NOAA Archives - Page 471 of 523

While Bering Sea groundfish booms, Gulf of Alaska struggles

December 5th, 2016 — Bering Sea fish stocks are booming, but it’s a mixed bag for groundfish in the Gulf of Alaska.

Fishery managers will set 2017 catches this week for pollock, cod and other fisheries that make up Alaska’s largest fish hauls, which are taken from 3 to 200 miles offshore. More than 80 percent of Alaska’s seafood comes from those federally managed waters, and by all accounts the Bering fish stocks are in great shape.

“For the Bering Sea, just about every catch is up,” said Diana Stram, Bering groundfish plan coordinator for the North Pacific Fishery Management Council.

Twenty-two species are under the council’s purview, along with such nontargeted species as sharks, octopus and squid. For the nation’s largest food fishery — Bering pollock — the stock is so robust that catches could safely double to nearly 6 billion pounds, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists who presented their data to the council last week.

But the allowable catch will remain close to this year’s harvest, Stram said, due to a strict cap applied to all fish removals.

“The sum of all the catches in the Bering Sea cannot exceed 2 million metric tons,” she explained.

With all stocks so healthy, catch-setting becomes a trade-off among the varying species, Stram said. The council also sets bycatch levels for the fisheries, another constraint.

Read the full story at Alaska Dispatch News

NORTH CAROLINA: Fishermen can earn $400 a day removing old gear from the waters

December 5th, 2016 — Fishermen can earn $400 a day removing old fishing and crabbing gear from the waters of northeastern North Carolina.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation is accepting applications through Jan. 13. Watermen must have a valid commercial fishing license and guarantee availability for work from Jan. 18 through Feb. 7, according to a news release from the federation.

Those accepted will have to attend a training session to learn general project protocol and how to use equipment such as data collection tablets and side-scan sonars.

Each boat can earn $400 per day and is required to have two people on board for safety. The project is funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program and is intended to improve habitat and water quality, according to the release.

In January 2016, 11 crews, in partnership with state Marine Patrol officers, removed 753 crab pots, the release said. Combined with a shoreline cleanup, this project removed over 7.5 tons of fishing gear and marine debris.

Applications are available at www.nccoast.org/crab and can be mailed to P.O. Box 276, Wanchese, N.C. 27981.

Read the full story at The Virginian-Pilot

NOAA Fisheries Asking Boaters to Watch for Right Whales

December 2nd, 2016 — NOAA Fisheries is warning boaters to watch out for the critically endangered North Atlantic Right Whales.

The whales are now migrating south for the winter and to help protect them, NOAA fisheries has designated several Seasonal Management Areas along the U.S. East Coast.

In the areas, which include Block Island, the Ports of New York/New Jersey and the entrance to Delaware Bay, vessels greater than 65 feet in length must not exceed speeds of 10 knots, through April.

The purpose of the regulation is to reduce the likelihood of deaths and serious injuries to the endangered whales that result from collisions with ships.

Read the full story at Capecod.com

NOAA Fisheries Offers Paperless Way to Receive Information about Fishing Regulations and Management Actions

December 1, 2016 — The following was released by NOAA:

This is an annual reminder that NOAA Fisheries offers you two ways to receive your fishery bulletins. These bulletins contain fishing regulation information and are typically referred to as “the blue sheets.”

You may receive a copy of the bulletin two ways:

Electronic/E-mail:

To receive an on-line copy of the NOAA Fisheries Southeast Fishery Bulletin, which explains current and proposed fishing regulations please visit http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/fishbulletin. You can unsubscribe at any time.

The electronic copy of the bulletin, sent via e-mail, will be delivered to you faster than a paper copy, is in color, features informational links, and reduces paper use.

Note: If you already receive electronic fishery bulletins via email, your subscription will not be affected and you do NOT need to sign up again now.

Text Message Notifications:

FIND OUT ABOUT IMMEDIATE OPENINGS AND CLOSURES

NOAA’s Text Message Alert Program allows you to receive important fishery related alerts via text message (SMS).

Text alerts you may receive include:

Immediate fishery openings and closures

Any significant changes to fishing regulations that happen quickly

Gulf of Mexico Recreational Fisheries Related Alerts

Text GULFRECFISH to 888777

Gulf of Mexico Commercial Fisheries Related Alerts

Text GULFCOMMFISH to 888777

South Atlantic Recreational Fisheries Related Alerts

Text SATLRECFISH to 888777

South Atlantic Commercial Fisheries Related Alerts

Text SATLCOMMFISH to 888777

Caribbean Fisheries Related Alerts

Text CARIBFISH to 888777

Mail:

Note: If you already receive fishery bulletins in the mail, you still need to complete the attached survey notice and send it back to NOAA Fisheries. If you do not send to the address below, you will not receive any bulletins in the mail.

This change will be EFFECTIVE January 2, 2017.

In an effort to better serve you, we want to update our records so the Southeast Fishery Bulletins you receive are of interest to you.

Please see below and let us know which regional specific bulletins you would like to receive.

Send your response to the following address:

National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration

Southeast Regional Office, Sustainable Fisheries Division

263 13th Avenue South

Saint Petersburg, FL 33701

NOAA fishing head: Science, bycatch likely to remain focus under Trump administration

November 30, 2016 — SEATTLE — In a little over a month and a half, Eileen Sobeck will leave her job as the US’s top fishing regulator as the Obama administration appointee leaves to make way for leadership named by incoming president Donald Trump.

Since 2013, Sobeck, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA’s) assistant administrator for fisheries, has led a team of over 4,800 federal employees, one of the major divisions of the 12,000-member agency of the Department of Commerce.

NOAA’s National Marine Fishery Service (NMFS) regulates all US ocean fishing that takes place outside of the three-mile coastal limit that falls to the states. Its legal authority stems mainly from the 1976 Magnuson-Stevens Act, but other laws also require it to protect marine mammals and endangered species.

In a recent interview with Undercurrent News, Sobeck said that despite the upcoming change in personnel, NMFS’s core objectives — to develop and maintain sustainable fisheries, to safeguard “protected resources, and to achieve “organizational excellence” through improved administration — will remain.

“We will always working on our science that’s needed to translate into management practices. I think we’re going to be focused on bycatch issues,” Sobeck, who will leave her post by Jan. 14, said. “We’ve beat the overfishing monster, but we still could be more efficient in maximizing targeted species and minimizing bycatch. That also goes for protected resource bycatch.”

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Oceana Files Legal Challenge to Northern Anchovy Catch Limit

WASHINGTON (Saving Seafood) — November 29, 2016 — Last week, environmental group Oceana filed a lawsuit alleging that a recent National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) specification rule allows commercial fishing for northern anchovy at levels that threaten the anchovy population and the marine ecosystem. The complaint was filed against the NMFS, Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in the District Court of Northern California.

The specification rule in question, announced October 26, 2016 under the Coastal Pelagic Species Fishery Management Plan, set an annual catch limit (ACL) of 25,000 metric tons for the central subpopulation of anchovy. In its lawsuit, Oceana claims that the NMFS did not articulate the scientific basis for this ACL, did not base the ACL and related management measures on best available science, and did not explain how it would prevent overfishing and protect the West Coast marine ecosystem’s food web.

In doing so, Oceana claims that the rule violates the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and the Administrative Procedure Act. The complaint claims that the northern anchovy population has severely declined since 2009, and that northern anchovy are “one of the most important forage species” in the California marine ecosystem.

“The Fisheries Service’s actions and failures to act have harmed Oceana’s members’ interest in rebuilding and maintaining a healthy and sustainable population of northern anchovy and a healthy ocean ecosystem,” said the lawsuit, which was filed by lawyers from Earthjustice on Oceana’s behalf. “This harm will continue in the absence of action by the Court.”

Read the full legal complaint as a PDF

Idea to cut NASA’s role in climate science could be major loss for Maine, scientists say

November 29, 2016 — Maine scientists are decrying the assertion by a senior adviser to President-elect Donald Trump that the new administration will eliminate or dramatically scale back NASA’s climate research.

The scientists say the elimination of the agency’s earth science programs would be catastrophic for climate science research in Maine, impairing their ability to detect and analyze effects on fisheries, forests and agriculture. Maine is a hub of climate research – especially as it relates to the oceans – and the work relies on data collected by NASA satellites and processed by the agency’s experts.

“If we lose these data sets and capabilities, that will be a major loss to us being able to monitor and track changes here in Maine and in other areas that impact us,” said Andrew Thomas, a professor of oceanography at the University of Maine’s School of Marine Sciences, which receives more than one-sixth of its research funds from NASA. “Basically, you’re chopping off one of your arms and saying, ‘Carry on.’ ” The school’s Satellite Data Lab is using NASA data to analyze effects of melting ice in the Gulf of Alaska and to monitor marine algae production in the California Current.

Bob Walker, a former Pennsylvania congressman who serves as Trump’s space policy adviser, said in interviews last week that the administration would realign NASA’s budget, prioritizing exploration of “deep space” over space-based observations of Earth, which he has previously characterized as “politically correct environmental monitoring.” Earth observations would instead be made by the National Science Foundation or National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, two much smaller agencies with little experience or expertise in space-based climate monitoring.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

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