Saving Seafood

As Long Island Sound warms, its fish species are changing

June 13, 2016 — During a day of fishing on Long Island Sound earlier this month, Richie Nickerson of Niantic caught 10 legal-sized scup, a black sea bass and a northern kingfish — all species he wasn’t likely to land when he first started angling in these waters 30 years ago.

Tony Murphy of Berlin, who fished from the Black Hawk charter boat with Nickerson, also reeled in a haul of scup, also called porgies, as did most of the other 38 fishermen on board that day.

“It used to be we’d strictly catch bluefish and striped bass,” Murphy said. “But now, there are just so many porgies.”

Scup, black sea bass and northern kingfish are just three of the species once more prevalent in warmer mid-Atlantic waters that are now becoming abundant in Long Island Sound.

As the warmer-water species move in, they compete for food and habitat with cold-water species, such as winter flounder and cod, that are now becoming scarce.

“Everything’s changing,” said Greg Dubrule, owner and captain of the Black Hawk, which takes daily boatloads of anglers into the Sound from its docks on the Niantic River.

“There’s no question that, because of the warmer water, we’re seeing more scup and black sea bass, which had always been a New Jersey and southern Long Island fish,” he said.

“Our mainstay used to be winter flounder and cod, but now it’s sea bass, scup and fluke,” he added, “and we’re catching a lot of trigger fish, which we never used to see.”

Read the full story at The Day

Congressmen complain that New England fishermen are being shortchanged

May 24, 2016 — Fishing quotas on black sea bass, summer flounder and scup are unfairly limiting the catch of New England fishermen, U.S. congressmen from the region said in a letter Monday to the U.S. Department of Commerce that complained about the current “out-of-date allocation formula.”

U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, was joined by Connecticut’s two Democratic U.S. senators, Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy, in the letter that was also signed by 13 other members of the Connecticut and Massachusetts congressional delegations. They noted that these fish species are heading north, looking for cooler water, yet New England states have been thwarted in cashing in on the bounty.

Read the full story at The Day

Changing Migration Patterns Upend East Coast Fishing Industry

May 11, 2016 — Summer flounder that once amassed in North Carolina have gradually shifted about 140 miles to New Jersey—one facet of the northward migration of fish species that is upending traditional fishing patterns.

The move north has sparked debate among regulators over how to respond to changing natural resources that could affect commercial fisheries across the eastern seaboard.

For the first time, a group of researchers backed by the federal government is trying to ascertain what the northward movement means for fishermen’s income and way of life.

“Some fisherman will end up losing out and some will win big,” said Malin Pinsky, an assistant professor of ecology and evolution at Rutgers University, who is part of a team of scientists from Rutgers, Princeton University and Yale University studying the phenomenon.

Funded through a piece of a $1.4 million National Science Foundation grant, the team of scientists is examining how shifting patterns of where fish congregate is affecting commercial anglers and how they are changing their practices. They are also studying what kind of regulations may be needed to adapt to these changing realities.

For Lund’s Fisheries, for example, the northward creep has forced the company’s boats to catch the flounder in New Jersey and then spend time traveling to North Carolina, where regulations allow them to bring them on shore in more abundant quantities. When the boats travel south, the fishery can’t catch sea bass, scup and other species they may have reeled in at the same time in waters off New Jersey.

“It does cause us to drive fish around the ocean longer than we have historically. That gets factored into the cost of doing business,” said Jeff Kaelin, an executive at the company, which has facilities in Cape May, N.J., and North Carolina.

Read the full story at the Wall Street Journal

Council Approves Changes to Scup Gear-Restricted Areas

April 21, 2016 — The following was released by the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council:

During a meeting last week in Montauk, New York the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council approved a framework action to modify the boundary of one of the region’s two Scup Gear Restricted Areas (GRAs). The proposed change to the Southern Scup GRA boundary is expected to increase the availability of longfin squid to small-mesh fisheries.

The GRAs were implemented in 2000 and are intended to reduce discard mortality of juvenile scup. The current GRA regulations include a Northern GRA, which is effective from November 1 through December 31, and a Southern GRA, which is effective from January 1 through March 15. Trawl vessels which fish for or possess longfin squid, black sea bass, or silver hake (also known as whiting) are required to use mesh 5 inches or larger in the GRAs during those times of the year. The scup stock has expanded substantially since the GRAs were first implemented, and analysis conducted by scientists at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center indicate that the GRAs were partially responsible for this rebuilding.

The GRAs have been modified several times in response to requests from commercial fishermen. In recent years, advisors have recommended further modification of the GRAs to restore access to certain areas for longfin squid fishing, arguing that modifications to the GRA boundaries would not harm the scup stock

In response to an industry request, the Council initiated a framework action in 2014 to address potential changes to the scup GRAs. The framework considered a range of alternatives, including modifications to the GRA boundaries and elimination of one or both GRAs.

After a lengthy discussion of the impacts of the proposed alternatives, the Council voted to modify the boundary of the Southern Scup GRA. The proposed change, shown in Figure 1, is based on a proposal developed by members of the Council’s Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass Advisory Panel.

“By increasing access to important fishing grounds, the Council balanced the concerns of the squid industry with the possible impacts on the scup stock,” said the Council’s Executive Director, Chris Moore. “If the modification is approved by NMFS, the Council will be working closely with NMFS to monitor scup discards to make sure that mortality of juvenile scup does not increase as a result.”

Read the release and see the chart at the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council

Regulations call for fewer, bigger black bass on hook

April 12, 2016 — While the Massachusetts regulations for recreational fluke and scup remain unchanged for the upcoming 2016 fishing season, recreational anglers will have to adhere to smaller bag limits and minimum possession guidelines for black sea bass.

Massachusetts, which is part of a multi-state management plan for black sea bass administered by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, must join Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York and New Jersey in the northern region in reducing its black sea bass harvest by 23 percent to adhere to the new management plan restrictions.

In Massachusetts, the 2016 black sea bass season will run May 21 to Aug. 31 and recreational fishermen will be limited to keeping five fish per day, with the minimum catch size set at 15 inches.

Those parameters are different from 2015, when the season ran May 23 to Aug. 27 and anglers were allowed to keep eight black sea bass per day as long as they met or exceeded the minimum possession size of 14 inches.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

Mid-Atlantic Council Announces Funded Collaborative Research Projects

April 8, 2016 — The following was released by the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council:

The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council announces that four research projects have been selected to receive a total of approximately $610,000 in funding as part of the Council’s 2016-2017 Collaborative Fisheries Research Program. The four projects each address research priorities identified by the Mid-Atlantic Council in a Request for Proposals distributed in December 2015.

“Accurate information is the foundation of effective fisheries management,” said Council Chairman Rick Robins. “These research projects will help fill critical gaps in our understanding of Mid-Atlantic fisheries and ensure their continued sustainability.”

Below is an overview of the selected projects. Click here to view Executive Summaries for these projects.

Changes in Availability of Mid-Atlantic Fish Stocks To Fisheries-Independent Surveys 

Principal Investigators: Janet Nye, Michael Frisk, and Skyler Sagarese.  

This project will investigate how habitat modifies the availability of summer flounder, black sea bass, and spiny dogfish to the NEFSC trawl survey. The focus of this research is on the relationship between the NEFSC trawl survey index and actual abundance of these species.

Collaborative Development Of A Winter Habitat Model For Atlantic Mackerel, “Version 2.0”, For The Identification Of “Cryptic” Habitats And Estimation Of Population Availability To Assessment Surveys And The Fishery

Principal Investigator: Gregory DiDomenico; Co-Principal Investigators: William Bright; Peter Moore, Josh Kohut, Mitchell Roffer, and John Manderson. 

This project will synthesize existing information to develop and evaluate a quantitative model describing dynamic winter habitat distributions for Atlantic Mackerel. The goal of this study is to develop a model that can be used to accurately estimate the availability of the population to fishery independent surveys.

Estimating and Mitigating the Discard Mortality Rate of Black Sea Bass in Offshore Recreational Rod-And-Reel Fisheries 

Principal Investigator: Olaf Jensen; Co-Principal Investigators: Eleanor Bochenek and Jeffrey Kneebone. 

This objective of this project is to estimate the discard mortality rate of black sea bass captured by recreational anglers using rod-and-reel fishing gear in the deepwater offshore fishery during fall/winter in the Mid-Atlantic. In addition, this research will generate “best practice” capture and handling recommendations.

Determining Selectivity and Optimum Mesh Size to Harvest Three Commercially Important Mid-Atlantic Species 

Principal Investigator: Emerson Hasbrouck; Co-Principal Investigator: Jonathan Knight. 

This project will analyze the selectivity of multiple codend mesh sizes relative to summer flounder, black sea bass and scup retention in the commercial bottom trawl fishery in the Mid-Atlantic region.

MASSACHUSETTS: Will Sea Bass Quota Go Up or Down?

April 7, 2016 — Last year, sea bass literally put some commercial fishermen in the black.

The black fish with the delicious pure white meat abundantly filled local waters and made up some financial losses for fishermen curtailed by otherwise stringent regulations on striped bass, cod, flounder and other lucrative species.

But that might change soon.

In a memo dated March 18 from the Division of Marine Fisheries in Boston, while regulations for striped bass, bluefish, fluke and scup will likely remain unchanged this year in Massachusetts, “Regulations for black sea bass have been amended to achieve a mandatory 23 percent harvest reduction.”

The Massachusetts regulatory agency says these revisions are being implemented along the entire Atlantic seaboard via “emergency rulemaking” to take effect prior to the onset of the 2016 season. Public hearings will be held to discuss proposals before changes are finalized.

Read the full story at Newport This Week

Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation New Website

April 6, 2016 — The following was released by the Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation:

The Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation is pleased to announce the launch of a newly renovated website, which can be accessed at www.cfrfoundation.org.

The new website features individual pages for current and past research projects, including recently completed final reports for the following projects:

  1. Supporting the Full Use of an Underutilized Species in the Northeast: Initial Work to Develop a Cost Effective Processing Technique for Scup (Stenotomus chrysops) – go to www.cfrfoundation.org/scup-processing-technique-initial-work to view.
  2. CFRF Lobster Research Fleet Pilot Project: On Deck Data Program – go towww.cfrfoundation.org/lobster-pilot-research-fleet to view.
  3. Gear Trials Program – go to www.cfrfoundation.org/gear-trials-program to view.

The CFRF encourages you to visit the new website at www.cfrfoundation.org.

Jersey Shore Fishing: ASMFC approves NJ Delaware Bay 17-inch fluke

February 4, 2016 — This week’s Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) meeting of the Summer Flounder, Scup & Black Sea Bass Management Board in Alexandria, Virginia produced unanimous approval of New Jersey as its own region with the option to utilize a 17-inch fluke minimum in Delaware Bay and for shore fishing at Island Beach State Park while the rest of the state maintains the same regulations as New York and Connecticut.

New Jersey was forced last year into a region with those states after New York objected to having higher minimum sizes for fluke while often fishing in the same waters as New Jersey boaters. Yet, the same disparity applied to Jersey boaters at the southern end of the state in Delaware Bay as Delaware’s region had a 16-inch minimum. Since party and charter boats on the Jersey side of Delaware Bay draw most of their customers from Pennsylvania, anglers from that state usually opted to drive over the Delaware Memorial Bridge in order to bag 16-inch fluke rather than be restricted to an 18-inch minimum which is hard to come by in that bay.

The new one year agreement allows the DEP to set up separate Delaware Bay regulations with a 17-inch minimum for four fluke during a 128-day season. That’s still an inch over Delaware, but may be close enough to keep some Pennsylvania fishermen coming to New Jersey Delaware Bay ports. Meanwhile, the two fluke at 17 inches for shore-based anglers in Island Beach State Park can continue – and the DEP also has the opportunity to set up similar shore opportunities if they can be properly monitored.

The rest of the state will maintain the same fluke regulations as last year – an 18-inch minimum with five fluke during a 128-day season. The Marine Fisheries Council will set the opening and closing dates. Those regulations last year resulted in the entire region coming in well under the recreational quota. According to the 2015 assessment, summer flounder are not overfished, but overfishing is occurring. There were substantial illegal commercial catches, especially before the Research Set-Aside Program was discontinued, and the fishing mortality rate in 2014 was 16 percent above the reference point. Four year classes from 2010 to 2013 turned out to be overestimated – and the biomass has actually been trending downwards since 2010. As a result, the Acceptable Biological Catch limit of 16.26 million pounds for 2016 is reduced 29 percent from 2015 – and only 40 percent of that goes to the public.

Read the full story at NewJersey.com

 

SMFC Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass Board Approves Regional Management for 2016 Recreational Summer Flounder and Black Sea Bass Fisheries

February 4, 2016 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries  Commission’s Summer Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass Management Board approved Addendum XXVII to the Summer Flounder and Black Sea Bass Fishery Management Plan. The Addendum continues the use of regional management for the 2016 summer flounder and black sea bass recreational fisheries, with a modification to the summer flounder regions. The modified summer flounder regions are intended to provide more equity in recreational harvest opportunities along the coast, especially between New Jersey and Delaware in the Delaware Bay. The approved summer flounder regions are Massachusetts; Rhode Island; Connecticut through New York; New Jersey; Delaware through Virginia; and North Carolina. For black sea bass, the Board approved the continuation of management measures by northern (Massachusetts – New Jersey) and southern regions (Delaware – North Carolina). 

Addendum XXVII was initiated to address the discrepancy in management measures between New Jersey and Delaware in the Delaware Bay. In recent years, the difference in size limit, which has been as great as 2-inches, has been cited as having an economic impact on southern New Jersey anglers. The approval of the New Jersey Delaware Bay region will allow New Jersey to pursue, through its regulatory process, the following management measures for New Jersey waters west of the COLREGS line in the Delaware Bay: a 17-inch minimum size, 4 fish possession limit, and a 128 day season. For New Jersey anglers east of the COLREGS line and north along the New Jersey coast, the state will seek to maintain 2015 management measures in 2016, namely, a 18-inch minimum size, 5 fish possession limit, and a 128 day season. The latter measures are consistent with those of New York and Connecticut. Management measures for the remaining states remain unchanged from 2015. The adaptive regional management approach for summer flounder has been approved for the 2016 fishing year only.

For black sea bass, the Board approved the continuation of ad hoc regional management measures for the northern (Massachusetts – New Jersey) and southern regions (Delaware – North Carolina). This approach has been used since 2011 and offers some advantages over coastwide regulations, which can disproportionately impact states within the management unit.  States in the northern region, which are responsible for approximately 97% of the total recreational harvest, will reduce their harvest by 23% to achieve the 2016 recreational harvest limit. Based on the recommendations of the Technical Committee, the Board approved management proposals and methodologies submitted by the northern states. The northern states will finalize their black sea bass management measures by the spring of 2016.

States in the southern region will implement measures consistent with federal regulations (current recommended federal measures are a 12.5 inch TL minimum fish size, 15 fish possession limit, and open season from May 15 – September 21 and October 22 – December 31). Combined, the regulations of the two regions are expected to achieve the required coastwide harvest reduction in order to not exceed the 2016 recreational harvest limit. The Board approved the ad hoc regional measures approach for the 2016 fishing year with the option of extending it through 2017 by Board action.

The Board also approved the maintenance of 2015 scup recreational measures for the 2016 fishing season. Addendum XXVII will be available on the Commission website, www.asmfc.org, by the end of February 2016. For more information, please contact Kirby Rootes-Murdy, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at krootes-murdy@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.