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NILS STOLPE: Why is the summer flounder quota being reduced 50 percent in two years (with another major reduction for the following year)?

October 20, 2016 — Summer flounder, also known as fluke, support recreational and commercial fisheries that are among the most important in the mid-Atlantic and southern New England. They have been a mainstay of recreational fishermen either from their own boats or on for-hire vessels, support a large directed commercial fishery, their incidental harvest is important in other fisheries and they are near the top of the list of must-have meals for summer visits to the shore. Hundreds of party and charter boats depend on them for all or for part of their annual incomes, thousands of private boats seek them out every summer, and much of the business bait and tackle shops do every year depends on the fishery. Hundreds of commercial fishing boats target them or take them incidentally in other fisheries.

To say that the summer flounder fishery is important to tens of thousands of people from Cape Cod to Cape Hatteras would be an understatement. The fishery is more important to both recreational and commercial fishermen than any other in the Mid-Atlantic and southern New England.

“By 2010 the fishing mortality on summer flounder had declined to its lowest level in at least 30 years, and summer flounder stock biomass was the highest since the stock assessments began in the 1960s” (from The summer flounder chronicles II: new science, new controversy, 2001–2010, M. Terciero, Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries, Dec 2011).

But in a memo dated 25 July 2016, the Chair of the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC), wrote “the revised understanding of the stock status produced by the assessment update indicates reductions in the estimates of SSB, and increases in the estimates of annual Fs.” So 5 years after declaring that the summer flounder stock was at its highest level in half a century the managers decided fishing mortality was greater that it had been thought to be and that there were fewer summer flounder than was previously estimated.

Following a quota cut for both recreational and commercial fishermen of 27% for the 2016 fishing year it was decided that a 31% cut was necessary in 2017. That’s a 50% reduction in landings in two years.

The NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, MA conducts annual bottom trawl surveys in the spring and the fall that have been continuous since 1963. They are designed to give a relative measure of the abundance of the various species caught. The chart on the right shows that there has been nothing particularly dramatic going on with the summer flounder in either the spring or autumn survey, seemingly nothing that would warrant such draconian quota cuts (note that beginning in 2009 a new survey vessel was employed, resulting in higher absolute catches).

With the quota reduction in 2017, commercial summer flounder landings are going to be at their lowest point since 1974. From 1950 to 2014 annual commercial landings averaged 7,200 metric tons. The 2017 quota will be one third of that. In the words of the head of NMFS in 2011 ”in 1976, federal management of marine fisheries was virtually non-existent. With the exception of state managed waters, federal activities were limited to supporting a patchwork of fishery specific treaties governing international waters, which at that time existed only 12 miles off our nation’s coasts.” In twenty-three of the twenty-six years between 1950 and 1976, pre-Magnuson years with no significant management of summer flounder, commercial landings were higher than they will be in 2017, which will be the fortieth year of intensive management of the fishery. This management has involved annual surveys, at least 100 meetings (usually involving at least a dozen people and usually held at coastal resorts or conference centers) and over 8,000 pages (either dealing with summer flounder alone or in combination with sea bass and scup, which are all included in the same management plan) of reports, calculations, charts and tables, memos, meeting notices and on and on.

Kind of makes you wonder what’s going on with summer flounder management, doesn’t it?

The Secret Life of Krill

October 19, 2016 — SYDNEY, Australia — On an August morning aboard the Nathaniel B. Palmer research vessel floating at the bottom of the world, Christian Reiss was listening for acoustic signals bouncing off krill, a pinkish, feathery-limbed crustacean that is the lifeblood of the Antarctic ecosystem.

It was the last month of the Southern Hemisphere winter, and conditions were good: There was no thud from sea ice pancakes bumping together to distort his tests in the clear waters of the South Shetland Islands, about 500 miles south of Cape Horn.

Dr. Reiss, an oceanographer with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and his team were studying where krill live in winter.

Low levels of sea ice gave them access to bays that in previous winters were closed. They wanted to know if a lack of sea ice, where krill gather to feed off the algae that live on the underside, was threatening the ocean’s largest biomass. Krill form schools that can be miles long and miles deep.

Whales, sea birds, penguins, squid and seals all feed off krill. And they compete with commercial fisheries in the same waters, who sell the tiny creatures to be used as fish food or to make omega-3 fish oil for human use.

Read the full story at The New York Times

Hawaii’s Longline Fishermen Pushing To Catch More Tuna

October 18th, 2016 — Hawaii’s longline fishermen will be able to go after similar amounts of bigeye tuna next year under a policy passed last week by the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council.

But some have their sights set on doubling or even tripling their annual catch limits through new quota-sharing agreements with Pacific Island territories that don’t currently fish commercially for ahi.

Before that can happen though, the fishermen will need to demonstrate that the species is no longer subject to overfishing and convince federal officials that the pending arrangements with Guam, American Samoa and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands do not violate international agreements to conserve fish stocks.

“We are right at the level of overfishing,” said Jarad Makaiau, a scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “We are right on the razor thin line.”

Wespac manages 1.5 million square miles of ocean in the Central and Western Pacific Ocean and advises the National Marine Fisheries Service on catch limits, endangered species mitigation and stock assessments.

Industry applauds new NOAA fisheries, Magnuson-Stevens guidelines

October 17, 2016 — Changes to national standards for Magnuson-Stevens are receiving accolades from the recreational fishing industry.

NOAA Fisheries last week filed in the Federal Register its final rule to revise the guidelines for National Standards (NS) 1, 3, and 7 of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (MSA). MSA contains 10 national standards which guide the contents and objectives of federal fishery management plans.

Groups including the Recreational Fishing Alliance and American Sportfishing Association are applauding the revision.

“We commend NOAA Fisheries for making meaningful improvements to the National Standard guidelines, which should improve recreational fishing opportunities for federally managed marine fisheries while ensuring the nation is still achieving our strong fisheries conservation standards,” said Mike Leonard, ASA’s Conservation director. “Many of the proposed changes address issues identified through the engagement that NOAA Fisheries has made with the recreational fishing community in recent years, and more specifically the recommendations of the Commission on Saltwater Recreational Fisheries Management, more commonly known as the Morris-Deal Commission.”

The revisions include several changes sought by the industry:

Allowing changes to catch limits to be gradually phased in over up to three years, as long as overfishing is prevented.
Increasing latitude, based on the biology of the fish stock, in setting timelines for rebuilding programs.
Providing flexibility for better managing data-limited stocks while adhering to conservation requirements.
Allowing for greater stability in fishing regulations through guidance on considering multiple years when determining overfishing status.

“RFA believes that the revisions put forward by NOAA Fisheries in the final rule are a step in the right direction and will help restore some balance to the management of our federal fisheries under MSA,” said Jim Donofrio, RFA executive director. “The intent of Congress was to treat the 10 national standards equally in order to achieve a balance between conservation and needs of our fishing communities. Yet, selective execution of certain national standards over the past decade has resulted in a loss of opportunity and economic output in many of our most important recreational fisheries.”

The rulemaking revisions are progress, but point to the importance of legislative changes to address the issues with Magnuson-Stevens, Donofrio said.

Read the full story at Boating Industry

Retention Limit of Aggregated Large Coastal Shark and Hammerhead Shark Management Groups Reduced to 25 Sharks per Trip

October 17, 2016 — The following was released by NOAA:

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has reduced the retention limit for the commercial aggregated large coastal shark and hammerhead shark management groups (Appendix 1) for directed shark limited access permit holders in the Atlantic region from 45 to 25 sharks per vessel per trip effective 11:30 p.m. October 19, 2016. As agreed upon by the Commission’s Coastal Sharks Management Board (in December 2015), the Commission will follow NMFS for in-season changes to the commercial retention limit, therefore, no more than 25 sharks per vessel per trip may be retained from the aggregated large coastal and hammerhead management groups by a state licensed fishermen effective 11:30 p.m. October 19, 2016. This adjustment is intended to promote equitable fishing opportunities in the Atlantic region.

The retention limit for the large coastal shark and hammerhead shark management groups will remain at 25 sharks per vessel per trip in the Atlantic region (federal and state waters) through the remainder of the 2016 fishing season or until NMFS announces another adjustment to the retention limit or a fishery closure is warranted.

The Great Barrier Reef is not actually dead, but it is in serious trouble

October 17, 2016 — There is a big difference between dead and dying.

Outside Magazine published a somewhat tongue-in-cheek obituary for the Great Barrier Reef earlier this week, citing its lifespan from 25 million BC-2016. The article detailed the life of the reef, its active membership in the ecological community, its worldwide fame and the coral bleaching that has led to its deteriorating health. “The Great Barrier Reef of Australia passed away in 2016 after a long illness. It was 25 million years old,” read the article.

Immediate response on social media

The obituary was met with horror and disbelief, both by scientists and social media users alike. Russell Brainard, chief of the Coral Reef Ecosystem Program at NOAA’s Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, told HuffPost that he believes the article was highlighting the urgency of the situation, but that those who don’t have any context “are going to take it at face value that the Great Barrier Reef is dead.”

Many people on social media are indeed taking it at face value. Twitter users have been grieving the loss of the reef and urging followers to pay serious attention to the consequences. Many are spreading false information entirely. Rowan Jacobsen, the writer of the obituary, is a food and environmental writer, not a scientist. But the article has led some outlets to claim that scientists have declared the reef officially dead, further spreading the exaggeration.

Read the full story at WREG

Out in the Atlantic, a canyon named Norfolk could be America’s next national marine sanctuary

October 17, 2016 — About 70 miles out in the Atlantic, a canyon begins. Down steep, craggy walls draped with corals it descends some 6,000 feet, a bridge between the continental shelf and the deep, deep ocean. Creatures move in swarms so thick along stretches of this oasis that cameras simply can’t peek through.

Yes, the Norfolk Canyon is grand.

Grand enough, some admirers say, that it should be given special status as a national marine sanctuary.

For more than a year, the Virginia Aquarium and Marine Science Center has been developing a case for making the canyon part of the sanctuary system. It has company: The National Aquarium in Baltimore and the New York Aquarium are working on nominations for ocean canyons off their states as well.

“These are incredibly special places, amazing places,” said Mark Swingle, the Virginia Aquarium’s director of research and conservation.

The Atlantic canyons, of which there are more than 50, large and small, are “biological hot spots,” he said. They’re havens, feeding grounds and nurseries for thousands of species of creatures, from worms burrowing in the deepest sediments to whales breaching on the choppy surface.

Swingle is leading the push for the Norfolk Canyon, the southernmost of the big ones. He said the Beach City Council will be asked soon to adopt a resolution of support, after which a nomination will be filed before year’s end with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Read the full story at The Virginian-Pilot

Hawaii agency opposes rule change for foreign fishermen

October 14th, 2016 — A group of Hawaii residents want to change local rules for issuing commercial fishing licenses and make the process more transparent after an Associated Press investigation found that hundreds of undocumented fishermen work in the fleet.

A federal loophole allows the foreign men to work but exempts them from most basic labor protections, and some residents are concerned that state rules offer little transparency and leave workers in the dark.

State and federal lawmakers promised to improve conditions for the foreign crews, and at least one company stopped buying fish from the boats immediately following the AP investigation.

The petition asks for rule changes that include certifying that license applicants understand and have read the paperwork they are signing, but a state agency recommends the changes not be implemented.

The foreign fishermen who work in the fleet often do not read, write or understand English and therefore cannot legitimately agree to terms of the license, petitioners said Wednesday.

In a document signed by Bruce Anderson, the administrator for the Division of Aquatic Resources, the department recommends denying the rule changes because the petition focuses on labor issues that are outside the department’s jurisdiction.

“We believe that a requirement that the applicant certify the he or she understands the application, or alternatively, certification from a person assisting the applicant the he or she has read the application and translated its terms to the applicant, is unnecessary,” the document said. “The applicant would be required to comply with all terms and condition of a commercial marine license.”

In a statement issued Thursday by the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources, Anderson reiterated his comments and discussed the issue further.

“While we are clearly concerned about recent media reports regarding working conditions on fishing vessels, our responsibilities currently involve enforcing DAR (Division of Aquatics) CML (commercial marine licensing) rules and any violations associated with the Joint Enforcement Agreement with NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,” Anderson said.

“It is absurd that DLNR will grant a fishing license in the expectation that the applicant will observe its terms and conditions when the applicant may never have seen or read the original application,” said Oahu resident Larry Geller in a statement emailed Wednesday. Geller was among a group to sign the petition.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The New Jersey Herald

Fishing rule gives regional councils more flexibility on catch limits

October 14th, 2016 — Recreation anglers could see more fishing opportunities under a new rule issued by the Obama administration Thursday that gives regional management councils more flexibility to set catch limits.

The rule, already under fire from environmental groups in a rare conflict with the administration, could help mollify the recreational industry and its Republican allies in Congress. They’ve been critical of the administration for not relaxing restrictions given the dramatic rebound of many fish stocks over the past few years.

Officials with the Fisheries division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said the change, months in the crafting, strikes an appropriate balance between the needs of the economically vital recreational and commercial industry while not undermining the current law that has helped rescue dozens of once overfished stocks.

Re-authorization of Magnuson-Stevens a decade ago is credited with helping to rebuild 40 endangered stocks since 2000. Eight stocks came off the overfishing list in 2015 including greater amberjack in the Gulf of Mexico, thorny skate in the Gulf of Maine; and hogfish in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico.

Read the full story at USA Today

Hawaii fishermen, scientists cooperate on sustainability research

October 13, 2016 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced Tuesday that it will be collaborating with fisherman in Hawaii to research the health and size of several native fish species’s populations.

The research will focus on seven species of Hawaii’s deep-water bottom-dwelling fish, which include six species of snapper and one species of grouper. These big red fish, particularly the Onaga and the Opakapaka, are commonly eaten across Hawaii, and the data from this study will inform sustainable fishing practices that, hopefully, will allow these fish to remain in the cultural diet for years to come.

“Our current stock assessment shows that [the Hawaii deep seven] are not over fished and they are not experiencing over fishing,” Benjamin Richard, a NOAA marine biologist who is leading the research, tells The Christian Science Monitor. “Part of our role is to collect the best scientific information so that we can help to ensure that that continues.”

All commercial fisheries are required to record how many fish they catch and sell. The data is used by the state, and agencies such as NOAA’s Pacific Islands Regional Office and the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, to inform the annual catch limit. But this study aims to improve upon those methods.

Read the full story at The Christian Science Monitor