August 10, 2018 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s American Eel Management Board approved Addendum V to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for American Eel. The Addendum increases the yellow eel coastwide cap starting in 2019 to 916,473 pounds. This modest increase in the cap (less than 1%) reflects a correction in the historical harvest. Further, the Addendum adjusts the method (management trigger) to reduce total landings to the coastwide cap when the cap has been exceeded and removes the implementation of state-by-state allocations if the management trigger is met. Lastly, the Addendum maintains Maine’s glass eel quota of 9,688 pounds.

The Addendum responds to concerns with the previous Addendum’s (IV) yellow eel management triggers given the timing and precision of landings data and the challenges of state-by-state quota management. Under Addendum IV, management action would have be triggered when (1) the coastwide cap is exceeded by more than 10% in a given year; or (2) the coastwide cap is exceeded in two consecutive years, regardless of the percent overage. If either of these triggers had been met, state-by-state quotas would have been required to be implemented.

Under Addendum V, management action will now be initiated if the yellow eel coastwide cap is exceeded by 10% in two consecutive years.  If the management trigger is exceeded, only those states accounting for more than 1% of the total yellow eel landings will be responsible for adjusting their measures. A workgroup will be formed to define the process to equitably reduce landings among the affected states when the management trigger has been met.

The Board slightly modified the glass eel aquaculture provisions, maintaining the 200 pound limit for glass eel harvest but modifying the criteria for evaluating the proposed harvest area’s contribution to the overall population consistent with the recommendations of the Technical Committee. Under the revised provisions, the Board approved Maine’s glass eel aquaculture proposal for the 2019 fishing season, allowing for an additional 200 pounds of glass eels to be harvested for development in domestic aquaculture facilities. This amount is in addition to the Maine’s glass eel quota.

The implementation date for Addendum V is January 1, 2019. The Addendum will be posted to the Commission’s website by the end of August at http://www.asmfc.org/species/american-eel under Managements Plans.  For more information, please contact Kirby Rootes-Murdy, Senior Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at krootes-murdy@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.