Saving Seafood

NORTH CAROLINA: Commission delays vote on southern flounder

October 6, 2015 — A state commission will delay until November a decision on whether the state should impose new restrictions on southern flounder in an effort to protect the potentially over-fished coastal stock.

Some recreational fishermen and conservationists claim the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission put off the protections under political pressure from a handful of state lawmakers and the state’s commercial fishing interests. Waiting until November means the new limits won’t be in place for this year’s fall season.

The Coastal Conservation Association of North Carolina has written to the commission chairman, Sammy Corbett, saying it is “infuriated” at his decision not to take up the topic until the next scheduled meeting, in mid-November. In August, Corbett said a special meeting would be held in September to consider the restrictions.

“This is not your commission, but a governor-appointed body that includes diverse interests, tasked with the duty to safeguard and manage public fisheries resources for all of the citizens of North Carolina,” Bud Abbott, the organization’s president, wrote.

Read the full story at The News & Observer

 

NORTH CAROLINA: Correction for Coastal Habitat Protection Plan Meeting

October 6, 2015 — The following was released by the North Carolina Fisheries Association:

CORRECTION

The Coastal Habitat Protection Plan Steering Committee Meeting scheduled for Thursday, Oct. 8 at 1 p.m. will be held at the NC Division of Marine Fisheries Central District Office, 5285 Hwy. 70, Morehead City.

NORTH CAROLINA: NCFA Board meeting postponed!

October 5, 2015 — The following was released by the North Carolina Fisheries Association:

NCFA BOARD MEETING POSTPONED!

The meeting, which was scheduled for this afternoon, has been rescheduled due to the weather.

The Board will meet on Tuesday, yes TUESDAY, October 27th at the Civic Center in Washington, NC, beginning at 2:00pm

RUSSELL LAY: “Disputed Fisheries Studies: Politics Or Inexact Science?”

WASHINGTON (Saving Seafood) – September 29, 2015 – The following excerpt appeared on September 27, 2015 in the Outer Banks Voice. Its author, Russell Lay, is co-owner and journalist at Outer Banks Voice, and an advocate for menhaden fishermen:

Science plays a big role in managing fisheries.

Scientists assess fish stocks, migration patterns, environmental issues – useful data that allow regulators to set policy.

We expect our science to be accurate and unaffected by politics, and as citizens, we expect political actors to treat science in the same manner.

Even Robert Fritchey, the author of Wetland Riders, a history of the Coastal Conservation Association, acknowledges that size limits, creel limits and other restrictions are necessary, and that “the science of estimating recreational discards and mortality is vastly improved.” Which would suggest that if interest groups are put aside, there is some hope science could be used in an unbiased manner to help manage fisheries.

Yet a series of e-mails found their way into the public domain from a 2007 round-robin discussion among several N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries scientists trying to peg a mortality rate for speckled seatrout caught by recreational anglers. See video

It would take a few hundred words to demonstrate where science goes off the rails and how other factors, including interest group reactions, exert an influence on what is expected to be an unbiased, fact-driven process.

The mortality rate is important because it is applied to the estimated landings of recreationally caught species and used to assign “catch quotas” for recreational and commercial interests.

The group of six scientists struggled. They questioned even the scope of the studies. “I have a problem with the adjusted values. The handling effect is a real phenomenon with recreational fishing and is definitely a cause for release mortality . . . this study wasn’t designed to look at stress-related mortality . . . ” said one team member.

They also expressed concerns over small sample sizes, differing numbers based on seasonality and salinity of the water, and a wide variance in mortality rates produced by the studies – from a low of 7.3 percent to a high of 19.4 percent.

For those who skipped the video, one comment by DMF scientist Douglas Mumford angered commercial fishermen already suspicious of state and national studies that were reducing stock assessment numbers in several species and therefore, reducing commercial quotas.

“If we put the 19.4 percent on the table, (recreational) folks will flip out. They’ll tell you there is no way 1 out of 5 fish they release dies,” Mumford wrote.

In the end the group decided to go at the low end and chose a mortality rate of 9.8 percent, even though more than one scientist felt a range closer to 14.8 percent was more accurate.

In 2015, another clash between science and politics took place.

The state Division of Marine Fisheries had ordered a stock assessment of southern flounder, a species many believe is suffering from a decline in North Carolina.

Commercial fishermen dispute those claims, citing rising numbers in commercial landings with no concurrent loss of landings on the recreational side, even while previous restrictions on southern flounder have reduced the catch effort by 137 percent, according to Britton Shackleford, president of North Carolina Watermen United.

Even though the DMF staff recommended against releasing the study, which subsequently failed to pass a peer review, DMF director Dr. Louis Daniel, backed by recreational members of the Marine Fisheries Commission and at-large member Chuck Laughridge (a life member of the Coastal Conservation Association), as well as the CCA and another recreational interest group, the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA), declared their intention to move forward on reducing the commercial catch of southern flounder.

Once again, commercial fishermen, noting a study that failed to pass a scientific peer review, saw the “flawed study” still being used to reduce commercial operations, and adding further fuel to the fire regarding whether science or politics was dictating policy at the state level.

While a group of 13 state senators and representatives was able to persuade the MFC to delay taking action on imposing those restrictions until their September meeting, vote counters in Raleigh worry that inland Republicans will follow the CCA lead and allow the MFC to impose restrictions even though the science backing the decision has failed to pass academic muster.

Menhaden was once a major economic contributor to coastal North Carolina communities.

Severe restrictions on menhaden harvesting were imposed in North Carolina and other states based on a 2012 stock assessment from the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which claimed the species had been severely overfished by the commercial industry.

Read the full op-ed at Outer Banks Voice

 

NORTH CAROLINA: Spawning site to help rebuild snapper-grouper fishery

September 23, 2015 — A spawning site off of the North Carolina coast is one of five locations selected to help in efforts to rebuild declining stocks in the snapper-grouper fishery.

The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council met Sept. 14-18 at Hilton Head, S.C., and identified the sites to be considered for final designation as Spawning Special Management Zones (SMZs).

The council recently held a series of public hearings on a proposal to establish up to nine SMZs off the coast from North Carolina to eastern Florida to protect valuable spawning sites.

While bottom fishing for the snapper-grouper species would be prohibited in the zones, activities such as trolling for tuna, dolphin and billfish would still be allowed.

There were four proposed sites off the North Carolina coast ranging in size from 1-2 square miles to a proposed site of 4-12 square miles.

The council selected the South Cape Lookout site, which is five square miles, as the preferred site.

Read the full story at Jacksonville Daily News

 

 

NORTH CAROLINA: Pamlico, Pungo, Neuse and Bay rivers to close to anchored, large-mesh gill nets

September 22, 2015 — The following was released by the North Carolina Fisheries Association:

Some rivers and creeks in the central coastal area of North Carolina will close to anchored, large-mesh gill nets at 5 p.m. Thursday due to interactions with Atlantic sturgeon.

The action closes Management Unit C under the state’s Atlantic Sturgeon Incidental Take Permit, which includes the Pamlico, Pungo, Neuse and Bay rivers and their tributaries. The closure impacts all anchored, large-mesh gill nets, including those set under a Recreational Commercial Gear License.

The closure will remain in effect until Dec. 1.

This marks the first management unit closure in North Carolina resulting from interactions with Atlantic sturgeon under the incidental take permit since July 2014.

The action is required by the incidental take permit, which allows for anchored, large-mesh gill net interactions with six Atlantic sturgeon, only two of which can be dead, in Management Unit C during the fall season (Sept. 1- Nov. 30). Once the allowed interactions are approached or met, the waters must close for the remainder of the season.

As of today, N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries’ staff have observed four live and one dead Atlantic sturgeon interactions with anchored, large-mesh gill nets in Management Unit C. The figures that state officials have observed are approaching the legal limit for these kinds of interactions in Management Unit C.

For details of the closure, see Proclamation M-15-2015 at http://www.ncmarinefisheries.net/proclamations.

North Carolina’s estuarine gill net fishery is managed under incidental take permits for sea turtles and Atlantic sturgeon. The permits are issued to the state by the National Marine Fisheries Service.

The permits authorize limited takes of these species, listed under the federal Endangered Species Act, as part of conservation plans that divide the state’s internal coastal waters into management units. The permits require observer coverage, so that the management units are closely monitored for interactions with sea turtles and Atlantic sturgeon. An annual number of allowed interactions with each species is assigned to each gear type in each management unit. If the number of interactions is approached or met, the management unit must close for the remainder of the season or year.

For more information, contact Chris Batsavage, the division’s Protected Resources Section chief, at 252-808-8009 or 252-241-2995, or via email at Chris.Batsavage@ncdenr.gov.

 

HARTFORD COURANT: Cost of Outdated Rules? Millions Of Dead Fish

September 21, 2015 — This is utterly crazy. Hundreds of thousands — perhaps even millions — of pounds of edible and valuable fish are being wasted every year, thrown overboard from commercial fishing boats off the Connecticut coast, due to long-outdated federal regulations that have not kept up with a changing climate and shifting fish populations.

The problem, as The Courant’s Gregory Hladky has reported, is that catch quotas for some species are based on where the fish were when regulations were created decades ago, not where they are today.

Take, for example, summer flounder or fluke. Catch quotas to protect and rebuild the species were set in 1990, based on data gathered in the 1980s. The concentration or biomass of the species was then off the mid-Atlantic coast, so North Carolina and Virginia fishermen got large quotas, 30 percent and 20 percent respectively, while Connecticut got 2.25 percent.

So too with black sea bass, for which Connecticut fishermen are limited to 1 percent of the commercial catch, about 22,000 pounds of black sea bass this year, while boats from North Carolina get to 11 percent of the total and Virginia fishermen get 20 percent.

Read the full editorial at Hartford Courant

RUSS LAY: CCA’s small numbers has large grip on N.C. politics, fisheries

September 15, 2015 — Approach any recreational angler wetting a line from the surf, a pier, a bridge or a boat and ask, “Are you a member of the CCA?”

It’s far more than an even bet that not only will the response be “No,” but more than likely, “What is the CCA?”

But visit legislators in Raleigh and ask them about the Coastal Conservation Association. Chances are every single lawmaker knows of the CCA and has likely been lobbied by a representative of the group.

When Sam Walker and myself traveled to Raleigh in 2014 to interview Sen. Bill Cook and Rep. Paul Tine, we brought with us a basket of questions.

At that time we both were researching the Marine Fisheries Commission in North Carolina and how the CCA might be influencing the panel.

We were also interested in the Game Fish Bill, legislation pushed by the CCA almost every legislative session to ban the commercial sale or harvest of three popular fish species in North Carolina: red drum, striped bass and speckled trout.

Read the full opinion piece at The Outer Banks Voice

NORTH CAROLINA: Fisheries joint enforcement, charter boat logs repealed

September 15, 2015 — A new law passed this summer by the General Assembly and signed by Gov. Pat McCrory rolls back a pair of controversial fisheries management measures approved by state lawmakers in 2014.

Senate Bill 374, sponsored by Sen. Bill Cook (R – Beaufort), repeals the for-hire coastal recreational fishing licenses logbook requirement and ends a joint agreement that allowed NOAA Fisheries Enforcement to also have jurisdiction in state waters.

Some members of the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission members and staffers at the Division of Marine Fisheries said the log book was going to be required by federal regulators in the near future, and imposing the rule last year divided the recreational fishing community along interest group lines.

Charter industry participants cited the distraction of keeping and recording catches when the captain should be attending to the safety of the boat and the fishing needs of their clients.

Read the full story at the Outer Banks Voice

 

NORTH CAROLINA: Local legislators cast for answers on flounder issue

September 15, 2015 — RALEIGH, N.C. — Fry it, broil it, stick it in a stew — flounder has as many possible preparations as there are chefs clamoring to serve it.

But the fish’s popularity is cause for concern along the North Carolina coast. Fisheries experts say southern flounder are over fished and need stringent management to save them. Commercial fishermen disagree, prompting state legislators — including three from Southeastern North Carolina — to get involved. The fish fight has erupted into an all-out battle focused on the state’s nine-member Marine Fisheries Commission, now tasked with finding a solution that will pacify policy makers, unburden fishermen and keep the flounder swimming.

“I think this is relatively newer to the legislators, and I think they probably jumped the gun on it,” said commission member Mike Wicker, who is also a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “I think they want to represent what their constituency would like them to represent, but I don’t think they’ve had enough time to understand what their constituency wants.”

Read the full story at Star News Online