“My theory is that the fish aren’t getting a chance to grow
up. The minute they hit 12 inches,
they’re getting killed.”
At the time, Louisiana fishery managers weren’t too
concerned about the health of the speckled trout stock, even though its 10%
spawning potential ratio was well below the 18% SPR that the state had set as a
gauge for the stock’s well-being. They
believed that, because the species matured early and began spawning in its
first year, there was virtually no risk of stock collapse. They also admitted that
“The current limits, biologically speaking, are designed to
maximize angler yield while not putting the stock into a condition where we may
see recruitment overfishing,”
and that managers
“walk a tightrope between getting full public use out of a
renewable resource and harming a fishery at least in the short term.”
I
revisited the issue three years later, and discovered that Louisiana’s
benign neglect of its speckled trout population did not do the fish any
good. A
2019 stock assessment determined that its speckled trout stock had been
overfished since 2014, that the stock had experienced overfishing in six of the past
ten years, and that the spawning stock biomass and the population of females at
least 3 years old was the lowest on record.
As a result of such woes, recreational speckled trout landings were at
their lowest point in nearly 30 years, yet angler effort continued to rise.
Even though a state fishery manager publicly admitted that
“I think everyone knows that we’re reluctant to change
regulations,”
Louisiana realized that their speckled trout were in real
trouble, and began moving toward more restrictive angling rules. At the time, I didn’t criticize the state’s
admitted reluctance to change the rules, but instead recognized that
“when all is said and done, changing fisheries regulations is
always a difficult thing for state managers to do, at least when the
regulations are being made more restrictive.
Some elements of the fishing community will always be opposed to any
reduction in harvest, with industry folks claiming that they’ll lose too much
business, and some anglers claiming that their ‘right’ to fish is being
infringed.
“When that happens, fishery management becomes more a
political process than a scientific one.
Needed changes supported by the professional fishery managers are often
abandoned when politicians intervene; no matter how badly such measures are
needed, managers know that they will end up in a bitter fight, not only with
elements of the public, but often with higher-ups in their own department and
in the governor’s office, before such rules are adopted.
“Faced with that reality, state managers are often loath to
propose harvest restrictions, and delay far too long, to the detriment of fish
stocks, before putting them in place.”
Unfortunately, we may now be seeing just that scenario beginning to play out with respect to Louisiana’s proposed, and badly needed, speckled
trout regulations, even though state regulators went to great pains to craft
regulations that would both benefit the troubled stock and be
acceptable to the majority of the state’s anglers.
As might be expected, anglers expressed a wide array of
preferences, with some wanting no change at all. But when anglers were asked whether they were
concerned about the speckled trout’s coast-wide status, about 55% of them said
that they were. There was strong support
for reducing the bag limit from 25 to 15 fish, an option not originally
presented in the public meetings, but which was added to the surveys due to
public support. Over all, despite its
absence from the choices first provided for the public meetings, angler comment
favored a 15-fish bag and 13 ½-inch minimum size, with a 12-fish bag and
13-inch minimum in second place.
“many fishermen felt the seatrout stock had grown worse in
recent years,”
and
“a majority from both surveys indicated they were moderately
to extremely concerned for the spotted seatrout stock.”
When asked about specific management options, around 38% of 2021 respondents expressed something between slight and strong
support for the status quo of 25 fish and a 12-inch minimum size; even so,
close to 85% of all such respondents agreed to the state adopting new
regulations. Of all of the possible
bag/size limit combinations, only two, the same 15-fish bag and 13 ½-inch
minimum size that was favored the year before, and a new option that featured a
13-fish bag and 13- to 20-inch slot limit, with one fish over 20 inches,
received strong support.
Based on that angler feedback, Louisiana fishery managers
chose to put the combination of 15-fish bag and 13.5- (or possibly 13-) inch
minimum out for public comment, believing that it would have the strongest
support.
And, based on the prior scoping comments, maybe it does, but
there
is one big voice that doesn’t particularly like it, and that’s the Louisiana
chapter of the Coastal Conservation Association. In a position paper posted on its website, the
organization wrote that
“CCA Louisiana believes that a reduction in the daily bag
limit to 15 fish per angler is appropriate, and feels strongly that the minimum
size of 12 inches should remain intact.
This should be part of a comprehensive plan to address issues within the
ecosystem associated with speckled trout.
[emphasis in the original]”
That’s fine as far as it goes. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion,
and nothing requires CCA Louisiana to agree with the state’s proposal.
But when you start reading the rationale for the CCA
position, things don’t really add up.
There is, of course, the obligatory, if questionable,
statement that
“Recreational anglers have always been the primary stewards
of our marine resources,”
which is quickly qualified by language saying that such
stewardship is accomplished
“through funding, advocacy and demanding better science and
management.”
Left unsaid is that the funding generally takes the form of
state fishing license fees that anglers are required to pay, the advocacy generally
takes the form of shutting down commercial fisheries for some species and
instituting commercial net bans for others, and that the demands for
“better science and management” generally involves demands for science and
management measures that would increase recreational harvest, not fish abundance.
That might be a form of stewardship, but whether it
represents good stewardship is very much in doubt.
And that trend continues in CCA Louisiana’s speckled trout position
paper, where the organization states, presumably with a straight face,
“Based on our experience, changes in recreational regulations
have rarely, if ever, resulted in a direct fishery recovery.”
My first thought on reading that was, “Did you ever hear of
striped bass?” But then I looked at the
statement again, and realized that it was just another example of CCA
weasel-wording a statement in order to mislead its readers. The qualifier “Based on our experience”
eliminates fishery recoveries that occur outside of Louisiana, and in that
state, restrictions on anglers are historically rare. And what is a “direct” fishery recovery, as
opposed to an “indirect” recovery?
We can only wonder.
But we also have to realize the CCA Louisiana had little choice but to dissemble. Historically it, along with other CCA chapters, promoted an approach to fishery management that blamed the commercial fishing industry for any and all of a fishery's ills.
If a stock is in bad shape, CCA characteristically
ignores any recreational contribution to the problem, and instead tries to
eliminate gill nets, or perhaps the entire commercial
fishery. I still recall being at a meeting
at CCA’s national headquarters in Houston, talking about the Atlantic States
Marine Fisheries Commission’s twenty-year failure to rebuild the overfished
tautog stock, when the only response I got was “Make it a gamefish!” and
eliminate the commercial fishery, which was nonsensical, given that over 90% of
tautog landings were, at that time, attributable to the recreational sector.
But the organization could not, and still cannot, publicly
admit that the recreational sector can have a negative impact on fish
populations.
That puts it in a bad position on Louisiana speckled trout given that, over the past decade, only 0.1% of all landings are attributable to
the commercial sector. Thus anglers
are, as a practical matter, solely responsible for the stock being overfished.
But to an anglers’ rights group such as CCA, accepting
responsibility for a fishery’s decline is a very, very, very, very
bad thing to do. It might lead to harvest restrictions. Thus, in the absence of
a commercial fishery that it can blame for the speckled trout’s problems, CCA
Louisiana must argue that
“recreational changes cannot be the only remedy. That will not fix the problem, as there are
many other factors that impact speckled trout.
Some of those factors are difficult to manage like water conditions, weather,
and other environmental issues. However,
some are able to be managed, and should absolutely be considered as part of the
overall plan to the address the management [sic] of speckled trout, as
well as other recreational stocks. Some
of those include: 1) Coastwide and
regional forage reduction, 2) Marine habitat and reef degradation, 3) Bycatch,
4) Marine fisheries restocking programs, 5) Stock evaluation protocols and programs,
6) Ecosystem level management. [emphasis
in original, internal formatting omitted]”
It’s important to note that, of the six points listed, five
have no direct relationship to the recreational fishery—again, the intention is
to deflect the blame—while the sixth arguably acknowledges excessive
recreational landings, but would remedy the issue with “Marine fisheries
restocking programs” rather than with restrictions on anglers’ harvest.
And yet CCA Louisiana has the temerity to say that
“As conservationists, we can lead the way by
supporting a creel limit of 15 fish while maintaining the 12-inch size limit, [emphasis in original]”
while admitting immediately thereafter that
“Louisiana anglers harvest less than 2 trout per trip on
average…we see a reduction from 25 fish to 15 fish as a reasonable move.”
In other words, the organization is willing to grudgingly
accept a change in the bag limit that will have no meaningful impact on most fishing
trips, but is very unwilling to accept an increase in the size limit that might
actually reduce the average fisherman’s harvest.
That’s not exactly “conservationists…lead[ing] the way…”
CCA Louisiana tries to justify its opposition to a larger
size limit by suggesting that there might be an
“impact on female trout if a shift to a larger minimum
size adjustment occurs, [emphasis in
original]”
but the science isn’t in accord with such concerns. While female speckled trout do grow larger,
and grow more quickly, than males, a
Louisiana fishery manager noted, at the August 6, 2020 meeting of the Louisiana
Wildlife and Fisheries Commission, that increasing the size limit from 12 to 14
inches would only increase the harvest of female trout by 3%. That’s hardly a significant increase when
compared to the 20% decrease in overall harvest provided by the proposed regulations.
In fact, it is the current regulations, which permit the
harvest of 12-inch fish, may place a disproportionate burden on females. The
minutes of the November 4, 2021 Wildlife and Fisheries Commission meeting reveal
that
“the Commissioner asked how old was a 12-inch fish and he was
told that it varied, but typically an age 1 female could be 6-13 inches and a 1
year old male could be 5-11 inches with the majority of the harvest being
females. Commissioner McPherson
then stated that the 1 year old males (11-11 ½”) were being thrown back
but the females (12” or more) were being taken out and Mr. Adriance
[the state fishery manager] felt that was a fair statement. [emphasis added]”
So it appears that CCA Louisiana’s concerns about a larger
size limit adversely impacting female speckled trout are misplaced. That is, if such concerns exist at all, and
aren’t merely being presented as a smokescreen, to avoid meaningful harvest
restrictions.
The simple fact is that Louisiana’s speckled trout are
overfished, and harvest needs to be reduced.
And because recreational fishermen are responsible for 99.9% of that harvest,
regulations likely to achieve a meaningful reduction—a 20% reduction—in recreational
landings must be imposed.
That doesn’t mean that recreational fishermen are
responsible for the entire decline in the speckled trout stock. The Louisiana marshes are shrinking, and it
is entirely possible that environmental conditions are reducing the
productivity of the speckled trout stock.
One can argue that any decline in trout abundance isn’t entirely the
recreational anglers’ fault.
But fishery management isn’t about fault.
Whether a stock becomes overfished simply because removals
have become too high, or whether changing environmental conditions also play a
role, the remedy remains the same; landings must be reduced to a level that the
stock, under existing environmental conditions, can sustain in the long
term.
And in the case of speckled trout, that means an increased
size limit, along with a reduced bag.
That’s something that any “primary steward of our marine
resources” ought to easily understand.
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