Saving Seafood

NC Division of Marine Fisheries urges fishermen to complete license, permit renewals early

April 24, 2025 — The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries began renewing commercial fishing, seafood dealer and for-hire licenses and permits on April 15, and the division is asking fishermen go ahead and get this business done in April or May.

Those who renew in these months may find reduced wait times, as opposed to those who wait until late June, noted a DMF news release.

Another way to avoid long lines is to renew by mail or drop-box or schedule an appointment for April or May. Those with appointments will be given priority over walk-ins.

Read the full story at The Coastland Times

Efforts On to Rebuild North Carolina’s Oyster Population

April 27, 2021 — North Carolina’s estuaries were teeming with oysters 150 years ago. In the time since, a combination of factors has caused oyster populations to decline.

Development, urbanization, point and nonpoint source pollution, intensive farming, harvest pressure, and increases in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events such as freezing temperatures, hurricanes, heavy rains and prolonged winds have all contributed to the loss, said state marine ecologist Jason Peters.

As supervisor of North Carolina’s cultch planting program, Peters has been heading up an effort by the Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries to rebuild the oyster population.

“Cultch planting is an oyster restoration technique employed by many states along the East and Gulf coasts to return hard bottom habitat to our estuaries. This hard-bottom habitat, usually in the form of oyster shell of fossilized limestone marl, is placed in areas with suitable conditions for recruitment, growth and survival of oysters,” said Peters, who also supervises the state’s artificial reefs and oyster sanctuaries program. “The objective of this program is to mitigate habitat loss from harvest or natural events by establishing new, successful oyster reefs.”

Erin Fleckenstein is coastal scientist with the Wanchese office of the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review. She explained that cultch planting activities are part of a comprehensive strategy to build back oyster resources and support a wild harvest fishery in the state.

Read the full story at Coastal Review Online

NORTH CAROLINA: Blue crab season closure implemented

December 10, 2020 — The following was released by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality:

The blue crab season closures will go into effect Jan. 1-31, 2021 in North Carolina state waters north and east of the Highway 58 bridge and March 1-15, 2021 south and west of the Highway 58 bridge. The N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission approved measures to end overfishing and achieve sustainable harvest with the adoption of the Blue Crab Fishery Management Plan Amendment 3 at its February 2020 meeting.

The blue crab season closure replaces the annual pot closure period and will remain closed for the entirety. Pots of any type must be removed from Internal Coastal Fishing Waters (excludes ocean) during the season closure and possession of blue crabs regardless of harvest gear type is prohibited from all Coastal Fishing Waters (ocean and internal waters).

Season closures are necessary to reduce harvest because a recent North Carolina stock assessment for blue crab determined the stock is overfished and overfishing is occurring. Overfished means the population is too small. Overfishing means the removal rate is too high. North Carolina law mandates that fishery management plans include measures to end overfishing within two years of adoption and rebuild the stock to achieve sustainable harvest within 10 years of adoption.

Division of Marine Fisheries Director Steve Murphey implemented the new measures through Proclamation M-01-2021. Proclamations are available on the division’s website at http://portal.ncdenr.org/web/mf/proclamations.

Information on Amendment 3 can be found on the Blue Crab Fishery Management Plan Information webpage. For more information, contact division biologist Daniel Zapf at 252-946-6481.

NORTH CAROLINA: Rebekah Williams is a pearl in the Carteret County oyster farming industry

October 19, 2020 — Rebekah Williams has vivid memories clamming and gathering oysters with her grandfather on his 10-acre oyster farm.

Her early childhood dream was to become an oyster farmer just like grandpa.

Williams has always loved being on the water, but children have a way of growing up and moving on to other things. After college, Williams came home for the summer and began working at Sammy’s, a local restaurant. Soon, Williams learned that Sammy Boyd had an oyster farm. He also grew up in the fishing industry.

When Williams shared her childhood dream with Boyd of starting a business of farming oysters, Boyd highly encouraged her.

In 2016, she officially obtained a lease from the State of North Carolina and in 2017 began buying “seed oysters.” Seed oysters are tiny oysters as small as 1 millimeter that are raised from larval oysters.

Read the full story at Carolina Coast Online

North Carolina submits formal comments in opposition to offshore drilling

August 21, 2017 — Gov. Roy Cooper and the Department of Environmental Quality submitted formal comments yesterday to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to convey North Carolina’s opposition to oil and gas leasing for offshore drilling on North Carolina’s coast.

“Because offshore drilling threatens North Carolina’s critical coastal industries and unique coastal environment with limited benefits for our citizens, it is a bad deal for North Carolina,” Cooper wrote in the letter. “Accordingly, I ask that you respect the wishes of our state and maintain in the new OCS Leasing Plan the current prohibition of oil and gas drilling off North Carolina’s coast.”

Coastal tourism generates $3 billion annually in North Carolina and supports more than 30,000 jobs in the eastern part of the state. Commercial fishing also brings in hundreds of millions of dollars to the state every year.

Read the full story at Island Free Press

Judge blocks closure of southern flounder fishing

October 12th, 2016 — A Wake County Superior Court judge has issued an injunction preventing the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission from closing the entire southern flounder fishery from October 16 through January 1.

During its November 2015 meeting at Jeanette’s Pier, the commission voted 6-3 to shut down both the commercial and recreational fisheries for southern flounder during the fourth quarter of 2016.

A lawsuit was filed by the New Bern-based North Carolina Fisheries Association, the Carteret County Fishermen’s Association, as well as Dare, Hyde and Carteret counties, against the commission’s action, and resulted in a temporary restraining order being issued on Sept. 28.

The defendants are the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, as well as NCDEQ secretary Donald R. Van Der Vaart, DMF Director Braxton Davis, and all nine members of the NC Marine Fisheries Commission,

After two hours of testimony on Oct. 6 from attorneys representing the NCFA and the state, Superior Court Judge John Jolly, Jr. issued an order preventing the Division of Marine Fisheries from instituting the October 16 closure.

When the MFC voted for the closure last year, interest groups from the commercial fishing industry, which were opposed to the ban, lined up against the recreation-oriented Coastal Conservation Association and Recreational Fishing Alliance.

The 6-3 vote pitted the three recreational, two at-large, and one MFC member representing the scientific community against the three members holding commercial seats on the commission.

CCA and RFA actually came into the meeting advocating that restrictions be imposed on the commercial fishery only, but both groups eventually took a public stance accepting the closure of the entire fishery.

Read the full story at The Outer Banks Voice