February 6, 2025 — Harassment of fishery observers is more prevalent than previously thought, with a new study finding that less than half of observers who experience harassment disclose any incidents.
Funded by NOAA Fisheries, the study was published in the Frontiers research journal 28 January, 2025. NOAA researchers estimated that roughly 22 to 38 percent of fishery observers in the North Pacific are harassed annually, more than twice the number that file official disclosures.
February 6, 2025 — Whales are gathering in large numbers off New Jersey in a portion of the Atlantic Ocean called the New York Bight, according to several sources.
Viking Yacht Company of New Gretna, Burlington County, posted to Facebook that a large group of North Atlantic right whales, an endangered species with only about 360 individuals left, was congregating in the New York Bight between the Hudson Canyon off Sandy Hook and Block Canyon off Montauk, New York.
The New York Bight is a triangular area of ocean that stretches between the Jersey Shore and Long Island.
“NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) has used planes to identify the whales — present due to large amounts of food,” Viking Yacht staff wrote on Facebook. “We’re advising boaters to be vigilant. If whale(s) are seen, provide a wide berth.”
February 4, 2025 — When certain algae flourish in the sea, they produce neurotoxins that can sicken both humans and marine animals. Acute exposure to these toxins is known to kill whales and other marine mammals outright, but many carry the toxins chronically without displaying obvious symptoms. The authors of a new study suggest these chronic exposures may nonetheless prove lethal.
The study, published in Frontiers in Marine Science in November, found an association between so-called harmful algal blooms (HABs) and whale deaths due to human causes in U.S. waters. The authors propose the reason may be that HAB toxins disorient whales, increasing their vulnerability to ship strikes and entanglements in fishing gear, which were by far the main causes of death and injury in the data they analyzed.
“Non-fatal concentrations of algal neurotoxins may render whales more susceptible to injury because they are less able to respond to entangling fishing gear and oncoming ships,” study lead author Greg Silber, an independent researcher and former coordinator of whale recovery efforts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), told Mongabay by email. “Knowing this provides an opportunity to reduce whale mortality by using algal bloom prediction capabilities.”
To explore the link between HABs and whale deaths, Silber and his daughter and coauthor, Katy Silber, an ecologist at the Institute for Applied Ecology in Santa Fe, New Mexico, studied the timing and location of HAB events alongside large whale mortalities and injuries in U.S. coastal waters. They analyzed data from the East Coast (2000-2021) and West Coast (2007-2021), from UNESCO’s Harmful Algal Event Database, and NOAA’s National Marine Mammal Health and Stranding Response Program. And they looked only at cases of whale injury or death attributed to human activities, excluding those attributed to natural or unknown causes.
Their main finding? “The number of mortalities/injuries was frequently higher in years with large-scale or severe HABs,” the paper states.
Although yearly changes occurred, both human-caused whale deaths and injuries and HABs showed general increases over time. The paper suggests that while improved monitoring and public reporting may partly explain this rise, year-to-year variations in HABs are influenced by oceanographic processes and warming ocean temperatures linked to climate change. HABs are also intensified by human activities that provide excess nutrients for algae growth.
The study also found differences between the two coasts. On the Pacific coast, it found a clear correlation between HABs and human-caused whale deaths and injuries: In areas with active HABs, there were at least three more whale deaths or injuries compared to places without HABs. On the Atlantic coast, the connection was still there but weaker. This might be because the ocean conditions, algal species, or the way whale and HAB data are collected differ between the two coasts, the researchers wrote.
February 3, 2025 — As warming waters threaten traditional fishing economies in the Bering Sea, the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island (ACSPI) is building a new future focused on research and higher education.
Plummeting populations of snow crab and halibut in the Bering Sea have cost ACSPI roughly $2.7 million a year in lost harvest revenue, according to the tribe’s president, John Melovidov. The federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) say the losses will worsen, with a 2024 report projecting the conditions supporting snow crab are 200 times more likely to disappear compared to the pre-industrial era.
“Fishing isn’t always what it used to be,” Melovidov told Tribal Business News. “Outlooks aren’t so great, but we can’t sit here and hope that things come back. We have to do something different.”
The community has begun diversifying its fishing-based economy through partnerships. In July 2024, ACSPI signed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) with Iḷisaġvik College, an Iñupiaq tribal college on Alaska’s North Slope, to establish a satellite campus and research station on the island. The agreement builds on a partnership that began with workforce training in 2018 and expanded to MOAs in 2022 and 2023 that focused on educational opportunities and dual-credit programs for high school students.
February 3, 2025 — U.S. President Donald Trump’s nominee to head the U.S. Department of Commerce Howard Lutnick told U.S. senators at his confirmation hearing that he would not dismantle NOAA and would work to protect American fishers.
Under questioning from lawmakers, Lutnick said that he looked forward to working with the president in implementing tariffs to gain respect from foreign nations.
January 31, 2025 — United States senators have introduced legislation that would task the federal government with developing a new methodology for identifying where tuna and red snapper sold in the U.S. originated from.
If passed, the Illegal Red Snapper and Tuna Enforcement Act would direct the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and NOAA with creating a field test kit that uses a chemical agent to determine whether red snapper or certain species of tuna originated in foreign waters.
January 31, 2025 — California is investing $15 million to offset climate change threats to salmon and steelhead trout in river and stream habitats through projects that improve watersheds such as adding wood and plants.
In December, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries determined after a five-year review of recovery efforts that four salmon and steelhead species of fish in northern California and southern Oregon should continue to be designated as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
January 30, 2025 — A joint legislative task force centered on bolstering Alaska’s seafood industry has forwarded its in-depth report after voting to make its amended version official on Wednesday.
State lawmakers, who shared a draft version of the report earlier this month, are making multiple recommendations to try and alleviate what they called a crisis in our state, citing some 18 different fisheries disasters within the last decade or so.
A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report released this past fall showed the seafood industry suffered a $1.8 billion loss from 2022 to 2023 alone, with about $191 million in state and local tax revenues for Alaska, Washington, Oregon, and California combined.
“This gives the public a very pointed direction of what we’re looking at,” said Rep. Sarah Vance, R-Homer, of the task force report. “Now is the time that we have to roll up our sleeves, and develop good policy, and make sure that we are not creating loopholes and missing some things along the way.”
January 30, 2025 — The following was released New England Fishery Management Council:
The New England Fishery Management Council voted on Western Gulf of Maine cod and Gulf of Maine haddock recreational fishing measures when it met January 28-30, 2025 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The measures are recommendations to NOAA Fisheries for the 2025 groundfish fishing year, which begins on May 1.
The Council also: (1) received an update on the Fishing Effort Survey conducted by NOAA Fisheries under the Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP); and (2) participated in a public listening session about NOAA’s collaborative initiative to re-envision recreational fishing data collection partnership approaches.
The Council’s fishing year 2025 recommendations for Atlantic cod are based on the new understanding of cod stock structure. Cod is now being assessed as four stock units, which are color-coded in the map below.
The Council addressed Southern New England cod in December 2024 under Framework Adjustment 69. The framework also establishes a regulatory process for the GARFO regional administrator to set Eastern Gulf of Maine cod and Georges Bank cod measures. The Council’s intent is for the measures to be equivalent to Western Gulf of Maine cod. This authority is a temporary regulatory provision for 2025 only.
The Council took up Western Gulf of Maine cod and Gulf of Maine haddock in January. Here is the full package of recreational recommendations resulting from both the December and January Council meetings.
January 29, 2025 — The U.S. secretary of commerce oversees the smallest but arguably most complex of all Cabinet-level departments.
Established as a distinct entity in 1913, it has evolved into a sprawling organization with 13 bureaus spanning a wide variety of critical areas that include weather forecasting, conducting the census, estimating gross domestic product, managing fisheries, promoting U.S. exports, setting standards for new technology and allocating radio frequency spectrum. It is even home to one of America’s eight uniformed military services, the NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps with its own fleet of ships, aircraft and 321 commissioned officers. Its main mission is to monitor oceans, waterways and the atmosphere in support of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.
As a result, there is no other Cabinet position that has to engage with lawmakers in Congress across so many disparate technical issues, committees and stakeholders. This medley reflects both the historical evolution of the U.S. economy and a degree of political happenstance.
I served at the Commerce Department in several roles, including as chief financial officer and assistant secretary for administration, management and budget, and have watched several administrations attempt to craft an overarching strategic narrative around this diverse set of missions.
Besides the difficult job of formulating a unifying strategy for the department’s many activities, I believe there are three specific challenges in particular that await the next secretary, a position that requires Senate confirmation.