STRIPED BASS MANAGEMENT BOARD AMENDS, BUT DOES NOT RELEASE, DRAFT ADDENDUM II

 

Last Tuesday afternoon, in the course of a long and, at times, annoyingly tedious meeting, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board made significant changes to the draft Addendum II to Amendment 7 to the Atlantic Striped Bass Interstate Fishery Management Plan, but decided not to release the amended draft for public comment.  Instead, the Management Board will delay such release until after its October meeting, by which time it should have received additional data from the ASMFC’s Atlantic Striped Bass Technical Committee.

While the Management Board's decision to delay release pending the receipt of additional data is not unreasonable, the delay means that final approval of Addendum II will not take place before January 2024, and that any new management measures contained in the addendum will not be adopted by the states until sometime next spring.  Because some states’ commercial striped bass fishing seasons begin on January 1^st, the deferred approval could impact the efficacy of the addendum’s commercial management measures, but since the Management Board also extended last May’s emergency action for another year, the delay will have little impact on the recreational bass fishery.

While the decision to delay release of the draft addendum was disappointing, as were some of the options added to the document, the Management Board also made amendments that, if adopted in the final version, will significantly improve Addendum II.

One thing that characterized both the emergency measures adopted by the Management Board at its May meeting and the original draft of Addendum II was the burden it placed on participants in the ocean recreational fishery.  Toni Kearns, the ASMFC’s Fisheries Policy Director, noted in response to a question that while the emergency action should achieve an 11% overall reduction in fishing mortality, it reduced mortality in the ocean recreational fishery by 14%, compared to a mere 2% reduction in the recreational fishery in the Chesapeake Bay, which primarily targets small fish that never reach the emergency action’s 31-inch maximum size.

And, of course, the emergency action didn’t impact the commercial striped bass fishery at all.

If some of the actions taken at Tuesday’s meeting are adopted in the final version of Addendum II, they would lead to both commercial and recreational fishermen, in both the ocean and the Chesapeake Bay, sharing the burden a little more equitably.

In last Thursday’s post, I noted that

“Draft Addendum II…includes what is probably an overly-complicated matrix of both size and bag limits for recreational fisheries in the ocean and in the Chesapeake Bay.”

Many members of the Management Board seemed to agree, so much of the discussion that occurred at Tuesday’s meeting focused on simplifying those options.  Dr. Michael Armstrong, a Massachusetts fishery manager, spearheaded the simplification process.

He began with the Chesapeake Bay. 

The original draft of Addendum II included nine separate options for the Bay’s recreational fishery, each including a different combination of size limits, bag limits, and seasons.  His original motion sought to

“amend Chesapeake Bay Recreational Options B and D [which would make no change to the current fishing seasons or bag limits, and either maintain the current minimum size (Option B) or adopt a Bay-wide 20-inch minimum (Option D)] to include maximum size limit options ranging from 23” to 26” in 1” increments and remove all other options.”

The motion led to a discussion in which one Management Board member expressed concerns that a 23-inch maximum size would lead to a narrow slot that might contribute to release mortality, since summer water temperatures in the bay were so warm that the release mortality rate at such time was well above the 9% rate generally accepted by striped bass managers.  

David Sikorski, the Legislative Proxy from Maryland, said that he preferred a 19-inch minimum size, which struck a balance between fish availability and fishing mortality.  He thus favored the inclusion of Option H, which would establish such a minimum throughout the Bay, while setting a 1-fish bag limit and maintaining current seasons.

In the end, Mr. Sikorski moved to amend the original motion, so that it specifically eliminated all Options other than A [status quo], B, D, and H.  Michael Luisi, Maryland’s fishery manager, stated that he could support such motion if it was further amended to allow a mode split that let for-hire boats kill two fish per person instead of one.  The amendment was adopted unanimously, then became the main motion, which was adopted by consent.

Dr. Armstrong later extended his simplification agenda to the ocean recreational fishery, moving that all options be removed other than Option A, status quo, and Option B, the 28- to 31-inch slot created by the emergency action.  His motion eliminated any closed seasons, which he deemed not appropriate for striped bass management.  He also spoke against the slot limits proposed in Options C and D, noting that Option C’s 28- to 32-inch slot did not produce a large enough reduction, while stating that this was not the time to adopt Option D’s 30- to 33-inch slot, which would make the same 2015 year class protected by the emergency action more vulnerable to harvest.

His motion was seconded by Cheri Patterson, New Hampshire’s fishery manager, and received the support of Doug Grout, that state’s Governor’s Appointee, who noted that short closed seasons, such as those proposed in the draft addendum, were generally ineffective management measures, as the available data is inadequate to accurately predict the impact of closures shorter than one of the two-month “waves” employed by the Marine Recreational Information Program.

In the end, Dr. Armstrong’s motion passed on a vote of 8 in favor, 6 opposed, 1 abstention, and 1 “null vote,” which occurs when a state delegation cannot come to a majority decision.

Not everyone was happy with that result, for there are many Management Board members who still can’t grasp the concept of a recreational fishery where catch-and-release prevails.  Such Board members seem to cling to the archaic notion that catch-and-kill represents the highest and best use of the resource, and that mortality resulting from a bass being caught once, and immediately killed, is somehow preferable to that resulting from a bass being caught an average of eleven times (if the generally-accepted 9% mortality rate is applied), and only removed from the public domain after multiple people have had the opportunity to enjoy the social and economic benefits generated by each individual fish.

Thus, early in Tuesday’s meeting, Adam Nowalsky, the Legislative Proxy from New Jersey, complained that, while draft Addendum II talked about reducing the overall levels of “removals,” which include all aspects of fishing mortality, the emergency action only sought to reduce harvest, while not limiting the catch-and-release fishery, even though release mortality exceeded harvest mortality in five of the past six years.  He claimed that the people who harvest fish are demographically distinct from those who engage in catch-and-release, and argued that the failure to discuss the impact of harvest restrictions in Addendum II was

“a glaring omission from the social and economic analysis.”

Ms. Kearns tried to explain that fishery managers lack the tools to control catch-and-release fishing, as its not possible to quantify the number of trips that would encounter bass even if targeting the species was prohibited.

Such explanation didn’t satisfy Nowalsky, who later argued that the Management Board couldn’t say that they were acting to help the striped bass resource if they didn’t try to rein in the catch-and-release fishery, but instead concentrated on limiting harvest, an argument which ignores the fact that, so long as overall mortality is reduced to a sustainable level, the source of such mortality does not matter to the resource at all.

Later on in the meeting, Sgt. Jeff Mercer of the Rhode Island Division of Law Enforcement, who chairs the ASMFC’s Law Enforcement Committee, tried to explain how difficult it is to enforce a no-targeting closure, but Nowalsky seemed unwilling to consider his professional opinion.

The other traditional proponents of the catch-and-kill fishery supported Nowalsky’s comments, with Maryland’s Luisi saying that

“I feel pretty strongly that no-targeting closures are appropriate in this fishery,”

and describing how he drove across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge during the second day of Maryland’s no-targeting closure, and saw few fishermen on the water.  However, Mr. Sikorski quickly explained that the reason Luisi saw so few anglers had little to do with the no-targeting closure; instead, striped bass had grown so scarce in the Chesapeake Bay that angling effort was focused on the sole concentration of fish, located in Baltimore Harbor, and there was little reason for anglers to fish elsewhere.

Later on, when Mr. Grout asked whether anyone was ever convicted of violating a no-targeting closure, Luisi admitted that he had no information on enforcement, and said,

“Tickets are being written, but how many are being prosecuted, I’m not sure,”

a tacit admission that few prosecutors will be able to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the angler who claimed to be fishing for white perch or bluefish was actually intending to target striped bass.

Maryland’s Governor’s Appointee, Robert T. Brown, Sr., also supported a no-targeting closure, making comments such as

“Dead discards are why we’re here today,”

and

“We came here today to talk about dead discards.”

 

While such Management Board members managed to include an option into the draft addendum that would consider replacing recreational harvest closures with no-targeting closures, Dr. Armstrong’s motion to remove all reference to seasons from the recreational measures negated its effect, and left the opponents of catch-and-release more than a little unhappy.

Thanks to Dr. Armstrong’s motions, the draft addendum’s recreational provisions were significantly improved.  Unfortunately, there was one motion that ran counter to the theme of restoring the striped bass resource, and of sharing the burden of striped bass rebuilding among all the various stakeholder groups.  That motion was made by the Rhode Island fishery manager, Dr. Jason McNamee, who added options that would give anglers fishing from for-hire vessels special privileges that were not enjoyed by other recreational fishermen.

Dr. McNamee justified his motion by calling the for-hire fleet

“a unique and different segment of our fisheries,”

that was neither commercial nor recreational, and argued that

“Given the business model of the fishery, I’m genuinely concerned”

with the future of the for-hire fishery if it is not given such special privileges.

The questions that no one asked at Tuesday’s meeting, but which will certainly be asked during any public comment period, include why a sector of the fishery which accounts for well under 2% of all directed striped bass trips, and yet already lands nearly 12% of the recreational striped bass harvest, ought to have its share of the harvest increased; why, in the third decade of the 21^st Century, managers should assume that a business model adopted in the mid-20^th Century should remain unchanged, and be given special consideration, despite significantly altered demographic, regulatory, and resource environments; and what public policy consideration might justify subsidizing businesses with an award of additional publicly-owned resources, if that business couldn’t otherwise survive if made to comply with the rules and regulations imposed on all other stakeholders, which are deemed necessary for the future health and sustainability of that resource?

Nonetheless, the motion was adopted on a vote of 11 in favor, 3 opposed, and 2 abstentions.

With those issues out of the way, the recreational section of the draft addendum was completed.

Dr. Davis began the debate on commercial measures by making a

“Motion to remove Option B1 (No Quota Adjustment) and Option C2 ([Fishery Management Plan] Standard as Starting Point) from Section 3.2.1 (Options for Implementing a Commercial Maximum Size Limit) from Draft Addendum II.  Task the [Plan Development Team] with conducting spawning potential analysis to determine quota reductions associated with each Option in Option Sets D (Ocean Commercial Maximum Size Limits) and E (Chesapeake Bay Commercial Maximum Size Limits).  Add a new Option Set to Section 3.2.1 containing the following options for reductions to commercial quotas:

“Option A:  Status Quo.  All commercial fisheries maintain 2017 size limits (or Addendum VI approved [conservation equivalency] plans) and Amendment 7  quotas (and Amendment 7 approved [conservation equivalency] adjusted quotas).

“Option B:  Commercial Quota Reductions:  Quotas for all commercial fisheries will be reduced by 14.5% from 2022 commercial quotas (including quotas adjusted through approved Addendum VI [conservation equivalency]).”

Option B of the motion represents a significant change that would, if adopted, place roughly equivalent conservation burdens on the commercial and ocean recreational fisheries.  That represents a big difference from the original draft amendment, which assumed that the commercial fishery would experience no reduction at all, and would impose a 16.1% reduction on the recreational fishery to make up for commercially generated fishing mortality remaining status quo.

While such commercial quota reduction might seem equitable, it’s not surprising that the commercial representatives on the Management Board didn’t like it. Maryland’s Robert T. Brown, building on his earlier comments, complained that

“We are not the ones who have the high dead discards,”

while Craig Pugh, the Legislative Proxy from Delaware, argued that Addendum II was only supposed to consider a maximum commercial size, and not quota reductions.  He complained that Delaware commercial fishermen were only allowed 1,200 pounds of striped bass each year, and asked the rhetorical question,

“Am I an actual commercial fisherman, or am I reduced to a hobby?”

At the same time, he claimed that his Delaware fixed gill net fishery produces

“Hardly any dead discards,”

a claim that was effectively disputed by John Clark, Delaware’s fishery manager, who asked that fixed gill nets be given an exemption from any maximum size limit that might be imposed, because a lot of the fish caught in them are dead when the nets are pulled, and a significant portion of those fish would be over the maximum commercial size contemplated in the draft addendum.  Ultimately, the Management Board agreed to such an exemption, in exchange for a maximum mesh size, for all gill nets, whether fixed or floating, and with that amendment, Dr. Davis’s motion was approved.

Unfortunately, because the amended language of the draft addendum would require that commercial quotas be adjusted to account for any commercial maximum size limit, the Board also agreed that the level of each state’s quota cuts ought to be spelled out in the document before it is released for public comment.  It will take a while to complete such calculations, making it impractical to send the draft addendum out to public hearing in time to get comments that can be reviewed by the Management Board ahead of its October meeting.

For that reason, the release of the draft addendum will be delayed.

Hopefully, the delay won’t be too long.  As Dr. Armstrong noted, the Management Board needs to get something in place soon, because

“We’re not at a big problem yet, but it’s coming.”

Although Dr. Armstrong said no more than that, those of us who fished for striped bass back in the 1970s and early ‘80s understand all too well just what that “big problem” might be.