GULF RED SNAPPER--WHEN THE COUNTING IS DONE

A while ago, Congress appropriated $9.5 million for what is being called a “comprehensive, independent” survey of red snapper abundance in the Gulf of Mexico. 

Recently, that survey has begun to move forward.  The Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium, which is administering the federal grant, has named a panel of 21 scientists, from both the academic and government communities, to perform the research; the universities have also chipped in another $2.5 million of their own funds to further the work.

Now, interested parties throughout the region are waiting for the work to begin and, even more, for the two-year project to end and its findings to be revealed. 

Militant red snapper anglers, who have spent the last decade or so howling at the National Marine Fisheries Service and complaining about its restrictive catch limits, obviously hope that the survey will reveal that there are far more red snapper out there than NMFS believes, a stock large enough to justify a much longer red snapper season and more liberal bag limit.  It was those hopes that led to the federal appropriation being made.

On the other hand, the federal stock assessment process currently used to estimate red snapper abundance, called SEDAR (from SouthEast Data, Assessment and Review), is a robust one.  

The last benchmark red snapper stock assessment was a massive document, roughly 1,000 pages long, that incorporated data from 33 separate research papers and 50 other Gulf red snapper-specific reference works, which was peer-reviewed by a panel of independent fishery experts.  (Note that a new benchmark assessment is pending, and is likely to be completed before the survey runs its course.)

While it’s possible that such a compendium of existing research could result in an inaccurate estimate of Gulf red snapper abundance, should it and the current survey show a substantial disagreement, there would probably be good reason to go back and check for errors in the survey’s methodology.  

There is little doubt that the methodology in the current survey is going to be different from that used in the most recent stock assessment.  An article in the Corpus Christi Caller Times says that the researchers

“will use remote-control underwater cameras to actually count fish on artificial reefs, oil/gas structures, salt domes, along thousands of miles of pipelines and on deep featureless ocean bottoms.  Researchers will employ electronic tags and scuba divers to gather greater insights…

“[T]he plan is to search places federal fisheries managers may have overlooked.  Hopefully this strategy to leave no habitat unturned will produce results that inspire confidence among most or all of the principals involved in the management battle.”

It would be nice if that turns out to be true.  And hopefully, the scientists working on the project—who are all recognized experts in their field—will successfully account for any biases caused by directing sampling effort at natural and artificial structures known to aggregate red snapper, as opposed to conducting more random sampling.  (Yes, sampling will also occur on “deep featureless ocean bottom,” but given that, by definition, there is nothing to aggregate snapper on a “featureless” bottom, surveyors will have to address and account for a situation in which some sampling is effectively random, while some is directed at areas known, or at least expected, to hold significant quantities of fish.)

The scientists also intend to employ commercial and recreational fishermen to assist with the research

“by tagging fish, reporting tags and working with scientists aboard their boats.”

While Texas Congressman John Culberson said

“I’ll be pleased to see that the independent estimate is moving forward and including the expertise of recreational fishermen,”

and Greg Stunz, the project leader, stated that

“The local knowledge fishermen bring to this process is very valuable and meaningfully informs our study,”

the use of fishermen to assist with the research also injects another potential source of bias.  

Unlike scientists, who do their best to conduct surveys and collect data in a systematic and objective manner, fishermen tend to want to focus there efforts where they know there are fish to be caught, and thus can skew population estimates to the high side by avoiding areas where few if any red snapper are likely to be found.

And, as noted in the Caller Times article,

“Stunz said no corporate or private monies will fund this effort.  This does not necessarily suggest a lack of bias.”

Stunz observed that

“There are lots of constituents who want an independent abundance estimate that will be anxiously awaiting our findings,”

and Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama), who was largely responsible for obtaining funding for the project, said that

‘It is my hope that these independent scientists will be able to accurately determine the abundance of red snapper in the Gulf of Mexico once and for all.”

Yet, although much is being made about the perceived independence of the survey scientists, it is hard to imagine any scientists more independent than those who work for NMFS, and conduct red snapper research in the Gulf.  They are salaried government employees; their careers do not depend on their abilities to attract grants or other sources of funding.  They derive no benefit from finding that Gulf red snapper stock still needs to rebuild, and they will derive no benefit when they can finally announce that the stock has recovered.

Greg Stunz, on the other hand, is the Endowed Chair for Fisheries and Ocean Health and Director for Center for Sportfish Science and Conservation at the Harte Research Institute at Texas A&M University.  Such Center for Sportfish Science and Conservation was established thanks to a $500,000 donation from the Coastal Conservation Association, one of the leading critics of NMFS’ management of Gulf red snapper,  and has received at least $250,00 in additional funding from CCA.  Pat Murray, CCA’s President, sits on the Harte Research Institute’s Board.  CCA has also supported the past research of two of the panel representatives from Mississippi.

While such financial support doesn’t suggest that such researchers have any inherent biases—all university scientists depend heavily upon such private funding, from various sources, to conduct their research, and wouldn’t be able to function effectively without it—it does lend some weight to the argument that the researchers conducting the survey are not, in fact, any more “independent” than those who work for NMFS and made the original estimates of red snapper abundance.

So, in the end, there’s no way to predict what the researchers will find, or what will be done with their findings. 

It’s possible, but very unlikely, that they will decide that there are fewer red snapper in the Gulf than NMFS believes.  Or the survey could come up with an estimate that isn’t all that different from the estimate in the stock assessment.  And it’s also very possible that it will find that there are more red snapper in the Gulf than NMFS currently believes.

If the latter scenario occurs, the scientists will still have to decide what to do with the estimate of increased abundance.

 

Many fishermen would probably assume that more snapper will translate directly into more liberal regulations, but that’s not necessarily true.  If the new, high-tech sampling techniques find more red snapper in places where they weren’t expected to be, or at least not expected to be in large numbers, fishery scientists will have to decide whether such fish were always there, and whether estimates of past abundance will have to be adjusted upwards.

If there are more red snapper out there today than NMFS believes, were there also more out there in 1960, when the stock was last at healthy levels, and in 1990, when it was badly overfished?  

If there were more snapper out there back then, does that mean that the rebuilding target needs to be adjusted upwards, to reflect the true past abundance?  And could that lead to regulations at least as restrictive than those in place today?

No one can answer those questions today.  Everything depends on how scientists interpret any such new data.

But in the end, maybe the scientists won't matter at all.  

In addressing the start of the survey project, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said,

“American communities across the Gulf of Mexico depend on their access to, as well as the long-term sustainability of, red snapper.  I look forward to the insights this project will provide as we study and manage this valuable resource.”

But this is the same Commerce Secretary Ross who elevated “access” above “sustainability” last summer, when he reopened the recreational red snapper season in the Gulf, knowing full well that such reopening would lead to substantial overfishing.

With such a man in charge, will a finding of more red snapper necessarily lead to a bigger red snapper kill, regardless of the scientific nuances involved?

And if the survey estimates don’t find more red snapper, but are largely in accord with the stock assessment, will that lead to science-based red snapper management?

Or will “access” trump all, and Commerce continue down its current path of reckless exploitation of the red snapper resource, science be damned, at least until stopped by the courts?

In two years or so, we will know.