Saving Seafood

ALASKA: Science supporting Alaska seafood industry threatened by federal firings, biologists and fishermen say

March 11, 2025 — Rebecca Howard is a marine biologist who spent six years in graduate school — largely funded by federal scholarship dollars — to earn a doctorate at Oregon State University. Last April, she was hired by the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries branch to join in annual surveys off Alaska that gather data vital to the management of the nation’s biggest seafood harvests.

This year, the Seattle-based Howard was scheduled to spend three weeks aboard a chartered fishing boat sampling Gulf of Alaska marine life, and another three weeks on a Bering Sea survey. But on Feb. 27, more than 10 months into a yearlong probation, she received an email from a NOAA vice admiral informing her that she was being terminated. Her ability, knowledge “and/or skills” no longer fit the agency’s needs.

“This is what I wanted to do. I wanted to stay at this job,” Howard said in an interview from Seattle, where she worked at the main branch of the Alaska Fisheries Science Center. “It was a huge disappointment.”

Read the full article at Anchorage Daily News

Court says NOAA must explain lack of protective measures for corals

March 10, 2025 — A federal judge has ordered NOAA to explain why it declined to adopt regulations to protect 20 coral species designated in 2014 as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

In a 42-page decision, Judge Micah W.J. Smith of the District Court of Hawaii said NOAA Fisheries, also known as the National Marine Fisheries Service, failed to provide adequate explanation for denying a 2020 petition from the Center for Biological Diversity to impose protective measures for the species that live Florida, the Caribbean, and the Indo-Pacific region and are threatened by the impacts of climate change.

“Even under [a] highly deferential standard of review, two facets of NMFS’ denial letter fall short,” Smith wrote. “NMFS offered no reasoned explanation for declining to protect the threatened coral species from their gravest threat, climate change. And for one set of the threatened species, the Caribbean corals, NMFS offered no reasoned explanation for declining to adopt regulations addressing localized threats.”

Read the full article at E&E News

El Niño Yields to Upwelling in the California Current, Renewing Productivity of West Coast Ecosystem

March 10, 2025 — According to the NOAA California Current Integrated Ecosystem Assessment’s annual report, the California Current Ecosystem pulled out of a strong El Niño pattern in 2024. That El Niño delayed the onset of the annual spring upwelling of nutrient-laden water that, was nevertheless strong enough to fuel the rich West Coast ecosystem and improv environmental conditions  for salmon.

NOAA Fisheries scientists presented the report to the Pacific Fishery Management Council to inform upcoming decisions on fishing seasons. The report provides a snapshot of ocean conditions, fish population abundance and habitat, and fisheries landings and fishing communities’ conditions. It gives short-term forecasts and longer term projections of how conditions across the ecosystem may evolve in 2025 and beyond.

Report Highlights

  • Upwelling resumed even more strongly and consistently than normal, supplying a greater influx of nutrient-rich waters that improved forage conditions for many species
  • Productive waters supported abundant forage speciessuch as anchovy and krill and strong production of young hake and juvenile rockfish that could contribute to commercial fisheries in future years
  • Improved freshwater streamflows should support survival of juvenile salmon migrating downstream in California to the ocean
  • California sea lions found enough prey amid the El Niño warming, while experiencing harmful algal blooms that led to premature birth of pups and strandings along the coast

“Each year we learn more about how this marine ecosystem functions and what we should be watching to anticipate change,” said Andrew Leising, a research oceanographer at NOAA Fisheries’ Southwest Fisheries Science Center who coauthored the new report. “We’re getting better at forecasting what is coming at us, at the same time we see some new twists.”

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries

NOAA-Funded Research Highlights Economic Effects of Oyster Reef Restoration

March 8, 2025 — Researchers at Morgan State University’s Patuxent Environmental and Aquatic Research Laboratory quantified how restored oyster reefs in the NOAA Middle Peninsula Habitat Focus Area in Virginia would affect the local economy. They found that oyster reef restoration in the York and Piankatank rivers has a meaningful effect on the area’s economy. Results of their work, which was funded through the NOAA Chesapeake Bay Fisheries Research Program, were published in Ecological Modelling.

Oyster reefs provide habitat and food for commercially important species, including blue crabs. More healthy reef habitat means more blue crabs are available for harvest and for your dinner table. That provides financial benefits to watermen and supporting industries along the way.

In recent years, the York and Piankatank rivers have been the site of large-scale oyster reef restoration projects. That effort has led to 204 acres of restored oyster reefs in the York River and 497 acres in the Piankatank River. These projects have been spearheaded by members of the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Virginia Oyster Restoration Workgroup, including:

  • NOAA
  • Virginia Marine Resources Commission
  • U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
  • The Nature Conservancy

These reefs support commercial and recreational fishing. But what would happen if there were more—or fewer—oyster reefs in the river? What other changes might affect the blue crab fishery?

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries 

‘I’m Heartbroken’: California Scientists Left Adrift by Mass Federal Layoffs at NOAA

March 6, 2025 — Many in California’s science community are reeling after last week’s mass firings within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration upended workers’ lives and raised dire concerns for the climate agency’s work going forward.

At least seven people, including National Weather Service employees and staff at the National Marine Fisheries Service, or NOAA Fisheries, lost their jobs along the Central Coast.

Their stories are similar and heart-wrenching. The early-career federal workers are planning marriages, recently signed mortgages and were saving to buy their first homes. But last Thursday, they got an email saying they were “not fit for continued employment because your ability, knowledge, and/or skills do not fit the agency’s current needs” — many of them before their supervisors even knew.

Read the full article KQED

Local Marine Research Takes a Hit, Following Federal Firing Edict

March 6, 2025 — The mass firing of probationary employees at federal agencies and other cuts by the Trump administration reached the epicenter of marine research for the Cape and Islands last week, leaving Vineyarders wondering about the potential ripple effects in the coming years.

Several scientists in Woods Hole were terminated Feb. 27, part of the Elon Musk-led layoffs by his so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), according to former employees and other scientific leaders in the seaside community.

The firings, expected budget cuts and disbanding of diversity initiatives, both in Woods Hole and beyond, have cast a pall of fear and anger over the scientific community.

“The body of knowledge and expertise that these agencies hold, and the staff within them, is immense, whether it’s their laboratory that we are able to access or their field expertise,” said Emily Reddington, the executive director of the Great Pond Foundation here on the Island. “We couldn’t do our work to help protect the ponds without them.”

Read the full article at the Vineyard Gazzette

MAINE: NOAA cuts raise concerns among fishermen

March 5, 2025 —  Over 2,000 people from across New England convened at the annual Maine Fishermen’s Forum over the weekend to talk all things fish.

But this year, between gear expos, panels, and buddies catching up, there was an undercurrent of uncertainty after news broke of hundreds of NOAA layoffs in the weather and fish management divisions.

At a panel on managing fish in Gulf of Maine waters, one NOAA speaker was absent, and the other declined to answer questions about how changes at the federal agency might impact local fishing.

Eric Hesse fishes for tuna far off the coast of Cape Cod. He drove up for a panel on the Gulf of Maine Bottom Longline Survey, which he participates in.

“We’re worried about the impact of it. We engage with NOAA on various levels, whether it’s reporting, observer coverage,” he said. “All these things are part of our daily life, on the water, and to suddenly lose part of that could really disrupt our fisheries.”

Read the full article at Maine Public 

Endangered California Coho Salmon Experience Record-Breaking Spawning Season on Mendocino Coast

March 5, 2025 — Last winter, endangered Central California Coast coho salmon (CCC coho) returned to Mendocino Coast rivers and streams in the highest numbers since monitoring began 16 years ago. Monitoring led by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to track their population status estimated more than 15,000 adult CCC coho returned to spawn during the 2023–24 season. The Ten Mile and Noyo rivers exceeded recovery targets set by NOAA for delisting CCC coho under the Endangered Species Act, and the Big and Garcia rivers experienced record returns.

While the overall numbers remain low compared to the species’ past abundance, NOAA scientists are excited by the results.

“I remember in the 1990s monitoring streams where water temperatures were too hot for CCC coho and lacking in structure, and I thought they would never come back in my lifetime,” says NOAA San Joaquin River Branch Chief Jonathan Ambrose. “I’ve been at NOAA Fisheries for 25 years, and we’ve changed the trajectory for CCC coho salmon. A lot of people think it’s too late—it’s too hard to bring back endangered species. This is a prime example of why it’s not too late or too hard.”

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries 

Fishery managers worry about effects of NOAA cuts

March 4, 2025 — The long term impacts of recent staff cuts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are still unknown, but fishery managers on the West Coast called the situation troubling.

On Thursday, NOAA laid off more than 800 workers as the Trump administration continues its push to reduce the federal workforce.

West Coast lawmakers have warned that the cuts — and the potential for more layoffs in the future — could endanger lives and threaten maritime commerce and the fishing industry. NOAA manages federal tribal, commercial and recreational fisheries and includes the National Weather Service, which provides weather forecast data.

For West Coast fisheries, the firings have created uncertainty for fishery management now.

This week, the Pacific Fishery Management Council, a quasi-governmental body that recommends management measures for a number of fisheries on the West Coast, will meet to begin — among other things — the process of setting summer and fall salmon fisheries.

Read the full article at KMUN

ALASKA: NOAA workers fired in Juneau as part of national purge

March 4, 2025 — More federal workers were fired in Alaska Thursday, this time at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA.

Agency staff could not confirm how many people were fired from NOAA offices in the Juneau area.

Aaron Lambert, a fisheries management specialist, says he was one of at least four people who cleared out their desks at NOAA’s Alaska Regional Office in the Federal Building downtown.

Lambert says he saw it coming – he was a ‘probationary employee’ who was with the agency for six months. But that didn’t buoy the “sinking feeling” when he received the email at 11:35 a.m. Thursday officially firing him because his “ability, knowledge and/or skills do not fit the agency’s current needs,” according to the email.

Read the full article at KTOO