Saving Seafood

MAINE: 2024 Maine pogy season makes its set

June 19, 2024 — Mainers know it’s pogy season when you’re boating along the coast and see a dark underwater cloud with quick shimmers of scales flashing near the surface. Not only are striped bass, tuna, and seals happy, but Maine lobstermen are also happy when they know fresh bait will be available in the near future.

The commercial fishery opened for Atlantic menhaden yesterday in the state, while the non-commercial fishery opened on May 1. A species that occupies coastal waters from Nova Scotia down to northern Florida is believed to consist of a single population, and during mid-June, there seems to be no shortage of them along Maine’s coast.

The preliminary allocation of the Atlantic menhaden quota for the 2024 fiscal year is 24,464,561 pounds. However, this allocation is expected to decrease significantly due to an overage in 2023, when the commercial fishery landings for the species reached 20,036,403 pounds. Despite this, the small-scale fishery continues with open harvest days on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, with a daily limit for harvester vessels set at 5950 pounds, according to the Maine DMR.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

MASSACHUSETTS: Pogies have been abundant in North Shore waters

August 7, 2017 — I can’t remember the last time there have been so many pogies (Brevoortia tyrannus for you Latin fans) in the water. Huge schools of them can be found right now from Salem to Salisbury. The big stripers and tuna have just been feasting on them.

These fish, also known as menhaden on the South Shore, bunker further south and about thirty other names along the Atlantic coast from Nova Scotia to Florida, grow to roughly 15 inches in length and weigh in at about 1 pound. Native Americans in precolonial America called the fish ‘munnawhatteaug,’ which means ‘fertilizer.’

They are a rather oily forage fish with a scale-less head that composes about one-third of it’s body length, are fairly flat-sided with a deeply forked tail. They can range in color from dark blue, green, blue gray, or blue brown above, with silvery sides, belly, and fins, and with a strong yellow or brassy luster. There is a conspicuous dusky spot on each side close behind the gill opening, with a varying number of smaller dark spots farther back, arranged in irregular rows.

They feed in a rather unique manner. An adult pogy swims along with it’s tooth-less mouth wide open and its gills spread. As tiny plankton, annelid worms, and crustacea flow into the mouth they are caught in a whole series of very fine comb-like gill rakers. As they move through the ocean these small fish filter as much as 7 gallons of water per minute! Imagine how much water is filtered when a whole school is feeding.

They have no defense mechanism other than being hidden in a huge school. They are oil-rich so every prey fish in the ocean targets them. Pollock, cod, tuna, stripers, sharks, bluefish and swordfish all savage these schools. Menhaden are a major source of omega-3 fatty acids, which have been shown to cut risks of heart disease and possibly other diseases, such as Alzheimer’s.

Read the full story at the Newburyport Daily News

Mississippi bill would allow pogy boats to keep more red fish

February 10, 2016 — A bill in the state Senate Ports and Marine Resources Committee would greatly increase the number of red drum a commercial fishing boat could have on board.

That, a conservation group says, is unacceptable.

“All of this has been done without any public scrutiny,” said F.J. Eicke of the Coastal Conservation Association. He said the conservationists were not included in any discussions about the bill.

Sen. Brice Wiggins of Pascagoula said he was asked by Omega Protein, which fishes for menhaden in Mississippi waters, to file the bill.

“They are looking out for their captains,” Wiggins said. “The way the law is now, there is zero tolerance. This allows law enforcement some leeway. As in any kind of law, there should be flexibility.”

Wiggins said the boat captains are responsible for the fines and have a violation that stays on their record that could hurt them during jobs searches.

The bill would increase from zero to 45 the number of red drum, also known as red fish, that can be kept by boats that fish with purse seines. Eicke said the red fish population is getting healthier but “we’re not where we need to be.

“And now they want to allow them to take 45 fish every trip.”

That’s not the only part of the bill the CCA doesn’t like.

A couple of times, “shall” would be changed to “may,” which Eicke said would enable law enforcement to let violators off with lesser penalties. Under both the current and proposed law, fines are $100 per red drum. But the penalty also would cost the violator the nets used to catch the fish. The change adds leeway to that penalty, though, by changing “shall” to “may.”