Saving Seafood

JIM HUTCHINSON JR: WILL ANGRY ANGLERS RESPOND TO FLUKE FIASCO?

November 28th, 2016 — Seriously, reading any further is just going to make you incredibly angry.

There’s no way to sugarcoat this, the coastwide quota for summer flounder (fluke) in 2017 is expected to be cut by about 40%. That means a shorter season, lower bag, an increase in size limits, or any combination of the three.

Pardon my French, but I told you that you’d be pissed!

The question is, what are you – what are we going to do about it?

NOAA Fisheries recently announced that their July 2016 summer flounder assessment shows continued overfishing and a fluke stock biomass in decline; in response, the federal government proposes a 30% reduction from catch limits previously implemented for the 2017 season, along with a 16% reduction from current 2018 allocations.

Because the Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP) showed gross overharvest in the recreational sector in 2016, that means we’re officially “overfishing” the fluke stock. That’s not to say the stock is in trouble, but because MRIP showed anglers caught too many fish this past summer, we now have a summer flounder stock that is experiencing statutory overfishing.

Read the full story at The Fisherman 

ALASKA: The next generation of ocean specialists

November 28, 2016 — Alaska’s university system is ramping up programs to train the next generations of fishery and ocean specialists — and plenty of jobs await.

Since 1987, the College of Fisheries and Ocean Science, or CFOS, at the University of Alaska Fairbanks has offered undergraduate and graduate degrees in Fisheries Science, complete with paid internships to help prepare them for positions in the state’s largest industry.

“It’s a degree path preparing students for what I call fish squeezers — they’re going to go to work for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, or NOAA, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or some other type of agency where they’re going to be primarily out doing field work, traditional fish biologist types,” said Trent Sutton, a Professor of Fisheries Biology and Associate Dean of Academics.

Due to student interest, the college broadened the fisheries degree this fall to include ocean sciences, and opened more oceanography and marine biology classes to undergraduate students. The new degree combo program attracted 53 students, Sutton said.

The college also is a center for ocean acidification studies, which is a big student draw.

“You hear all the concerns regarding climate change and marine mammals and fisheries and sea ice — all of those garner interest from students because there are job opportunities down the road to deal with these issues,” Sutton explained.

The CFOS also is the only school in the nation to offer a Bachelor of Arts degree in fisheries for students interested in seafood sciences and technology, and marine policy. Another focus of the B.A. track is in rural and community development where students can get the degree at home.

“A student in Bethel or Dillingham can stay home and take 100 percent of their courses either through video conferences or online or by some other distance delivery technology. They can get a degree that is tied to fisheries and it will help them have a good career and become leaders in their communities,” Sutton said.

Read the full story at the Alaska Journal of Commerce 

Remote and Vast, Our New Marine Monuments Are Difficult to Protect

November 23, 2016 — Unable to constantly patrol the waters, fishery enforcement agencies need new methods and technologies for monitoring [marine monument] areas.

Just west of the Hawaiian Islands sits one of the largest marine protected areas in the world. In August, President Obama tripled the size of Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, which now stretches across 582,578 square miles of ocean, an area nearly four times the size of California. The monument is home to colorful coral reefs teeming with marine life and encompasses rocky outcrops where some 5.5 million birds, including the Laysan Duck and Short-tailed Albatross, breed every year.

More than 5,000 miles east of the warm Pacific waters of Hawaii, in the frigid northern Atlantic Ocean, sits the 4,913-square-mile Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, which Obama designated in September. There, 130 miles off the coast of Massachusetts, underwater ravines deeper than the Grand Canyon contain cold-water coral reefs, among the world’s most delicate ecosystems, and the water’s surface serves as the winter home of Maine’s Atlantic Puffins.

The monuments are major victories for environmentalists—with a swipe of his pen, the President banned all commercial fishing within the monuments’ boundaries and outlawed all gas and oil exploration. Protecting marine life in both oceans will ultimately support fisheries and provide refuge for wildlife adapting to a changing climate.

But it’s one thing to designate a monument, and it’s quite another to actually enforce the promised protections. The two new monuments are vast and remote, and authorities already struggle to detect illegal activity in marine protected areas that are smaller and closer to land. In 1997 and 2004, nets and other commercial fishing gear were uncovered in the Monitor National Marine Sanctuary off the coast of North Carolina. Even worse, evidence of fishing with explosives, bleach, and even cyanide has been found in the National Marine Sanctuary of American Samoa.

That the new monuments are so large and located in such distant waters presents an even bigger challenge for the federal agencies responsible for their monitoring. Ideally, crewed vessels would police the areas, says Lisa Symons, resource protection coordinator at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Office of National Marine Sanctuaries. A physical presence would deter illegal fishing or mining and allow authorities to arrest or capture violating vessels. But this is almost impossible considering the locations of the new monuments—offshore and hundreds of miles from cities, towns, or villages.

Read the full story at Audubon

New Program Gives Vet Foothold in Fisheries

November 22, 2016 — Barney Boyer’s first few months as a NOAA Fisheries intern have been busy. He has assisted with tracking the return of salmon and forage fish to the Elwha River estuary, surveyed Puget Sound ocean conditions, and begun studying the invasion of non-native fish in the Snohomish River.

Boyer is the first military veteran to take an internship with NOAA Fisheries through a new partnership between Washington’s The next link/button will exit from NWFSC web site Department of Veterans Affairs and The next link/button will exit from NWFSC web site Veterans Conservation Corps, NOAA Fisheries’ West Coast Region, the The next link/button will exit from NWFSC web site NOAA Restoration Center and the Northwest Fisheries Science Center (NWFSC). Boyer is based at the NWFSC’s Mukilteo Research Station, near Everett, where he is assisting with several research projects, including one that may include him as co-author of a peer-reviewed paper.

“It’s really turned out to be an amazing experience so far,” Boyer said. “Every day here is an interesting experience, and I’m learning all the time.”

Casey Rice, director of the Mukilteo Research Station until his unexpected passing earlier this year, was a key advocate of hosting veterans at Mukilteo.

“Casey wanted this to happen and his colleagues have assumed the task of moving it forward,” said John Floberg of the NOAA Restoration Center, who helped coordinate the program. “It’s Casey’s legacy that veterans are now contributing to research at Mukilteo.”

Read the full story at the Fishing Wire

New England 2017 scallop plan likely to mean landings of 47.5m pounds

November 22, 2016 — The New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) has approved an Atlantic sea scallop fishery management plan for 2017, which maintains landings at a comparable level to 2016, it said.

The framework establishes specifications for the 2017 fishing year, and sets default specifications for 2018.

All told, estimated landings for 2017 are put at 47.5 million pounds, NEFMC said. So far this fishing year — March to October — the fishery has caught around 33m pounds, Dvora Hart, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told Undercurrent News.

She estimated that by the end of the fishing year, on Feb. 28, fishers will have caught a total of around 40m pounds for 2016. Hence, the NEFMC’s projection suggests an increase of 18.7%.

The NEFMC, meanwhile, told Undercurrent that “many factors go into these calculations, but once all of the adjustments and deductions are made, the council’s projections indicate that landings in the end will be very similar — not exactly the same, but in the same general ballpark”.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Governor Bentley Announces $63 Million for Gulf Restoration Projects in Alabama

November 16, 2016 — MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Governor Robert Bentley on Tuesday announced the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) has approved more than $63 million for six Alabama projects that address high-priority conservation needs, including the acquisition and restoration of significant coastal habitats in key focal areas, and the continuation of fisheries monitoring.

“One of Alabama’s greatest natural treasures is its gulf coast, and it’s vital that we continue to provide the necessary funds to ensure our coastline is restored from the devastation caused by the 2010 oil spill,” Governor Bentley said. “This $63 million from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation will support long-term recovery efforts and provide for future efforts to return wildlife populations to their normal levels. I appreciate the efforts of our local, state and federal partners who are working so hard on the continuing resurgence of the Alabama Gulf Coast.”

In 2013, a U.S. District Court approved two plea agreements resolving certain criminal charges against BP and Transocean related to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The funds announced Tuesday are the fourth installment from NFWF’s Gulf Environmental Benefit Fund (GEBF). A total of $356 million will be paid into the Gulf Fund over a five-year period for conservation projects in the State of Alabama.

The number of awards from the GEBF in the state of Alabama now stands at 19, with a total value of more than $115 million. All projects were selected for funding following extensive consultation with the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Read the full story from WLTZ

The Bycatch That Gives You a Haddock

November 4, 2016 — Starting in October, the federal government began a pilot project to test electronic monitoring on midwater herring trawlers fishing in “groundfish closed” areas off the coast of New England, two of which are in the rich spawning grounds on the continental shelf known as Georges Bank. The yearlong project will help regulators decide whether cameras can replace people as observers to regulate herring trawlers’ catch of haddock.

But before the study is finished, the New England Fishery Management Council will be working to loosen the rules on how much haddock herring trawlers can catch.

Since 2011, government observers have been required on any trips trawlers make to those areas, as part of a program to limit incidental catch, often called “bycatch,” of untargeted fish species. In the case of herring fishing, the biggest bycatch concern on Georges Bank has been haddock, a species on the rebound after the groundfish collapses of the mid-1990s.

But the monitoring program has been expensive. A recent amendment to all Northeast fisheries plans required the industry to assist in funding its overseers, increasing pressure to bring down costs.

Federal regulators believe electronic monitoring could be the answer.

“This year we’ll get really good (human) observer coverage — 440 sea days — so we’re going to compare what the observer sees and what the camera sees,” said Daniel Luers, a monitoring expert at the Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries office of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). “The contractors will watch all the videos, and then NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service) will watch to confirm that what the contractors have seen correlates with the observers.”

What they’re looking for are “discard” events, where fishermen dump unwanted fish back into the sea — rather than reporting the bycatch and facing fishing closures.

Read the full story at Eco RI News

New Jersey anglers throw back three times more fish than they keep

November 4, 2016 — According to a fisheries report, in 2015 New Jersey anglers kept 4 ½ million fish, but they threw back 14.8 million, or roughly three times the amount they brought home.

The three to one catch and release rate is the about the same rate as in 2014. But, the same report found there was a substantial drop off in the number of fish anglers caught.

In 2014 anglers put 6.2 million fish in their coolers while releasing 19.9 million.

The numbers were provided in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s annual Fisheries of the United States report, released last week.

The report didn’t provide analysis, but the reason for the dip could be related to the fact that fewer fishermen fished in 2015. Nearly 625,000 anglers fished in 2014, compared to almost 540,000 last year. The result was about 600,000 less fishing trips.

In total 23 marine coastal states, plus Puerto Rico were in the survey and combined to keep 151 million fish last year while releasing 200 million.

Of all the coastal states only Maine and Massachusetts anglers kept more fish than they threw back.

Read the full story at the Asbury Park Press 

MASSACHUSETTS: New Bedford fish catch most valuable in U.S.

November 4, 2016 — NEW BEDFORD, Mass. – Citing 2015 landings worth $322 million, for the 16th year in a row the city held the top-value title nationwide for its fishing catch, according to NOAA Fisheries. The top ranking was thanks largely to scallops, SouthCoastToday.com reported Oct. 28.

New Bedford’s catch was 124 million pounds, good for 11th in the country.

“We’re reaping the benefits of good, cooperative science, and solid relationships between the regulators, the fishermen and the scientists,” said Ed Anthes-Washburn, port director for the city’s Harbor Development Commission.

The annual catch reports, released by NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service, showed New Bedford’s catch dipped by about 11 percent last year, falling to 124 million pounds in 2015 from 140 million in 2014. The 2013 catch totaled 130 million pounds.

Read the full story at the Providence Business News