not slogans

If the ASMFC is going to consider seasonal quota periods, rollovers, closures, or cap changes, the public deserves more than CBF’s headlines. At minimum, the proposal should clearly state:

What exact problem is being measured (where, when, with what data)
What evidence links that problem to fishery activity, as opposed to Bay-wide environmental conditions
What mechanism the rule is intended to change, and how success will be measured
How monitoring and enforcement will work in practice

That is what the work group should do, and what CBF’s statement does not do.

6) Advocacy shouldn’t substitute for evidence

Like too many CBF alarmist releases on this issue, the May 5 statement uses hyperbolic language to rile up its readers.

Chesapeake Bay challenges are real. But regulation-by-campaign, especially when it treats correlation as causation and elevates rhetoric over evidence, does not protect the Bay. It distorts public understanding and pressures regulators toward decisions that may be politically satisfying, but scientifically unmoored.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

Studies challenge ‘gauntlet’ theory in Chesapeake menhaden debate

May 6, 2026 — Two independent analyses are pushing back on a key claim driving current Atlantic menhaden management discussions, that Virginia’s reduction fishery is preventing fish from reaching Maryland waters.

According to a May 4 release from the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition, both a statistical review and an oceanographic study found no evidence supporting the idea that Virginia’s Chesapeake Bay purse seine fishery is “blocking” menhaden migration to the upper bay.

The findings were submitted to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) Atlantic Menhaden Management Board through a comment letter from Ocean Harvesters, as regulators consider a proposed addendum focused on the timing of the reduction fishery.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

Menhaden group claims ASMFC applied a double standard on economic impacts

May 6, 2026 — An analysis released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition argues that federal fisheries managers treated economic concerns differently when weighing striped bass and menhaden management decisions at last year’s annual meeting of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC).

The report titled “When Jobs Count, and When They Don’t,” compares discussions from the Atlantic Striped Bass and Atlantic Menhaden management board meetings held during the ASMFC’s 2025 Annual Meeting.

According to the analysis, socio-economic impacts were a central factor in the striped bass debate, where commissioners ultimately opted for a proposed 12 percent reduction in harvest despite the stock being below target levels. Instead, the board maintained the status quo and formed a work group with representation from multiple sectors.

During that meeting, speakers and board members repeatedly cited the potential impacts on charter operators, recreational businesses, tackle manufacturers, and coastal economies.

In contrast, the report says similar concerns raised during the menhaden discussion, particularly those tied to industrial fishing jobs, did not carry the same weight in the final decision.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Atlantic Menhaden Recertified for Another Five Years as a Marine Stewardship Council Sustainable Fishery

May 5, 2026 — The Atlantic menhaden fishery has been recertified as sustainable according to Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) standards. The recertification once again confirms that the fishery is environmentally sustainable and effectively managed.

The Marine Stewardship Council is the international gold standard for seafood sustainability and has one of the most rigorous certification programs in the world. All fisheries certified under the MSC benchmarks must undergo an independent third-party audit to confirm that they adhere to MSC standards.

MSC evaluates fisheries according to 28 separate sustainability criteria. These criteria are divided among three principles: the sustainability of the fishery, whether the fishery has minimized its environmental impact, and the effectiveness of its management. In order to be certified, fisheries must achieve a score of at least 60 on all 28 criteria. The fishery averaged a score of more than 80 for all three of the principles measured, scoring an 86.7 on the health of the species, 82.0 on its ecosystem impacts, and 96.3 on its management system.

Three companies, Ocean Harvesters and Omega Protein in Virginia, and Lund’s Fisheries in New Jersey, represent the ‘client group’ supporting this MSC assessment.

“Our operations are focused on ensuring that everything we do is sustainable and based on ecologically sound management practices, and this recertification reflects that,” said Ben Landry, Vice President of Public Affairs for Ocean Fleet Services. “The Atlantic menhaden fishery is one of the most sustainable fisheries on the East Coast, and with this recertification, we will continue to be good stewards of the Chesapeake Bay and the resource.”

The Atlantic menhaden fishery was first certified in 2019. MSC-certified fisheries are required to undergo the recertification process regularly to ensure that they still meet the organization’s high standards.

“For nearly ten years, Lund’s Fisheries has collaborated with the MSC to assure domestic and international markets, vitally important to our long-term success, that the seafood we produce is managed sustainably based on the rigorous, annual, scientific and monitoring reviews that are the core of the MSC program.” said Wayne Reichle, President of Lund’s Fisheries.

The menhaden fishery operates primarily in Virginia and in federal waters off the coast of New Jersey. In Virginia, where the fishery has operated out of Reedville since the 1870s, the menhaden purse seine fishery harvests menhaden for use in marine ingredients such as fish meal and fish oil. In New Jersey, the purse seine fishery operating out of Cape May is a key source for menhaden used as bait in the Atlantic lobster and crab fisheries and Gulf crab and crawfish fisheries. Both fisheries are integral to their local fishing economies and coastal communities.

This MSC recertification reflects the most recent science on the health of the Atlantic menhaden resource and confirms that the fishery is being managed sustainably, for the future. According to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, the interstate body that manages menhaden, the species is not overfished, and overfishing is not occurring.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

TRCP Video Series Is Latest Campaign to Spread Falsehoods About Atlantic Menhaden Fishery

May 5, 2026 — The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

A recent video series from the Teddy Roosevelt Conservation Partnership continues the organization’s near decade-long practice of spreading misinformation about the Atlantic menhaden fishery. From substituting anecdotes for real science to misidentifying the companies involved in the fishery to mischaracterizing the state of the stock, the videos paint a misleading picture of a sustainable and economically vital fishery.

Menhaden Are Important — But the “Most Important Fish in the Sea” Claim Is Misleading

The videos repeatedly refer to menhaden as “the most important fish in the sea,” which also serves as the title for the series. This phrase comes from the title of a 2007 book by H. Bruce Franklin, a former Rutgers University English professor. While menhaden are an ecologically and economically important species, the moniker of “most important fish in the sea” has historically been misused by industry opponents to suggest that menhaden play an outsized role in the ecosystem compared to other forage species. This is not borne out by the science.

A 2015 analysis of the diets of five major predator species in the Chesapeake Bay found that Atlantic menhaden was not one of the top four most important prey species. Menhaden was found to be significant for just one predator, striped bass, while bay anchovy was significant for four of the species and was even more important for striped bass than menhaden. Similarly, a 2025 study of Gulf menhaden using cutting-edge stable isotope analysis found that they do not play an outsized role in predator diets and that there is no “most important” prey species in the Gulf.

Anecdotes Are Not a Substitute for Science

Besides misleading monikers, the videos frequently use anecdotes as stand-ins for real science. In one video, a drone operator states that she saw menhaden on 76 days in 2023, and just 24 days in 2025. In another, a filmmaker states that she is seeing fewer menhaden inshore, while a few years ago there were “acres and acres of menhaden all summer long” and “you could almost walk on [them].” She also falsely states that the “biggest threat facing menhaden is overfishing.”

While the observations of those on the water can in some cases guide sound science, individual anecdotes are not a substitute for the work of numerous scientists and fisheries managers who have found the menhaden population is healthy and sustainable. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) has repeatedly found that menhaden are not overfished and overfishing is not occurring. Moreover, the fishery is certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), the international gold standard for seafood sustainability.

The Videos Misidentify the Companies Involved in the Fishery

Another video featuring a charter captain is replete with falsehoods. In it, the captain accuses an “industrial company, Omega [Protein]” of “taking more than the Bay can handle — it’s not sustainable.” This is not only incorrect on the merits — again, the fishery is managed for sustainability by the ASMFC and has been certified sustainable by MSC — but also misidentifies the company that harvests fish. Fishing is conducted by Ocean Harvesters, an American company based in Reedville, Virginia; Omega Protein is a processing company that does no fishing.

Sustainability Is Measured by Science, Not Visual Impressions

The charter captain further states, “you can sit out here and watch them pull up a gigantic net full of [menhaden] and you look at it and it’s like ‘how is that sustainable?’” The size of the net has nothing to do with the sustainability of a species that is measured in millions of metric tons. The menhaden fishery adheres to quotas set by federal managers and states based on the best available science. That is how sustainability is measured — not by the size of individuals nets.

The Osprey Narrative Ignores Scientific Complexity

The video series also features frequent fishery detractor Chris Moore of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation continuing to drive the narrative that menhaden fishing is responsible for problems with osprey productivity in the Bay. This claim is echoed by Remy Moncrieffe of the National Audubon Society, who states that a “lack of science in regards to the menhaden population, especially in the Bay, is one of the biggest deterrents we have towards effectively managing menhaden.”

Menhaden is one of the most studied fish species on the Atlantic coast. Menhaden fishery members have partnered with the Science Center for Marine Fisheries for the past decade, leading to numerous scientific publications and graduate-level theses. Landings data from the industry is used by NOAA scientists and the ASMFC in their menhaden stock assessments. And the industry is supportive of a new effort to produce a research roadmap for menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay.

There is no scientific consensus that menhaden fishing is related to osprey issues in the Bay. U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) scientists have pointed out that osprey populations have leveled off in numerous areas around the country, including places like California and Washington where there are no menhaden, and that there are numerous environmental factors that impact osprey productivity. Fisheries scientists have also questioned the statistical basis that some avian researchers used to draw a link between menhaden fishing and osprey.

Menhaden Is Already Managed With Extraordinary Precaution

The videos call for “more precautionary management” of menhaden “while we get more science,” ignoring the fact that menhaden are already managed with extraordinary precaution, including the use of ecological reference points specifically designed to account for predator needs. This call echoes a TRCP petition to remove the fishery from the Chesapeake Bay, which would effectively lead to its shutdown. The idea of shuttering a fishery that has operated continuously for nearly 150 years, is not overfished nor experiencing overfishing, and is certified sustainable by the world’s preeminent seafood certifier flies in the face of all traditional fisheries management. Advocacy videos from TRCP using anecdotes, mischaracterizations, and straight up falsehoods do not change the truth about this fishery.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition

Chesapeake Bay Foundation Continues Spreading False Claims in Latest Attack on Atlantic Menhaden Fishery

May 5, 2026 – The following was released by the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition:

Just over a month ago, Will Poston of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation once again published false and misleading claims about Virginia’s menhaden fishery. Just as CBF did in a March email falsely connecting natural fish die-offs to the menhaden fishery, Poston presents advocacy as science, speculation as fact, and political talking points as settled biology.

Poston’s piece is built around a series of assertions that cannot stand up to the actual record.

Start with his effort to portray Virginia’s 2026 legislative session as proof that industry influence defeated “meaningful conservation measures.” What lawmakers rejected were proposals that would have imposed sweeping new restrictions without first establishing any biological basis for them. Atlantic menhaden are not unmanaged, and they are not being harvested in some regulatory vacuum. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) manages this stock under ecological reference points specifically designed to account for the species’ forage role, and the Commission continues to report the stock is not overfished and that overfishing is not occurring. The fishery is also certified as sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council, the international gold standard for seafood sustainability.

Then there is Poston’s claim that “new coastwide science found the population of menhaden is nearly 40 percent smaller than previously estimated.” This is one of the most misleading lines in the entire article. It invites readers to think scientists discovered a dramatic new collapse in the stock. This is not the case. The ASMFC responded directly to this talking point and explained that the difference between the earlier and later estimates is “primarily due to a change in the estimate of natural mortality.” Importantly, the ASMFC stated, “the 2025 update indicates total biomass has actually slightly increased since 2021. The lower estimate of biomass from the current assessment compared to the previous assessment is a result of a change in our understanding of the stock rather than a change in the stock itself.” Poston is taking a technical model revision and selling it to the public as a conservation crisis.

Poston also points to osprey chick mortality and implies that menhaden harvest is to blame. That claim goes well beyond what the underlying science supports. As the U.S. Geological Survey has stated, many factors affect osprey productivity, including contaminants, disease, predation risk, parental condition, brood size, and weather conditions, as well as prey abundance and access to prey. Current research has not explored all the possible causes of osprey issues in the Bay. It is one thing to say more research is warranted. It is another to repeatedly tell the public that the case is already closed when it is not.

A similar problem appears in Poston’s claim that bait fishermen have seen catches decline and that this somehow proves the Bay is being emptied of menhaden by the reduction fleet. That is an anecdote dressed up as population science. Catch levels in local bait fisheries can reflect a range of factors, including effort, participation, market conditions, gear, weather, and location. Poston presents this as if it were hard evidence, when science continues to point to a healthy stock.

Poston’s charge that scientific research “has repeatedly been delayed by Omega Protein and their Richmond lobbying firm” is also false. There is a legitimate policy debate over what kind of Chesapeake-specific research should be done, how quickly, by whom, and for what management purpose. But that is very different from claiming the industry has simply blocked science. In fact, the industry has supported a Science Center for Marine Fisheries (SCEMFIS) project to produce a research roadmap for menhaden in the Bay as a long-overdue opportunity to ground Bay management in sound science. SCEMFIS, a member of the National Science Foundation’s Industry-University Cooperative Research Program, brings scientists and industry together to fund and conduct applied marine fisheries research.

Last Fall, SCEMFIS funded a team of Atlantic menhaden researchers from the Batten School of Coastal and Marine Sciences & VIMS at William & Mary, the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory at UMCES, and NOAA to identify the research needed to support a scientifically defensible Chesapeake Bay harvest cap. Since then, the team has worked collaboratively online, met in person in February in Solomons Island, Maryland, and presented its progress at the SCEMFIS spring meeting in Nashville. The current focus is on advancing a PIT-tagging pilot study, including controlled holding studies at VIMS and field-planning work starting May 12 with Ocean Harvesters to determine how tagged fish could be detected and recovered during commercial fishing and processing operations.

Poston wants readers to believe that one side supports research and the other side fears it, but that caricature is not an accurate description of the actual debate. One side is helping science progress, while the other side is raising money via fear-mongering.

A broader look at the data only further undermines Poston’s narrative. The ASMFC’s 2025 Atlantic menhaden assessment update shows that recent coastwide age-1+ biomass remains roughly twice the depressed levels seen in the early 1970s, even after the revised natural-mortality assumption in the 2025 model. At the same time, the ASMFC says coastwide reduction landings today are only about one-third to one-half of what they were in the 1970s and 1980s, and the Chesapeake Bay reduction fishery is already tightly constrained by a 51,000-metric-ton Bay cap that is far below historic Bay harvest levels.

And Maryland’s own survey work continues to show strong juvenile menhaden presence in the Bay: Maryland DNR reported that menhaden abundance in 2024 was nearly equal to the previous year, “which was the highest measured since 1990,” and in October 2025 stated that “Atlantic menhaden and bay anchovies were widespread in the Bay for the third consecutive year.”

The truth is much simpler than Poston would like readers to believe. Atlantic menhaden are managed under one of the most ecosystem-conscious fisheries frameworks on the Atlantic coast. The ASMFC says the stock is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring. The ASMFC says the latest update shows total biomass has actually slightly increased since 2021. And the ASMFC says the lower biomass estimate relative to the earlier model reflects “a change in our understanding of the stock rather than a change in the stock itself.” Poston’s effort to turn that into proof of collapse is not honest science communication. It is advocacy masquerading as analysis.

About the Menhaden Fisheries Coalition