NMFS GETS SERIOUS ABOUT CALIBRATING RED SNAPPER DATA--AND GETS FLAK FOR DOING ITS JOB

 

For people who write about fishery conservation issues, the recreational red snapper fishery in the Gulf of Mexico is the gift that just keeps on giving. 

Fishery managers keep coming up with new strategies to end overfishing.  Recreational private boat fishermen keep finding new and creative ways to defeat those strategies and increase the rancor directed at fishery managers.  And the whole situation has become so filled with trouble and turmoil that even when the recreational folks come up with an idea that looks like it should finally make everyone happy, they find a way to torpedo their own plan, and launch an attack on the very program that they created.

Anyone who believes that’s an exaggeration need only look at the short but controversial history of Amendment 50A to the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council’s Fishery Management Plan for the Reef Fish Resources of the Gulf of Mexico.

For many years, recreational fishing organizations, which primarily represented the private boat sub-sector, chafed against the science-based red snapper catch limits imposed by NMFS, railed against both the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and the federal managers who had to abide by its terms, and generally kicked their feet and screamed like petulant children every time they were asked to do their part to help conserve and rebuild the red snapper stock.

State fishery managers weren’t bound by the provisions of Magnuson-Stevens, so the Gulf’s red snapper anglers then tried to take management responsibility for the species away from the feds, and hand it over to the states, where regulations could, and often were, based as much on political considerations than on scientific advice.  

When politics dictated that states go out of compliance with federal red snapper regulations, and to allow excessively high recreational landings in state waters, federal managershad to compensate by imposing more restrictive regulations offshore. 

Recreational fishermen responded bydemonizing NMFS, even though it was the anglers’ placing incessant political pressure on states to break with federal managers that was the real cause of the restrictive NMFS rules.

After Wilbur Ross became the Secretary of Commerce in the Trump Administration, and was given the ultimate say over NMFS policy, politics carried more weight than science at the agency, too.  The recreational fishing groups hailed a decision to extend the federal red snapper season, even though overfishing would certainly ensue, as a win for private boat anglers.  Only a legal action brought by the conservation community led the Trump-era NMFS to back down.

And that’s when Amendment 50 came along.

Amendment 50, as finally adopted by the Gulf Council, was largely the brainchild of the recreational fishing industry and recreational fishing organizations.  It represented a sort of compromise between the militant red snapper anglers, who liked the idea of having the snapper managed by politically-influenced state management bodies, and federal fishery managers bound by the provisions of Magnuson-Stevens.  Pursuant to the amendment, which was adopted in 2020, federal fisheries managers would, based on the best available scientific information, set the overall red snapper catch limit. 

That limit would then be allocated among the five Gulf Coast states, based on their historical landings.  The states, in turn, would be allowed to set their own seasons for both state and federal waters and, within certain specified limits, their own size and bag limits as well, provided that such state regulations would successfully constrain recreational limits to each state’s quota.  In that way, each state would be able to tailor its recreational red snapper rules to the needs of its particular fishery, rather than be forced into a one-size-fits-all management measure that might not fit any state’s needs particularly well.

Amendment 50 seemed like a good idea, and it probably was.

Jeff Angers, President of the Center for SportfishingPolicy, an umbrella group that includes some of the most militant recreationalfishing groups in the Gulf, hailed adoption of the amendment, saying

“We have reason to celebrate today thanks to the willingness of the state fish and wildlife agencies of the Gulf Coast and the leadership of Secretary Ross and congressional champions like Senator Richard Shelby (R-Ala) and Representatives Garrett Graves (R-La.), Steve Scalise (R-La.) and Austin Scott (R-Ga.).  Over the past two years, private recreational red snapper anglers in the Gulf have become more active partners in the states’ data collection systems and enjoyed much longer red snapper seasons than the federal system was able to provide.”

The problem was, no one seemed to stop and think that, if red snapper seasons were longer, and if anglers could fish in deeper, snapper-rich federal waters during that season, recreational landings were likely to spike.

At first, it was hard to tell, because all of the Gulf states had developed their own ways to count anglers’ landings.  The state data programs ranged from the technically advanced Tails ‘N Scales in Mississippi to an archaic system in Texas that predated the obsolete Marine Recreational Fishing Statistics Survey that NMFS abandoned a few years ago. 

While NMFS helped the states develop their individual data programs, and eventually certified all of them, other than the old Texas system, for use with the federal Marine Recreational Information Program, each program uses a slightly different methodology from those used by other states.  Thus, their results can’t be directly compared with one another, but must be converted into a “common currency,” that is, the data across the array of surveys must be calibrated in a way that accounts for each program’s differences.

When the first rough estimates of the calibration results came out, it appeared that the data collection programs utilized by two neighboring Gulf states, Alabama and Mississippi, grossly underestimated recreational landings.  Managers believed that anglers in those states overfished so badly that their landings would have to be reduced by roughly 60% to keep them within their state quotas.

That’s not something that such states’ anglers wanted to hear, particularly because if they did overfish their quotas, such overages would have to be remedied with pound-for-pound paybacks in subsequent years.  

Perhaps hoping to find a way to avoid such remedial action, the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council delayed the data calibration process, ignoring NMFS’ warnings that basing management actions on uncalibrated data represented a failure to employ the best scientific information available.  NMFS allowed the Gulf Council to get away with such delay, and not use calibrated data until 2023.

At the same time, “anglers’ rights” organizations allied with the recreational fishing industry continued their cynical campaign intended to undercut recreational fishermen’s faith in the Marine Recreational Information Program and the federal management system.  They repeatedly claim that state landings data need not be adjusted, and repeatedly attack the accuracy of federal landings estimates.

Such organizations, which were so willing to extol the virtues of Amendment 50 just a couple of years ago, were no longer so enamored of the red snapper management program that they, themselves, had created.  While Amendment 50 might have been praiseworthy when it led to longer seasons and bigger red snapper kills, it suddenly looked far less attractive when it held anglers, and those anglers’ states, accountable for their red snapper overages.

Calibration of the state data, or at least any calibration that would result in reduced harvests for one or more states, became a hot issue, as the organized Gulf angling community did what it could to assure that no such calibration took place.

Amendment 50, after all, wasn’t supposed to be about managing and conserving red snapper, it was about creating a longer fishing season for red snapper anglers, and allowing those anglers to take more snapper home.

At least, that’s how the various recreational fishing advocacy groups viewed—and still view—the amendment.

However, NMFS sees things a little differently.  On its website, it notes

“some constituents believe the agency is forcing states to modify their red snapper data to match federal data.  That is incorrect.  Fishery managers need to compare red snapper catches to established landing limits to understand if the catch limits were met or exceeded.

“Red snapper catch limits were developed using state and federal data that included inputs from NOAA’s Marine Recreational Information Program.  Red snapper landings are being estimated using state landings data using multiple and differing state surveys.  The data behind the red snapper catch limits and the states’ landings estimates are collected in different ways and rely on different calculations.  The data have to be standardized, meaning converted to a standard set of units.  This ensures that catch limits are set in units that are consistent across states, monitor catches, and allows managers to see apples-to-apples results…”

This week, NMFS took a big step toward achieving that goal, issuing proposed regulations that would establish calibration criteria for recreational red snapper landings.  Such criteria, designed to standardize all of the state and federal landings data, establishes ratios that make the state and federal data directly comparable and compatible.  Two states, Florida and Louisiana, are thought to slightly overestimate their recreational landings; to compensate for such overestimation, federal data will be multiplied by 1.602 and 1.600, respectively, to translate it into a common standard for such states.

On the other hand, to account for underestimated landings in Alabama and Mississippi, federal data, including state quotas, will be multiplied by 0.4875 and 0.3840, respectively, to achieve a similar translation.

Since data from the questionable Texas system can’t be directly translated into or made comparable with the more contemporary surveys, no adjustment ratio will be applied to its estimates, which will be assumed equivalent to the federal data.

Needless to say, red snapper anglers in Alabama and Mississippi aren’t happy with the proposed rule. 

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), representing the desires of Mississippi’s recreational fishermen, released a press release in which he stated that

“NOAA’s proposed rule on red snapper represents a gross failure by the agency to improve the quality of data it uses to manage federal fisheries.  Mississippi’s recreational anglers are tired of seeing their seasons cut short unnecessarily based on faulty data.  The Tales ‘n Scales program run by Mississippi produces far more accurate data that should be used.  I will keep fighting for the Department of Commerce to develop a higher quality data collection process for recreational fishing.”

There is some irony in the senator’s statement, as recalibration would go a long way toward providing “higher quality data” for recreational fishermen, and yet Sen. Wicker seems to be trying to frustrate the calibration process.  

In addition, he seems to be missing one of the most important points about the calibration issue:  That all data created by the states or by NMFS must be converted into a single standard form. 

Tails ‘n Scales may well be a state of the art program, but it is only used in Mississippi.  Adopting Tails ‘n Scales as the quality standard for red snapper data might benefit Mississippi, but it will do nothing for data from Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, or Texas, nor for federal managers, who must utilize the data from every state to establish the Gulf-wide annual catch limit, that is then broken down to set the individual state quotas.

In order to set a Gulf-wide catch limit, fishery managers need a Gulf-wide data standard, which is precisely why NMFS’ recently proposed rule makes a lot of sense.  Anything less will make it far more difficult to protect the long-term health of the red snapper stock.

Of course, “the long term” means somewhat different things to different people.

When Amendment 50 was finalized, the Center for Sportfishing Policy celebrated, hailing it in a press release issued on February 6, 2020.  Yet by September 29 of the same year, the Center was complaining that if the Gulf states had to calibrate their data, and put it into a standardized, statistically useful form,

“it puts us right back to where we were before Amendment 50 was adopted.”

For some folks, even just seven months can be a very long time.

 

 

 

PIONEERING STUDY PROMISES TO SHED LIGHT ON FALSE ALBACORE

 

False albacore—more properly known as “little tunny,” although I’ve yet to meet my first fisherman who actually refers to them that way—are a cult favorite throughout the mid-Atlantic and southern New England.

They’re not the best-tasting fish in the sea.  Unless you bleed them thoroughly and ice them down immediately after they’re caught, and then eat them the same day—generally as sashimi with soy and maybe a bit of ginger or wasabi—most Americans find them inedible, and even some pampered cats will turn up their noses at the prospect of a false albacore dinner.

However, the fish can fight.  Pound-for-pound, they’re probably the hardest-fighting fish that’s readily available to the inshore angler; even surfcasters can usually get in on the action, at least around inlet jetties and along certain favored stretches of coast, when albacore blitz bait in the fall.  The same oxygen-charged muscles that give them their deep red, strong-tasting flesh imbue the false albacore with strength and speed, the very things that make it attractive to anglers.

False albacore are also the perfect size fish for light-tackle anglers.  Most that I’ve caught probably weighed between six and 10 pounds, although I’ve landed some in the mid-teens.  The New York state record, which was caught just about one year ago off the South Shore of Long Island, weighed 18.05 pounds, which provides a good idea of the largest fish that one might run into.  

While false albacore superficially resemble tuna, and belong to the same family, Scombridae, they belong to the genus Euthynnus, not the genus Thynnus, to which the bluefin, yellowfin, and bigeye belong.  That can make things a little confusing, for within Thynnus lies another fish just called “albacore,” Thynnus alalunga, so when fishermen just talk about catching “albacore,” as they often do, it pays to understand just which albacore they’re talking about.

From a scientific perspective, false albacore are what fishery managers deem a “data-poor species.”  Biologists know that they can be found throughout the tropical and temperate Atlantic, and also in the Mediterranean and Black seas.  They know that false albacore eat smaller fish, squid, and some crustaceans, that they like warmer water, and that they can be found in both inshore and pelagic habitats.  But some important questions, such as the size and status of the stock, and the presence and extent of local population, remain unknown.

Right now, false albacore are an unmanaged species all along the Atlantic coast.  The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council removed false albacore from its Coastal Migratory Pelagics Fishery Management Plan in 2012, and neither the other Atlantic coast councils nor that Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission have chosen to pick up the management baton.  Since 2017, recreational catch has averaged a little under two million fish per year, with no clear year-to-year trend; about one-quarter of those fish were landed.  No one knows what percentage of the released fish survive.

Commercial little tunny harvest seems to be slightly above the recreational landings, averaging a little over 500,000 pounds annually during the period 2016-2020, again with no year-to-year trend.

From a federal fishery management perspective, the key question is whether those landings are enough to suggest that false albacore are in need of conservation and management.  Right now, scientists lack the information needed to provide an answer, but a recently announced study promises to shed the first bits of light on that issue.

The American Saltwater Guides Association has teamed up with the New England Aquarium’s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life to conduct a pioneering study of false albacore migration patterns and release mortality.  Offshore wind developer Orsted, along with sunglass manufacturer Costa del Mar, will provide the necessary funding.

It’s a logical project for the Guides’ Association.  As noted earlier, false albacore are a very popular target for light-tackle anglers on the Atlantic Coast; according to the National Marine Fisheries Service, recreational fishermen made more than 425,000 directed false albacore trips last year.  Many of those trips were undoubtedly made aboard boats belonging to Guides' Association members.  It’s thus in the Association’s best interests to do what it can to ensure that the false albacore stock remains healthy.

The study will take place in Nantucket Sound, south of Cape Cod, where scientists from the Aquarium, working from boats belonging to Guides' Association members, will surgically implant acoustic tags in 50 false albacore.  The study area hosts an array of acoustic receivers maintained by the Aquarium.  Any time one of the tagged false albacore passes close to a receiver, the receiver will record a “ping” from the tag that includes an identifying number unique to that fish.

If a fish pings a few days after release, it will be a good indication that it survived the experience, although not receiving a ping does not mean that a fish has necessarily died; it may merely have traveled outside of the receivers' range.  However, over the course of the study, detections of fish passing near a receiver will establish the upper boundary of release mortality, although the actual release mortality level could be somewhat lower.

The acoustic tags will also allow scientists to determine the migration patters of fish caught off New England, and help determine what the false albacore's population structure might be on the East Coast.

That’s because the acoustic tags implanted in the false albacore do not only interact with the array of receivers in Nantucket Sound.  They can be detected by an expansive network of receivers, placed along the entire East Coast by cooperating scientists, who share access and information with one another.  Thus, if a false albacore tagged in Nantucket Sound swims through an array located off Long Island, North Carolina, or the Florida coast—or a host of places in between—the researchers at the New England Aquarium will be notified.

Thus, researchers will be able to learn whether the false albacore that summer off Cape Cod and Nantucket belong to the same body of fish that show up off North Carolina late in the fall, or off Florida during the winter, or whether they belong to a local population that, perhaps, moves offshore and on with the seasons, instead of migrating north and south along the coast.

With only 50 fish tagged—acoustic tags are expensive—it may take a while for results to come in. 

At the same time, because acoustic-tagged fish don’t have to be recaptured, the way conventionally-tagged fish do, but need only pass by a receiver to produce data, information might begin to start flowing in quickly.

Regardless of how long it takes for the data to be gathered, the study should represent an good first step in developing data about a species that, with the decline of striped bass and bluefish, is becoming ever more important to the recreational fishery on the Atlantic coast.

Last Thursday, I wrote about the conflicts between scientists and fishermen that spring up when the scientists develop data that tells a story much different from the one that fishermen want to hear.

The Guides’ Association’s false albacore project depicts the other side of that coin:  Fishermen and scientists working together to develop data that will both add to the scientists knowledge of an under-researched fish, and help ensure the future health of a stock that makes an important economic contribution to the recreational fishing business.

It’s a perfect example of a cooperative win-win.

SOUTH ATLANTIC RED SNAPPER: ANALYSIS VERSUS OPINION

 

There are recurring themes in saltwater fisheries management; the clash between scientific analyses of the state of fish stocks and fishermen’s opinions on the same subject may be the one most often seen.

Both sides have their strengths.

Scientists take an objective approach to such matters, viewing them through the lens of data that encompasses the entire range of a stock, usually extending over an extended period of time.  Sometimes that data is good, based on many different sources, gathered over the course of years.  Sometimes the data is sparse, and filled with uncertainty.  And sometimes it’s worse than that; many data-poor stocks remain.  However, the scientists who perform stock assessments many only have limited time on the water, observing the species in question.

Fishermen are rarely objective.  Whether they belong to the commercial or the recreational sector, they are typically interested in harvesting or, in the case of anglers, at least catching and releasing, the fish.  Thus, their observations are not only limited in both space and time, but they are also often limited by the fishermen's biases, which tend to reinforce their beliefs.  At the same time, good fishermen are invariably keen observers of the natural world, who understand how changing environmental conditions impact their target species, even though they might not know exactly why.

In a perfect world, fishermen and scientists would complement one another, with scientists using fishermen’s observations to suggest new lines of study and develop new information on both fish and fisheries.  I saw such collaboration in action nearly 20 years ago, when I sat on the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council.

The Council had established a minimum size for escape vents in black sea bass pots, which was intended to allow undersized fish to escape.  The escape vents achieved their intended goal, but fishermen claimed that they also reduced their landings because the water pressure at the bottom, where the traps were fished, reduced the size of the sea bass’ bodies enough to let some legal-sized fish squeeze through the vents.  While such claims seemed unlikely, a study was undertaken, which suggested that the fishermen were right.  The size of the escape vents could be reduced.

That’s how the relationship between scientists and fishermen ought to work.

But perhaps it only worked that time because the scientists confirmed what the fishermen already believed.  If the study showed that legal-sized fish weren’t getting out through the vents, maybe the fishermen would have continued to claim that they did, just because that’s what they had already decided was true.

That’s the sort of thing that we’re seeing today in the recreational red snapper fishery in the South Atlantic.

The scientists seem to have a good case.  The red snapper stock assessment was just updated in 2021.  While it found that

“the red snapper stock has shown substantial progress toward rebuilding,”

it also found that the stock was not yet rebuilt, with spawning stock biomass at just 44% of the rebuilding target; since the fishing mortality rate was about twice the fishing mortality threshold, the stock was also experiencing overfishing.

In performing their assessment, biologists ran the data through a computer model multiple times, to address any possible uncertainty.  The results very strongly indicated that the assessment’s conclusions were correct, as 99.8% of the runs agreed that overfishing was occurring, and 97.8% agreed that the stock was not yet rebuilt.

Fishermen, however, do not seem to agree with those conclusions. 

The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s Snapper-Grouper Advisory Panel has taken strong exception to the findings of the updated stock assessment, and with the subsequent actions of the Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee which, in response to the updated assessment, acted to reduce permissible red snapper landings by about one-third.

According to a statement that the Advisory Panel sent to the South Atlantic Council,

“the overriding feeling and opinion of the [Advisory Panel] is that red snapper are recovered…The AP overwhelmingly feels they were asked for suggestions to solve a problem that no longer exists.  The red snapper is highly abundant.  The biomass of the species is largely assumed by the AP as recovered and sufficient in abundance and range to begin a pathway to more liberal regulation of the species.”

Such “feeling and opinion” stands in direct contrast to the conclusions of the updated assessment, which based its findings on over two dozen different data sets, ranging from data on the size of red snapper released by Georgia party boats to a video counts of red snapper off the South Atlantic coast.  Such data was analyzed by a large team of fishery professionals, statistically analyzed, and run through population models.  When all of that work was done, the assessment came to a very defensible conclusion, with the only significant uncertainty being the snapper’s natural mortality rate.

The contrary view of the fishermen on the Advisory Panel were based solely

“on the collective on-the-water experience of the AP members.”

Not on data, not on independently verifiable facts, but merely on the “experience”—also described as the “feeling and opinion”—of the Advisory Panel members.

That’s often the way it goes when fishermen challenge the science, relying on experiences which may not reflect the larger reality out on the water.  As Mark Kurlansky, author of Cod:  A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World, told The New York Times with respect to New England’s fisheries,

“Fishermen will almost always tell you that [fish are abundant] and it’s not that they’re lying.  Landing a lot of fish can mean the fish are very plentiful, or it can mean the fishermen are extremely efficient in scooping up every last one of them.”

So long as fish are being caught in reasonable numbers, fishermen generally assume that numbers are high.

And we can’t discount the impacts of confirmation bias, which can be explained as

“the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one’s prior beliefs or values.  People display this bias when they select information that supports their views, ignoring contrary information, or when they interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing attitudes.  This effect is strongest for desired outcomes, for emotionally charged issues, and for deeply entrenched beliefs.  [emphasis added].”

Confirmation bias is a very human trait, which everyone shares to a greater or lesser extent.  However, it can be controlled, if not eliminated, in a scientific process that is based upon verifiable data, statistical analysis, and peer review.  But in the case of a fisherman who sees an increasing stock—and the updated stock assessment reveals that the South Atlantic red snapper stock, although far from recovered, is steadily increasing—and wants to be able to catch more fish on each trip, particularly if increased bag limits translate into increased income, it is easy for that fisherman to believe that the stock is recovered, and reject any suggestion to the contrary.

That is particularly true in the South Atlantic’s recreational red snapper fishery, where much of the fishing mortality is attributable to snapper that are caught during the closed season, and die after release.  In such a situation, the only way to get fishing mortality under control isn’t to just limit anglers’ red snapper landings, but also to restrict fishing for other species that share the red snapper’s habitat, to reduce red snapper bycatch and the resultant release mortality.

That is the course recommended by the South Atlantic Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee, which advised

“In the short term…the SSC recommends pursuing temporal/spatial reductions (possibly wave-based) in bottom fishing.  Seasonal differences among regions within the South Atlantic should be considered when developing these regulations, if possible.  The bulk of recreational discards for red snapper are occurring off the East Coast of Florida; thus, spatial closures may be most effective in this area.”

Fishermen naturally hope to avoid any such closures, and so want to believe that all is well with the stock.

It is a difficult issue to resolve.  Federal managers, bound by the requirements of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, are compelled to follow the science.  State managers face no such restrictions, and may well be unwilling to accept closures of fisheries targeting healthy fish stocks that support local, fishing-related businesses.  In the case of South Atlantic red snapper, Florida’s Marine Fisheries Director plainly stated

“I’ll just once again note, for the record, that [the Florida Wildlife Commission] is against closures…time-area closures aren’t going to work here in Florida.”

While such a stance might help Florida fishing businesses, it certainly won’t help South Atlantic red snapper.  Unless, of course, the red snapper stock is already recovered, which gives fishermen one more reason to choose to believe that it is.

Thus, the split between scientists and fishermen continues, in the South Atlantic and elsewhere.  The potential impact on fish stocks, if data were subordinated to “feeling and opinion,” provides one more reason why Magnuson-Stevens’ science-based management measures remain the gold standard for United States fisheries, and why state fishery programs, which often yield to fishermen’s whims, have yet to prove its match.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ARE FISHERIES MANAGEMENT PRIORITIES SHIFTING AGAIN

 

Not all that long ago, marine fisheries management was a scattershot effort, with no coherent, overarching philosophy.  Regulations were adopted on an ad hoc basis, to address supposed problems as they arose.  

There was no Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act to end overfishing and rebuild overfished stocks.  There was no Atlantic Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act, to bring some order to inshore fishery management on the East Coast.

Instead, just about all management was addressed on a state level, where local politics and local concerns drove the process, with science and the needs of fish stocks both a secondary consideration, if they were considered at all.

When I was a boy growing up along the southwest Connecticut coast during the 1960s, there was only one regulation we had to deal with, a 16-inch (fork length) minimum size for striped bass.  Even that rule wasn’t based on the bass’ biology, but rather on the fact that northeastern markets weren’t interested in bass any smaller than that.

By 1960, commercial striped bass fishing had been outlawed in the Nutmeg State, but that was just political posturing, as bass killed by anglers were just as dead as bass killed by commercial fishermen, and there was no limit on the number of striped bass that a single angler could retain.  Since, in those days, conservation wasn’t something that bass fishermen really thought about, and just about every “keeper” was kept, the ban on commercial landings didn’t provide much benefit to the striped bass.

In those days, most of the truly adept striped bass fishermen sold their bass to local restaurants and markets with complete impunity, regardless of the rules.  About all that you could say in favor of the state’s “gamefish law” was that it left such anglers free to illegally market their catch without having to compete with legitimate commercial fishermen, which I suppose was a benefit of sorts, if you looked at things from the poachers’ perspective.

But the bottom line was that, whether one was talking about anglers, commercial fishermen, poachers, or legislators, the welfare of the fish wasn’t high on anyone’s priority list in those days.  Everyone was pretty much looking out for themselves.

Despite such indifference, there seemed to be a lot of fish around.  Winter flounder were everywhere and, unless the water was sheathed in ice, could be found in greater or lesser numbers throughout the year.  Blackfish (tautog) were also abundant; there were so many that we even caught some while trolling sandworms for striped bass during midsummer.  Bluefish were just coming back in big numbers, and there were porgies (scup) in deeper water.  In the cool months, we caught tomcod and smelt off local piers.

Thus, anglers thought that all was well although, in retrospect, we should have seen that problems were on the horizon.

The first fish to fall was striped bass.  The stock began to collapse in the mid-1970s, as spawning in the Chesapeake Bay declined.  The lack of small fish made it clear that trouble was on the way, but there were still enough big bass around to keep people greedy and maintain their willful ignorance of the problem.  I had a summer job at a tackle shop then, and was on the water just about every day.  I could see the continuing decline of the stock, but customers kept hanging big bass on the store’s scales, and the owner, who was making good short-term money because of such fish, was angered by any talk about conservation.  He encouraged his customers to keep killing fish, and assured everyone who would listen that the striped bass was doing just fine.

But the stock collapsed, despite his assurances.

And it was a lot harder to restore the striped bass to health than it was to collapse the stock.  A lot of that was because the states were jealous of their neighbors, and protective of their own fisheries.  The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which was then strictly an advisory body, had adopted a plan to rebuild the stock, but it could not overcome states' resistance.  As Nelson Bryant, the outdoor writer for The New York Times, stated in 1982,

“All the states are moving, or striving to move, in compliance—or a partial compliance—with the plan.  In many instances, state legislatures zealously guard their right to regulate fish and game matters.  This almost inevitably results in tedious procedures often vitiated by political considerations.”

Despite the collapse, the needs of the striped bass stock were still not being prioritized.

At about the same time that the bass stock began to collapse, Congress passed the forerunner to Magnuson-Stevens, the Fishery Conservation and Management Act, in response to declining fish stocks.  During the debate over the legislation, the bill was often referred to as “the 200-mile limit law,” because the primary impetus for its introduction was the presence of large, efficient foreign fishing vessels just 12 miles off the coast of the United States.  The foreign fleet was blamed for the domestic fleet’s problems, so it was hoped that the Fishery Conservation and Management Act would push the foreign vessels 200 miles offshore, and so Americanize the local fisheries.  Modernizing the U.S. fishing fleet was also one of the law's priorities.  Once again, protecting parochial interests, and not protecting the fish themselves, was legislators’ primary concern.  

That fisherman-focused mindset was particularly clear in the bill’s definition of “optimum” yield, which was

“The term ‘optimum’, with respect to the yield from a fishery, means the amount of fish (A) which will provide the greatest overall benefit to the Nation, with particular reference to food production and recreational opportunities; and (B) which is prescribed as such on the basis of the maximum sustainable yield from such fishery, as modified by any relevant economic, social, or ecological factor.  [emphasis added, internal formatting omitted]”

Based on that language, regional fishery management councils, and in particular, the New England Fishery Management Council, frequently set quotas above maximum sustainable yield, and so explicitly promoted overfishing, a “modification” that increased short-term economic returns at the expense of the long-term health of fish stocks.

State and federal solicitude for fishermen, at the expense of the fish, had the predictable effect.  Fish stocks continued to decline until Congress stepped up and forced fishery managers to protect the nation’s living marine resources.  Its first step was passage of the Atlantic Striped Bass Conservation Act in 1984.  Such bill recognized that

“The population of Atlantic striped bass has been subject to large fluctuations due to natural causes, fishing pressure, environmental pollution, loss and alteration of habitat, inadequacy of fisheries conservation and management practices, and other causes; and risks potential depletion in the future without effective monitoring and conservation and management measures.  It is in the national interest to implement effective procedures and measures to provide for effective interjurisdictional conservation and management of this species.  [internal formatting omitted]”

The Atlantic Striped Bass Conservation Act gave the ASMFC the authority to impose its preferred management measures on every state between Maine and North Carolina, and effectively shifted the focus of management from satisfying the fishermen in the various states to conserving and rebuilding the striped bass stock.  The result was Amendment 3 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass, a document that, to the displeasure of many commercial and recreational fishermen, effectively prevented most striped bass harvest, and so allowed the stock to rebuild.

While that was good for the striped bass, it didn’t help federal fisheries, many of which continued to deteriorate in the face of excessive fishing pressure.  Finally, Congress passed the Sustainable Fisheries Act of 1996 which amended Magnuson-Stevens and, for the first time, prioritized the long-term health of fish stocks over the short-term profits of fishing-related industries.

In stark contrast to the original Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976, the Sustainable Fisheries Act no longer allowed regional fishery management councils to countenance overfishing in order to provide short-term economic benefits to the fishing industry; instead, such councils had an affirmative duty not only to prevent or, if necessary, end overfishing, but also to rebuild overfished stocks within a time certain, which in most cases would not be more than 10 years.  The new law also required fishery managers to base their decisions on the best available science, and not on local concerns.

The results were striking.  Nearly all fish stocks ceased their decline, and most began to recover.  Today, 47 once-overfished stocks have been completely rebuilt.  While biologists have been unable to determine the status of every managed stock, where the status is known, 92% are not experiencing overfishing, and 80% are not overfished.  Focusing fishery management efforts on the fish, rather than on the fisherman, has paid real benefits.

Unfortunately, the pendulum has now begun to swing in the other direction, driven primarily by the recreational fishing industry, which is urging managers to consider the short-term impacts that their actions have on fishermen, rather than emphasizing the long-term health of fish stocks.

Although there have always been some members of the recreational fishing community who have opposed management measures needed to rebuild stocks such as summer flounder and prevent anglers from exceeding their share of the landings, they generally constituted a sort of irrational fringe that found reasons to oppose just about any conservation measure that reduced recreational harvest. 

It wasn’t until 2014, and the release of a position paper titled “A Vision for Managing America’s Saltwater Recreational Fisheries,” that mainstream recreational fishing organizations, including those representing the angling and boating industries, began actively pressing for a management system that focused on benefitting fishermen, even if such benefits came at the expense of fish stocks.  Such position paper contained statements that included

“The NMFS should manage recreational fisheries based on long-term harvest rates, not strictly on poundage-based quotas.  This strategy has been successfully used by fishery managers in the Atlantic striped bass fishery, which is the most sought-after recreational fishery in the nation.”

Of course, we later learned that by 2014, the Atlantic striped bass fishery was in serious trouble, and was declared both overfished and subject to overfishing in a benchmark stock assessment completed in 2018, yet the virtues of such “alternative” management approaches are still being trumpeted by the angling industry.

The position paper would also delay the recovery of fish stocks, in order to minimize the short-term economic impacts on the angling industry.  It complained

“The Magnuson-Stevens Act currently states that the timeline for ending overfishing and rebuilding fisheries ‘be as short as possible’ and ‘not exceed 10 years,’ with a few limited exceptions to allow for longer timeframes…”

while supporting a recommendation that

“the regional councils and fishery managers set lower harvest rates that would allow fish stocks to recover gradually while diminishing socioeconomic impacts,”

even though such longer rebuilding times can increase the uncertainty about when—and if—the stock will be fully restored.

Ironically, the recreational fishing industry’s efforts to undercut Magnuson-Stevens came at the same time that many leaders in the commercial fishing industry, an industry that had traditionally been hostile to any sort of regulation, began to acknowledge that conservation benefitted their businesses in the long term.

Recreational industry efforts led to passage of legislation called the Modernizing Recreational Fishery Management Act, usually referred to as the “Modern Fish Act.”  Although the version of that bill was nowhere near as bad as the legislation that was originally introduced, it provided just enough of a framework for an activist fishing industry to use to weaken the existing, science-based recreational management structure.

We saw that earlier this month, when the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council, along with the ASMFC, passed something they and the industry called the “Harvest Control Rule,” even though both Council staff and the professionals who sit on its Scientific and Statistical Committee raised substantial concerns about the measure, which passed largely because it will allow anglers to fish two very abundant stocks, scup and black sea bass, at riskier, and previously impermissibly high, levels.

We also saw it in the Gulf of Mexico where the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council voted to defer calibrating state landings estimates for red snapper until 2023, even though doing so will almost certainly cause one or more states to exceed their red snapper quotas this year, and despite the fact that the director of NMFS’ Southeast Fisheries Science Center had advised the Council that by delaying calibration, 2022 management measures would not represent the best available science.

Last year, the Mid-Atlantic Council adopted a rebuilding plan for the recreationally-dominated bluefish fishery that violated the Council’s risk policy, and required the Council to modify such policy in order to accommodate the plan.  That was the second time since 2019 that the Council voted species-specific amendments to its risk policy in order to adopt a somewhat more fisherman-friendly rebuilding plan, the first time involving the rebuilding plan for the commercially-dominated Atlantic mackerel fishery.

Such actions suggest that fishery managers are now more willing to accept more risk to fish stocks, in order to provide transient benefits to fishermen.  Most of those benefits have accrued to the recreational sector; we have already seen instances at the Mid-Atlantic Council where, after the Council adopted measures that condoned anglers exceeding their harvest limit, representatives of the commercial sector asked whether commercial overages of very abundant species would be handled in the same tolerant way.

Such actions also suggest that the pendulum is swinging away from managers' former precautionary approach, and back toward those of an earlier era, when managers regularly accepted more risk to the stock in order to convey greater benefits to fishermen.  If so, we could be abandoning the management policies that led to the current abundance of many species, and moving back toward policies more likely to lead to overfishing and future depletion.

It's not a direction that managers ought to choose, but right now, it’s very possible that, at least in some regions, it is precisely where they are heading.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SOME THOUGHTS AT THE START OF SHARK SEASON

 

I’ve been a participant in the northeastern shark fishery for a very long time—more than 45 years, if I start counting from my first shark charter out of Rhode Island, about 40 years if I only consider trips where I ran my own boat. 

It's been even longer if I count one outing back in the late 1960s when, after seeing two big sandbar sharks caught by anglers off the southwest Connecticut coast, a friend and I wired the two biggest hooks we could find onto a water ski towrope, nose-hooked a bunker onto each of them, tied a rock to the rope for weight, and began slow-trolling that misbegotten rig off the Greenwich shoreline from a 10 ½-foot plywood skiff.  The idea was that, when we hooked a shark, it would tow us around until it was exhausted, at which point, we would drag the fish up on a local beach.  Unfortunately—or so we thought back then—our enterprise never reached the Nantucket sleighride stage.

The bottom line is that, for most of my life, when I had some free time, there was a very good chance thaat I was somewhere out on the ocean fishing for sharks.

Most of those somewhere have been off Long Island, usually fishing out of Fire Island Inlet, although there were some memorable trips out of Montauk and Rhode Island, as well.

As one might expect, the shark fishery has changed over the years.

The two biggest changes are a general decline in the number of sharks that we find, and in the species mix of the fish that we catch.

In the ‘80s, most people started to chase sharks sometime around the beginning of June, although some began in late May.  The May fishing was notoriously slow; anglers normally caught nothing but bluefish, although a few blue sharks, even fewer threshers, and the occasional mako or white shark would sometimes show up in the slick.

Well before I started fishing for sharks—in the 1950s and ‘60s—Long Island May run of porbeagle sharks, a species related to makos and whites, which are particularly fond of cool water.  The 1971 book Sportfishing for Sharks, by the late Capt. Frank Mundus and writer Bill Wisner, noted that

“In numbers, porbeagles exceed makos and maneaters [a/k/a white sharks], and they appear to have a greater tendency to group more than most other sharks.  In that respect they may be second only to the blues.  When they’re visiting a region, therefore, it’s possible to contact them with frequency.  The Cricket II [Capt. Mundus’ Montauk-based charterboat] has docked with as many as six or eight caught during a single sailing.”

By the time I made my first Montauk shark trip in 1982, such porbeagle abundance was a thing of the past.  Norwegian longliners began to target porbeagles during the 1960s, and quickly drove down their numbers.  Although there is no longer a directed longline fishery for porbeagles in the western Atlantic, the population has been recovering very slowly and remains overfished, although overfishing is no longer occurring.  Where Capt. Mundus sometimes brought six or eight porbeagles back to Montauk in a single trip, fewer than that are now landed on Long Island over the course of an entire season.  The landing of even a single fish is newsworthy.

Thus, by the time I began running my own boat out of Fire Island Inlet, shark season didn’t really get underway until early June, when swarms of blue sharks appeared in local waters.  I usually started to target sharks when surface temperatures rose above 60 degrees, but the blues could tolerate cooler water.  I still recall one June day when I ran out to the 40 fathom line, about 40 miles south of Shinnecock.  The surface temperature was only 55 degrees, and I had my doubts about what we might catch, but we ended up having one of those days when fish hit the baits as soon as the baits hit the water, we ran out of bait and almost out of hooks, and when we were ready to leave, the water beneath the boat looked like some sort of National Geographic special, with a dozen fish cruising around almost close enough to reach out and touch.

We still see blue sharks off of Long Island, and sometimes still run into swarms.  But that happens less than it used to.  My last June trip south of Shinnecock saw only four blue sharks take our baits, in a time and place where I might have expected to catch a dozen or two just a decade ago.  

A 2015 stock assessment found that the blue shark was neither overfished nor experiencing overfishing, but admitted that there was significant uncertainty in the assessment’s results.  While blue sharks don’t support a directed commercial fishery, many are caught and killed as bycatch in pelagic longline fisheries targeting other species, which led the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas to adopt a North Atlantic quota of 39,102 metric tons in 2019.  It was the first blue shark quota ever adopted by ICCAT.  Although such quota represented a meaningful step forward, some conservation organizations believe that it was too high to provide meaningful protection for the blue shark resource.

Then there are makos, the porbeagle’s swift, beautiful, and acrobatic relative.  Even back in the glory days of offshore fishing, when tuna, marlin and swordfish were frequently encountered relatively close to shore, and most sharks were viewed as trash fish, the shortfin mako was revered as a worthy adversary for the blue water angler.  When I started fishing for sharks, most Long Island anglers talked about “going out for makos,” rather than “going shark fishing.”

The first mako of the season usually hit the scales around Memorial Day, and by the first weekend in June, anglers were bringing in quite a few fish.  The last two weeks of June and the first week or two of July were the peak season, with multiple tournaments run out of just about every port between East Rockaway and Montauk.  There was also a steady pick of fish throughout the summer, with makos over 200 pounds regularly caught even in the dog days of August.  In the fall, makos would follow the bluefish, their favorite food, and often appeared in chum slicks through early November.  On most shark trips, we’d see at least one, even if that one was small, and we’d often catch multiple makos in a single day.  Less than ten years ago, we had a 6-mako day fishing just 20 miles ESE of Fire Island Inlet.

Unfortunately, it’s all been downhill since.  A recent ICCAT stock assessment found shortfin makos to be in serious trouble, and late last year, ICCAT prohibited all mako landings.  The National Marine Fisheries Service is completing work on a regulation that will prohibit mako landings in United States waters, which is expected to be released very soon. 

Even so, recovery of the mako stock will probably take 50 years.

That might seem like a long time, but it is far shorter than the time it will take to rebuild dusky sharks, which once were abundant south of Long Island.  During the '80s, small duskies regularly invaded bluefish slicks inside the 20-fathom line.  We caught them while chunking for tuna in the Mud Hole, east of New Jersey.  Truly large duskies—fish over 500 pounds—were far from unknown.  But the fish were--and still are--extremely vulnerable to longlines.  They were killed by bottom longlines set for shark, and they were killed by pelagic longlines targeting swordfish and tuna.  

The population collapsed.

In 2017, the National Marine Fisheries Service finalized a rebuilding plan intended to restore the population by 2107—a full 90 years.  The conservation group Oceana believed that the rebuilding plan won’t get the job done, and challenged it in court.  However, earlier this week, the Federal Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected such challenge, finding that NMFS’ rebuilding plan met all of the applicable legal standards. 

Still, no one living today--except a few that are still wearing diapers--will ever see what a healthy dusky shark population looks like. 

At the same time, there's some good news.

The same Sportfishing for Sharks book that I mentioned before states that

“You could go the full route of your shark-hunting career without ever contacting a thresher…It has been our experience that threshers seldom are what could be called abundant.”

That statement might have been true in 1971, but it’s certainly not true today.  Two people I know have already caught threshers this season, and from now into the middle of July, I fully expect to hook up to a thresher any time that I set up a chum slick.  It doesn’t happen on every trip, but it happens often enough that I rarely fish anything lighter than 50-pound line these days; a 4 ½-hour fight with a 400-pound thresher a few years ago convinced me to leave the 30-pound stuff at home.

Part of the reason we’re seeing more threshers is the abundance of baitfish; in recent years, we’ve seen far more menhaden off Long Island than we’ve seen before.  The threshers will follow the menhaden schools right up to the beach; quarter-ton fish have been caught in just 40 feet of water.  We’ve also been getting an influx of chub mackerel, which bring in the threshers.  When the chub mackerel swarm, the odds of hooking a thresher spike.

The population may also be growing, but no one knows for sure, because a stock assessment has never been performed; however, ICCAT considers common threshers to be one of the shark species that is least impacted by pelagic longlines, which is clearly a good thing.  Data is providing mixed signals, and depending on how it is interpreted, provides reason to believe that common thresher abundance remains in decline, has stabilized at relatively low levels, or is slowly increasing. 

Whatever the state of the stock, anglers seem to be seeing more of them.  A recent paper reported that, at one major shark tournament, the proportion of threshers caught increased from 0.1% in 1965 to 4.8% in 1995, then rocketed up to 27.8% in 2004.  Whether that increase reflects a greater abundance of threshers or a decline in the abundance of other species is not completely clear.

The number of sandbar (“brown”) sharks also seems to be on the rise.

There were a lot of them around years ago—enough to reach into western Long Island Sound, and capture my 14-year-old imagination, back in 1968.  We caught a lot of them in the 1980s, too, until they fell victim to bottom longlines and became scarce off Long Island.  But as soon as they were put on the “prohibited species” list, and could no longer be retained by commercial or recreational fishermen, we started to see abundance increase.  Although there probably aren’t yet as many around as there were 40 years ago, few days go by when we don’t catch at least one. 

Another fish that is becoming more abundant is the white shark, although there were always a few swimming off Long Island.  Back in ’82, we were fishing about 30 miles south of Montauk on a calm August day when a 15-foot white shark popped up next to my 20-foot outboard.  It was sobering to think that, at around 2,500 pounds, that fish easily outweighed our boat and all it contained--including us.  Although that shark remains the largest white that I ever saw, I’ve seen a few others that weren’t much smaller.  But recently, we're also seeing quite a few juveniles, little sharks six or so feet long, weighing less than 200 pounds.

That, too, is a good sign.

And then there are the “summer sharks.” 

While we seem to run into fewer tiger sharks than we did years ago, tigers are a “data-poor” species, so we can’t say whether the population is in decline.  Some NMFS data shows a steady decline in both Atlantic commercial tiger shark landings and recreational catch, which seems to suggest that abundance is not what it was.

We’re catching about as many hammerheads, mostly smooth hammerheads, as we ever did, but seeing fewer of them cruising on the surface, probably because we’re rigging and setting out baits a little differently than we used to.  There is no doubt that hammerhead abundance is not what it was, as all three major hammerhead species were hit hard by commercial fishermen who sought their valuable fins, which are sold in China and used to prepare shark fin soup.

The same smaller baits, fished close to the surface, are also attracting spinner sharks, a southern species that is new to Long Island waters.  Even a dozen years ago, catching a spinner shark was rare.  Now, there are drone videos showing large numbers of spinners actively feeding on menhaden schools.  The appearance of spinners is clearly attributable to a warming ocean, but an increasing abundance of bait is also part of the equation.

So, what does it all mean?

The biggest takeaway is the same message that applies to most of our other fisheries.  We shouldn’t take current abundance for granted, and we should turn our backs on old practices, which saw fishermen regularly killing sharks that weren’t wanted for food, such as large tigers, hanging them on a scale, and then dumping them back in the water or trucking to a landfill.  There’s no room in today's increasingly pressured ocean for kill tournaments that offer prizes for fish that end up feeding the flies, rather than the angler who caught it.

It means that we shouldn’t be trapped by the shifting baseline syndrome, which tempts us to view today’s reduced abundance as normal, and forget what healthy shark populations looked like.  It also means that we should acknowledge our responsibility to those not yet born, and do what we can to rebuild depleted shark stocks, even if we won’t be around to enjoy the fruits of our efforts.

But it doesn’t mean that we ought to abandon the fishery.  Instead, we must approach it with respect for the fish, and perhaps even with an eye toward helping researchers with their work through tagging programs, or perhaps by providing a platform that scientists can use to conduct their own studies.

The shark fishery has provided a lot of enjoyment over the years.  As this season starts, it is only right that we, in return, do what we can to ensure it a future.

A HUDSON CANYON MARINE SANCTUARY: HOW WOULD IT IMPACT ANGLERS?

 

Last week, President Biden announced that he was considering designating Hudson Canyon as a National Marine Sanctuary.  That announcement undoubtedly worried many blue water fishermen, who reasonably wondered, “What does that mean for us?”

Right now, the only answer to such question is, “It’s hard to say.”

Hudson Canyon is the largest submarine canyon on the East Coast.  It is essentially the mouth of the Hudson River, as it flowed at the end of the Ice Age, when much of the Earth’s water was tied up in glaciers, and the sea’s level was more than 300 feet lower than it is today.  As the last—the Wisconsian—glacier retreated, roughly 15,000 years ago, the torrent of meltwater flowing down the newly freed river carved a deep cut in the edge of the continental shelf.  

As melting glaciers throughout the world poured more water into the ocean, the sea level rose and created the coastline that we see today.  The Hudson River’s submerged channel remains etched into the bottom; places offshore fishermen know as the “Mud Hole,” “Glory Hole,” “Chicken Canyon,” and the Hudson Canyon itself are merely waypoints that the ancient river passed on its way to an older sea.

Today, Hudson Canyon is a place where nutrient-rich deep-ocean waters collide with the continental shelf, mix with warm surface waters, and create prime feeding conditions for baitfish and, in turn, for pelagic predators such as marlin, tuna, swordfish, and sharks.  It would not be much of an exaggeration to say that Hudson Canyon may be the best-known, and most heavily fished, offshore destination in North America, given its proximity to New York City and to ports from southern New Jersey to eastern Long Island, Connecticut, and even Rhode Island.

Thus, fishermen are right to worry whether a National Marine Sanctuary designation might affect their ability to access Hudson Canyon, and deny them access to that traditional fishing ground.

The good news is that current law permits fishing, including commercial fishing, in national marine sanctuaries.  The bad news is that the same law also allows all fishing to be banned, and permits regulations to prohibit some kinds of fishing while countenancing others.  

Whether and how fishing is regulated in any future Hudson Canyon Marine Sanctuary will depend, in large part, on what such sanctuary is created to protect, and in the comments made and political pressures applied during the designation process.

The Wildlife Conservation Society—the organization that operates the New York Aquarium and the Bronx Zoo, among other enterprises—is the primary advocate for the creation of a Hudson Canyon Marine Sanctuary.  On its webpage, the Society explains,’

“By designating the Hudson Canyon a National Marine Sanctuary, NOAA would be advancing community-led conservation of nationally significant marine wildlife and their habitat, while also providing research and STEM education opportunities.  Sanctuary designation has an opportunity to provide a wide range of benefits for New York and New Jersey residents and for the diversity of marine wildlife in Atlantic waters.  To help protect this ecological treasure, WCS recommends that a Sanctuary Designation

·        Permanently preclude offshore oil, gas, and mineral exploration and development in the canyon

·        Maintain healthy populations of fish and other wildlife

·        Ensure a future for sustainable fisheries under existing regulatory authorities

·        Support the tourism industries that depend on healthy ocean ecosystems

·        Increase federal investment in biological and ecological research and monitoring—including the impacts of climate change on ocean life and resources, and collaborative research with fishing, shipping, and offshore wind industries

·        Identify and protect cultural resources and history

·        Expand opportunities for STEM education, community management, and workforce development, especially for historically under-represented communities

There’s nothing in that list of purposes/benefits that would suggest that angling, or for that matter, any sort of fishing, would be threatened by a marine sanctuary designation.  In fact, the language about maintaining sustainable fisheries “under existing regulatory authorities,” as well as that supporting “tourism industries that depend on healthy ocean ecosystems,” suggest that recreational fishing would continue in the Hudson Canyon National Marine Sanctuary, should such sanctuary ultimately be created.

However, even though the Wildlife Conservation Society kickstarted the designation process, it does not control the process’ outcome.  Just because the Wildlife Conservation Society does not wish to prohibit fishing doesn’t mean that such prohibitions can’t be put in place.  In fact, NOAA’s Office of Marine Sanctuaries describes the “primary goals” of the proposed Hudson Canyon sanctuary somewhat differently than the WCS does, saying

“The primary goals of the proposed national marine sanctuary designation are to 1) support conservation of the area’s marine wildlife, habitats, and maritime cultural resources, 2) work closely with Indigenous Tribes and Nations to identify and raise awareness of Indigenous connections to the area, 3) highlight and promote sustainable uses of the area, 4) expand ocean science and monitoring in, and education and awareness of the area, and 5) provide a platform for collaborative and diverse that support effective and inclusive long-term management of the area.”

One might note that the Wildlife Conservation Society’s references to “sustainable fisheries under existing regulatory authorities” and “tourism industries that depend on healthy ocean ecosystems” do not appear anywhere among the agencies “primary goals,” although optimists can argue that the intent to “highlight and promote sustainable uses of the area” embraces similar themes.

Realists might observe that no-take marine protected areas have long been embraced by elements of academia and the marine conservation community, and that the creation of a Hudson Canyon National Marine Reserve will offer such individuals an opportunity to advocate for a prohibition on any sort of fishing.  While, under certain circumstances, closed areas may provide quantifiable fishery benefits, no one has yet adequately explained how closing a discrete area such as Hudson Canyon to fishing for highly migratory pelagic species, which can and do travel for miles in a single day, following preferred bait and favorable ocean conditions, would provide meaningful benefits to either the fish or to fishermen. 

Even so, a recently published paper recommends that the government

“Establish new highly and fully protected, networked MPAs with better representation of U.S. marine biodiversity, regions, and habitats…Fully and highly protected MPAs are overwhelmingly concentrated in the Central Pacific.  These large MPAs have immense value and should be celebrated.  However, the disproportionate share of MPA stewardship by Pacific Islanders in the U.S. and associated territories should be recognized and rectified by increasing the share of highly and fully protected MPAs in diverse ecosystems elsewhere in the U.S.  This action is imperative, not only to achieve effective protection for biodiversity but to bring the benefits of MPAs within reach of diverse communities.  [emphasis added]”

It’s not difficult to imagine those holding such an opinion viewing the creation of a Hudson Canyon National Marine Sanctuary as the perfect opportunity to create one of their favored “highly and fully protected MPAs”—a place where fishing is very strictly restricted if not fully outlawed--and to “bring the benefits of MPAs within reach of diverse communities,” whether such communities want an MPA or not.

So, again, fishermen need to be wary.

At the same time, fishermen ought to look at other East Coast marine sanctuaries, to get an idea of the range of restrictions that might be imposed. 

Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary, which lies off the coast of Massachusetts, sits at one end of the spectrum.  Commercial and recreational fishing are both permitted there, although a revised management plan for the sanctuary, now under development, notes that

“Data suggest measurable degradation of habitat quality over the past ten years, primarily due to direct impacts of commercial fishing…In addition to adverse impacts on whales and other important focal species, incidental contact with fishing gear has impacted nearly every maritime heritage resource in SBNMS, reducing their historical, archaeological, scientific, or educational value.”

Such language suggests that additional restrictions on commercial fishing activities might eventually be put in place.  However, nothing in the proposed, revised management plan suggests that recreational fishing activity will be curtailed.  Current recreational fishing activity within the sanctuary is substantial, accounting for about 25% of all recreationally-caught cod in the Gulf of Maine; private boats fishing within its boundaries account for about 117,000 angler-days of fishing activity, and about $6 million in related spending, each season.

If the proposed Hudson Canyon National Marine Sanctuary was managed like Stellwagen Bank, anglers would have nothing to fear.  However, it’s worth noting that the same scientific paper mentioned earlier describes the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary as a “minimally protected” area, and notes with apparent disapproval that it allows

“large impacts from human activities like fishing.”

Thus, any attempt to adopt Stellwagen-like management measures for the proposed Hudson Canyon National Marine Sanctuary would probably meet with some degree of opposition from the preservationist wing of the conservation community.

At the other end of the marine sanctuaries spectrum lies the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.  Although the Keys Sanctuary allows angling in some of its waters, it also includes areas where all fishing is prohibited, and other areas where angling is limited to catch-and-release trolling, in order to protect coral reef communities.

Whether fishing is prohibited, and how fishing is regulated, depends on the designations given to specific areas within the Marine Sanctuary, which features five different kinds of “Marine Zones.”  The most exclusive of those zones are the “Ecological Reserves” and “Special Use Areas,” where no fishing of any kind is allowed.  Slightly less restrictive are the “Sanctuary Preservation Areas.”  Fishing is generally prohibited in those areas, too, although four of them do permit catch-and-release trolling; surprisingly, fishing for bait, provided that the fisherman holds the appropriate Sanctuary Permit, is allowed in all of the Preservation Areas.  Finally, there are the “Wildlife Management Areas” and “Existing Management Areas,” all of which allow angling, and often commercial fishing, in some form, although there may be restrictions on the gear used, on vessel speeds and propulsion modes, etc.

Florida Keys Marine Sanctuary-like regulations, if applied to the Hudson Canyon, might or might not be problematic.  Few sport fishermen would care if commercial fishing was restricted, or if certain gear, such as longlines or trawls, were prohibited in order to better protect turtles, marine mammals, or sensitive bottom habitat, although some General Category HMS Permit holders, who claim to be anglers but end up selling their catch, might end up a bit perturbed if commercial harvest was outlawed.

But if all, or even a section, of Hudson Canyon was put off-limits to anglers, either because it was declared a research area (a “Special Use Area,” in the parlance of the Florida Keys Sanctuary) or an Ecological Reserve, recreational fishermen could experience real harm.  Even mandatory catch-and-release in all or part of Hudson Canyon, as in the Florida Keys’ “Sanctuary Preservation Areas,” would be a very tough sell to just about everyone in the canyon tuna fleet.

Right now, it’s impossible to predict what a Hudson Canyon National Marine Sanctuary might look like.

It might look like Stellwagen Bank.  It might look like the Florida Keys.  Given the pressure to create “highly or fully protected” marine protected areas on the East Coast, it might look even worse.

However, given that five years has passed since Hudson Canyon was first nominated as a National Marine Sanctuary, and given that neither the Trump nor the Biden administration has yet derailed the designation effort, there is a very good chance that a Hudson Canyon National Marine Sanctuary will eventually be created.  The offshore angling community is thus well advised to get involved in the designation process now, to best assure that when and if such sanctuary is created, its creation will not do material harm to recreational fishermen.

On June 8, the Office of Marine Sanctuaries announced the beginning of a two-month public scoping period, which is intended to give interested parties an opportunity to provide comment on the proposed marine sanctuary.  As such Office states,

“This is a critical step in NOAA’s consideration to move forward with the process. Should designation proceed, scoping comments also assist NOAA in its future development of sanctuary designation documents, including a draft environmental impact statement, draft management plan, and proposed rulemaking.”

Scoping comments will be accepted through August 8.  They may be submitted in writing, electronically, or at any of the four online and in-person meetings that will be held before the close of the comment period.

More information can be found at https://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/hudson-canyon/.

Anyone who fishes blue water, and leaves from any port between Cape May and Pt. Judith, would be foolish not to make their thoughts known.