Saving Seafood

Improving Safety Before a Trip Benefits Everyone on Commercial Fishing Vessels

October 9, 2019 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

Ensuring a safety culture is critical to the Northeast Fisheries Science Center’s Fisheries Sampling Branch mission. The branch manages fisheries observer and monitoring programs in the Greater Atlantic region from North Carolina to Maine. Assessing observer practices and procedures is an ongoing effort. That was reflected in a summer workshop organized by the branch to evaluate the process of completing the required observer’s pre-trip vessel safety checklist.

The August workshop brought together a diverse group of professionals. The 24 people who attended have a combined 440 years of experience working with observer programs and/or commercial fishing vessels. A report on the workshop is now available.

Participants came from the U.S. Coast Guard enforcement and vessel safety offices in two districts, the fishing industry, NOAA’s National Observer Coordination office, regional observer programs, observer provider companies, and the Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office. There were groundfish sector managers, observers, safety trainers, and gear specialists.

“The top nine life-saving items listed in our workshop report need to be present and operable every trip,” said Amy Martins, chief of the Fisheries Sampling Branch. “Observers and fishermen have offered suggestions for improvements to the safety checklist to make it safer and more efficient for everyone, plus we all benefit by cooperative efforts and shared expert advice.”

The Fisheries Sampling Branch plans to start testing and incorporating improvements to the safety checklist process beginning in the fall of 2019 and continuing into the spring of 2020. The proposed changes developed at the workshop will be evaluated to assess their effectiveness and may be changed if safety is thought to be compromised.

Read the full release here

NOAA Fisheries Seeks Comments on Amendment 8 to the Atlantic Herring Fishery Management Plan

October 10, 2019 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

NOAA Fisheries proposes establishing an Atlantic herring acceptable biological catch (ABC) control rule and prohibiting the use of midwater trawl gear in inshore waters from Canada to Connecticut.

Acceptable Biological Catch

The proposed ABC control rule is intended to ensure sustainable harvest of the Atlantic herring resource and account for Atlantic herring’s role as forage in the ecosystem. The control rule would limit fishing mortality to 80 percent of the fishing mortality rate to support maximum sustainable yield when Atlantic herring biomass is high and restrict fishing even further when biomass is low. The control rule would set Atlantic herring ABC for three years but would allow ABC to vary year-to-year with projected estimates of biomass.

Prohibiting Midwater Trawl Gear Inshore

This amendment would prohibit the use of midwater trawl gear inshore of the 12-nautical mile territorial sea boundary from Canada to Connecticut and inshore of 20 nautical miles off the east coast of Cape Cod (see below).

The proposed inshore midwater trawl restricted area is intended to minimize user group conflict as midwater trawl vessels overlap with other user groups (i.e., commercial fisheries, recreational fisheries, ecotourism) that rely on herring as forage. Moving midwater trawl effort offshore is intended to mitigate potential negative socioeconomic impacts on other user groups resulting from short duration, high volume herring removals by midwater trawl vessels and help ensure herring is available inshore for other users groups and predators of herring.

The proposed inshore restricted area may also have biological benefits if it minimizes catch of river herring and shad, reduces fishing pressure on the inshore component of the herring stock, and helps ensure herring are available to predators.

Read the full release here

West Coast Fisheries “Comeback of the Century”

October 8, 2019 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

With help from rebounding West Coast rockfish, Giuseppe “Joe” Pennisi has put the fisherman back in San Francisco’s famed Fisherman’s Wharf.

Pennisi is the first fisherman to sell freshly caught fish off his boat at Fisherman’s Wharf in many years. He has reintroduced locals to the flaky white fish that was once a mainstay of West Coast seafood. Most weekends when the fishing is good, crowds form early at the dock next to his boat, the Pioneer, and continue all day. Some wait for hours to buy chilipepper rockfish, rose fish, boccacio and other deep-water species Pennisi brings up in his nets.

“You can’t help but be excited when you get to the dock and all these people are waiting for their fish,” he said.

The reemerging demand for rockfish reflects what may be the West Coast fisheries comeback of the century. Rapidly rebuilding stocks are reviving opportunities for determined fishermen such as Pennisi and customers of his Pioneer Seafoods. From Washington to California, a fishing fleet that sacrificed heavily while groundfish stocks rebuilt are now beginning to harvest the results.

“It really does seem like we’re turning an important corner,” said Shems Jud, who has long tracked the groundfish fishery for the Environmental Defense Fund. The rebuilding of groundfish represents a rarity among environmental issues. Fishermen, environmental groups, fisheries managers, and others replaced contention and controversy with lasting collaboration.

Read the full release here

MAINE: DMR joins partnership to restore Penobscot River salmon

October 8, 2019 — The Department of Marine Resources will employ a novel approach to rearing Atlantic salmon for restoring native populations on the East Branch of the Penobscot River.

The project, funded through a $1,075,000 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Species Recovery Grant, will involve a partnership among DMR, Cooke Aquaculture USA, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, NOAA Fisheries and the Penobscot Indian Nation to grow juvenile Atlantic salmon to adult size in aquaculture pens located in Machias Bay near Cutler. The adult salmon will then be released into the East Branch of the Penobscot, a river with large amounts of high-quality salmon habitat, to spawn.

Smolts raised from native broodstock by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at the Green Lake National Fish Hatchery in Ellsworth and smolts captured in the wild using rotary screw traps will be used to stock the marine net pens in 2020, 2021 and 2022. To ensure the genetic integrity of salmon in the river, only smolts of Penobscot River origin will be released.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Sharks and tuna will be the focus of UMaine research grant

October 8, 2019 — Commercially valuable tuna, swordfish, sharks and other “highly migratory species” will be the focus of research to be conducted by a consortium that includes the University of Maine.

The consortium was awarded $1.6 million by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, according to a news release.

The funds came through NOAA’s 2019 Sea Grant Highly Migratory Species Research Initiative.

The study will focus on the life histories of highly migratory species in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. It’s expected the research will help contribute to better management of the species.

The new research consortium, called the Pelagic Ecosystem Research Consortium or PERC, is led by Walt Golet at the University of Maine.

Read the full story at MaineBiz

Federal Fisheries Management Needs Some Fine-tuning, Locals say

October 8, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Formerly depleted fisheries off the Pacific Coast have recovered in recent years, but North Coast fishermen are concerned larger vessels are more likely to get access to those fisheries than smaller and medium-sized vessels.

That was the message a panel of fishermen and fisheries experts gave to North Coast U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman at the D Street Neighborhood Center in Arcata on Saturday afternoon. Specifically, Huffman was asking for input on the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, which governs how fisheries are managed in federal water.

“This is a chance to build on the success of that framework,” Huffman said, “but also see if we can modernize it, fine-tune it and make it even better without undermining those elements that have made it so successful over the years.”

The act is designed to “prevent overfishing, rebuild overfished stocks, increase long-term economic and social benefits, use reliable data and sound science, conserve essential fish habitat, and ensure a safe and sustainable supply of seafood,” according to information on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries website.

While the act has helped rebuild depleted fish stocks, local fishermen said generally larger fishing vessels have a better ability to gain access to those stocks.

“We have seen winners and losers,” said Marc Gorelnik, vice chair of the Pacific Fishery Management Council. “The large fleets fared very well under Magnuson. I think that the small fishing communities, medium-sized fishing communities, small boat fishermen have not necessarily fared that well.”

The fact that the fish stocks have been rebuilt should be a huge success story, said Harrison Ibach, president of the Humboldt Fishermen’s Marketing Association, but the unequal access to those stocks has blemished that success and needs to be addressed.

Permits for fish stocks are also going to become more complicated as climate change intensifies and fish stocks move to different areas, the experts said.

Most fisheries have gone to limited entry over the last 30 years, so a permit is required to catch a particular kind of fish in a given area, said Dave Bitts, a local fishermen.

“We may well find in the future, and they may already be finding more than us in the Atlantic … the permit I’ve got ain’t worth anything anymore because those fish aren’t here,” Bitts said. “However, there’s another type of fish here and there’s lots of them and I don’t have a permit for them.”

The act could possibly create a way to expedite shifting permits around, he said.

The act also needs to take a more holistic approach to managing fisheries, the panelists said. Right now, only the most endangered species are a focal point of protection, but the entire habitat needs to be protected, they said.

“I think there should be consideration to manage water for all species, not just those that have already had a train wreck,” said Dave Hillemeier, the Yurok Tribe’s fisheries director.

Instead of being reactive to crises, Hillemeier said the act should be more proactive in preventing stocks from depleting in the first place.

Doing that is a challenge because what happens with the fish stocks along the coast also depends on how water is managed in the Central Valley, where the needs of fish are always pitted against the needs of people, the experts said.

Huffman said it might be a good idea to require mandatory consultation with the regional councils that manage the fisheries and agencies managing water inland. Right now, the fishermen said the most they can do is send an angry letter to the relevant agencies.

“One of the things I’ve learned in those 30 years is you can win a case in court, you can pass a law,” Bitts said, “but good luck changing what happens in the Central Valley.”

Beyond the issues with managing fisheries, the panelists said it was important to revisit some definitions in the act, such as over-fishing. Sometimes a fishing stock may be depleted for reasons that have nothing to do with fishing, such as climate change.

“I think it would be greatly to our advantage as fishermen and the public’s advantage in knowing what’s going if we could change the definition from overfished to depleted,” Bitts said.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

NOAA Fisheries report identifies IUU in Ecuador, Mexico, South Korea

October 8, 2019 — NOAA Fisheries has released its 2019 report to the U.S. Congress, identifying the organization’s efforts to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing internationally while also rebuking three countries for lack of sufficient enforcement against IUU.

The biennial report on improving international fisheries management – made to Congress as part of the High Seas Driftnet Fishing Moratorium Protection Act – identified Ecuador, Mexico, and the Republic of Korea has three countries that failed to sufficiently comply with agreed-upon regulations related to IUU. The report also credited Ecuador, Mexico, and the Russian Federation for earlier work to react to IUU allegations made in NOAA’s 2017 report to congress.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

NOAA Fisheries Announces 2020-2021 Summer Flounder Specifications and Interim 2020 Scup, Black Sea Bass, and Bluefish Specification

October 8, 2019 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

We are implementing the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s recommended 2020-2021 summer flounder specifications and initial 2020 specifications for the scup, black sea bass, and bluefish fisheries. The initial 2020 specifications for scup, black sea bass, and bluefish will be re-evaluated early in the fishing year to address the results of an operational assessment for all three species.

Read the final rule as published in the Federal Register, and our permit holder bulletin.

NOAA Fisheries Evaluates Role of Opt-in Angler Reporting Apps in Recreational Fisheries

October 11, 2019 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

In a new report, NOAA Fisheries describes how electronic technologies, including web and app-based data collection programs, may improve the agency’s estimates of marine recreational catch. The report finds “opt-in,” or non-mandatory, angler reporting apps to be appropriate for collecting qualitative data that support citizen science-based studies. But for these apps to produce population-level estimates of recreational catch, a large proportion of anglers would have to consistently use them to report accurate information about their fishing trips, and a statistically valid probability-based sampling survey would have to validate self-reported data, monitor the extent of reporting, and account for unreported trips.

The report (PDF, 12 pages) is part of the MRIP Action Plan on Implementing Electronic Reporting. Its recommendations are based on an external review of electronic reporting options for recreational fishing surveys, as well as our own assessment of two projects that evaluate the use of iAngler and iSnapper to collect recreational fisheries data.

Electronic reporting is a method of data collection that can include smartphones, tablets, and other technologies used to record, send, and store data. When electronic reporting is part of a probability-based sampling survey design, it has the potential to reduce data collection costs and improve the quality of reported information. But when recreational catch estimates are produced with only those data collected through an opt-in website or mobile app, the estimates are likely to be biased.

Read the full release here

University of Maine receives grant for marine species research

October 7, 2019 — The University of Maine has been awarded $1.6 million to help research Atlantic Marine Species.

The grant is made possible from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Sea Grant College Program.

The funds will support a research project on tuna and shark species in the Gulf of Mexico and the Northwest Atlantic Ocean.

Data researches hope to collect includes growth, age, and migratory behavior.

Maine’s Congressional Delegation made the following statements:

“Maine’s coastal communities depend on Highly Migratory Species fisheries as an economic engine, sustaining and creating jobs as well as driving coastal tourism and recreation year after year,” said Senator Collins. “In order to better understand and maintain the health of HMS fisheries, more research is needed. This funding will assist researchers at UMaine as they work with partner institutions to fill the knowledge gaps about the history and biology of HMS fisheries.”

Read the full story at WABI