Last Tuesday, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries
Commission’s Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board met to provide initial
direction to the Plan Development Team that will compose the initial draft of
the proposed Addendum III to Amendment 7 to the Interstate Fishery Management
Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass.
In some ways, the meeting was fairly predictable and very routine. In other ways, it was more than
a little strange; perhaps the strangest part was that, at times, it seemed that
some of the Board members forgot that the whole point of Addendum III is to
rebuild the striped bass population, and not to find new ways for their favored
sectors to increase their landings.
Some of the members also seemed to forget that Addendum III,
in whatever form it might take, needs to be approved by the Board’s October
meeting, and so sought to add various bells and whistles that would contribute
nothing to rebuilding the stock.
Nevertheless, by the time that the meeting ended, the Plan
Development Team had a pretty clear idea of what they, with the help of the
Striped Bass Technical Committee, needed to do.
But to get to the point, the Board took a long, twisting path, that doubled back on itself more than once, and might
not necessarily lead to its intended destination—a fully rebuilt stock by 2029.
Ahead
of the meeting, Emilie Franke, who serves as the ASMFC’s Fishery Management
Plan Coordinator for Atlantic Striped Bass, had laid out a number of topics
that the Board might want to consider in the draft Addendum III. Megan Ware, a Maine fisheries manager who currently
chairs the Management Board, suggested that Board members provide comment on which
of those topics they’d like to see included in the draft addendum and that, absent any strong opposition, such topics would be considered by the Plan
Development Team. In the event
of a strong difference of opinion, Ms. Ware would call for a formal motion and
Board vote to determine whether an issue should be included in or excluded from
the initial draft.
Given that some topics were addressed more than once, and in
more than one way, I’m going to abandon my usual practice of presenting events
in chronological order, and instead address them by topic, in the hope
that such an approach will make the outcome of the meeting a little more
understandable.
A 10-year stock trajectory
William Hyatt, the Governor’s Appointee from Connecticut, asked that the draft Addendum III include projections of spawning stock biomass that do not stop in 2029, as was the case with the projections provided by the Technical Committee ahead of the Board's December 16, 2024 meeting, but instead extend to 2035.
Mr. Hyatt asked that such projections address two different recruitment
assumptions, one being the
low-recruitment scenario described in Amendment 7 to the Interstate Fishery
Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass, which is based on recruitment
during the period 2007 through 2020, with the other reflecting the
record-low recruitment that occurred during the period 2019 through 2024. He also asked that for each of those
recruitment assumptions, the Technical Committee provide two projections, which
assume both a low and a moderate level of fishing mortality.
Although Mr. Hyatt was assured that such projections can be
easily done, his proposal was opposed by Joseph Cimino, a New Jersey fisheries
manager who frequently opposes striped bass conservation efforts. Mr. Cimino argued that there comes a point
where projections are “not helpful,” due to the increasing uncertainty in the
assumptions used to project stock trajectory ten years in the future. However, Dr. Katie Drew, a member of the
Technical Committee, while admitting that projections of fishing mortality over
a ten year period would be uncertain, noted that because of the long period
before striped bass mature, a longer projection is needed if the impacts of
lower recruitment were going to be included in any projections made.
She observed that
“Striped bass is a little unique in that there is a longer
lag”
between the time when
an individual recruits into the stock (at age 1) and when it will be mature (usually
around age 5 1/2, although some mature at both younger and older ages).
In the end, Mr. Cimino did not oppose the projections requested
by Mr. Hyatt being included in the draft addendum.
Probability of rebuilding
Historically, ASMFC striped bass management plans have been
based on a mere 50 percent probability of achieving their goals. On Tuesday, Christopher Batsavage, a North
Carolina fisheries manager, asked that in addition to management options with a
50 percent chance of success, draft Addendum III also include management options that
would provide a higher, 60 percent probability of rebuilding by 2029, in order
“to account for some inherent management uncertainty.”
No one rose to oppose that suggestion.
Special rules for anglers fishing from for-hire vessels
Nichola Meserve, a Massachusetts fishery manager who has
become one of the champions of striped bass conservation, then asked that the
various management options included in draft Addendum III not include “mode
splits;” that is, provisions that grant special privileges to anglers fishing
from for-hire vessels, which would not be enjoyed by the great majority of
striped bass anglers.
Ms. Meserve noted that such mode splits had just been
rejected a year ago, when the Board adopted Addendum
II to Amendment 7 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic
Striped Bass. She noted that there was only
“limited public support [for mode splits] at the time,”
that such splits
create angler compliance issues and so are not recommended by the ASMFC’s
Law Enforcement Committee, and that they run counter to the sentiment that
everyone should be making an equal contribution to striped bass rebuilding.
Despite such arguments, Michael Luisi quickly rose to
support special privileges for for-hire anglers, saying
“It was a year ago now that we convened here as a board and
decided that mode splits would not be allowed…The consequences of that have
been dire.”
He alleged that the decision led to a drop of somewhere
between 60 and 80 percent in Maryland charter boat bookings, although he didn’t
volunteer why the Board should attribute all of that drop to Amendment II’s
1-fish bag limit (previously, Maryland had adopted a special 2-bass bag limit
for its for-hire fleet) instead of also considering the impact of six years of
bad spawns, which have made it very difficult for anglers to find the 19- to
24-inch bass that fall within Maryland’s slot size limit in the waters of
Chesapeake Bay.
Jason McNamee, a Rhode Island fisheries manager who has long
been a fan of mode splits, asked whether Addendum III would have to include multiple
mode split options, or whether it would be possible to merely include a “midrange”
mode split that could later be modified by the Board. He was told that, in order to be able to calculate
the impact of such management measures, explicit options were needed.
Another Rhode Island representative, Eric Reid, the state’s
legislative proxy, argued that the Board should consider special regulations favoring
the for-hire fleet, because
“It’s not just about saving striped bass. It’s about saving a lifestyle, tradition, and
way of life.”
Of course, harpooning right whales was once a tradition and
way of life in the northeast, too.
Sometimes, changing times demand that we leave traditions behind, and
lifestyles have to change as well.
But the fishermen who fall back on the “traditions” argument, when all
other arguments fail, are more interested in clinging to the past rather than adapting
to the future, and many fisheries managers still choose to enable such
attitudes.
Faced with such attitudes, Ms. Meserve was forced to make a
motion to keep mode splits out of the draft Addendum III, which was seconded by
Mr. Batsavage. But on this occasion, the
traditionalists prevailed, as the motion was defeated on a vote of four states—Massachusetts,
Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina—in favor, nine states against, with New
Hampshire, NOAA Fisheries, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service electing to
abstain.
That didn’t end the debate.
Ms. Meserve rose again, to note that the motion passed on December
16, which initiated the Addendum III process, only provided that
“Options should include, if needed, a range of overall
reductions, considerations of rec vs comm contributions to the reductions, rec
seasons and size changes taking into account regional variability of
availability, and no harvest vs. no target closures, [emphasis added]”
and did not call for changing the
recreational bag limit.
After various ASMFC staff members assured her that even
though the motion did not explicitly mention bag limits, it still potentially
allowed their consideration, and that the motion was merely “a starting point”
for Board discussion, which the Board had the “flexibility” to change, Ms.
Meserve said
“That was not my understanding of the motion that I voted
for [last December],”
but after a few more comments, the Board moved on to other topics. The Board seemingly assumed that
increasing the bag limit, at least for for-hire anglers—something that would seem contrary to the primary goal
of rebuilding the stock—would be considered in
Addendum III.
But Ms. Meserve was not to be deterred. Later on in the meeting, she again raised the
issue, arguing that if the Board intended to consider changes to bag/possession
limits in Addendum III, there should be a vote to explicitly authorize such
consideration. Adam Nowalsky, who acts as New Jersey’s Legislative Proxy and has long been an advocate for the
for-hire fleet, made the appropriate motion, which was seconded by the Governor’s
Appointee from New York, Emerson Hasbrouck, another long-time defender of the
for-hires’ interests.
Ms. Meserve announded her opposition to the motion, noting
that the purpose of Addendum III is to conserve striped bass, not to liberalize
management measures. Mr.
Batsavage agreed, noting that the motion was
“pretty far away for striped bass stock rebuilding,”
and that
“We’re setting us up to fail.”
Mr. Luisi argued that mode splits weren’t about
liberalization, and suggested that any increase in bag limits might be offset
by a change in the season—although whether he was talking about a change that
only impacted for-hires, or whether he contemplated shortening the season for
everyone, just so the for-hire fleet could kill more fish, was not completely
clear.
Fortunately for the striped bass, the motion failed, by the
narrowest possible margin, with seven jurisdictions—Rhode Island,
New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, the District of Columbia, and the
Potomac River Fisheries Commission—voting in favor, another seven—Maine, New
Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North
Carolina—voting against, and the two federal agencies abstaining.
Unwilling to accept that defeat, Mr. Nowalsky then made a
slightly modified motion, which would again have allowed the draft Addendum III
to consider changes in bag limits, but only for the for-hire fleet. But that motion also failed on an identical
vote.
So Ms. Meserve—and the bass—ultimately prevailed on at least
that one point. Addendum III will leave
bag limits unchanged.
Size limits
Changes to size limits, on the other hand, are very much in
play in Addendum III.
Doug Grout, the Governor’s Appointee from New Hampshire,
felt that the draft addendum should consider both slot limits and minimum
sizes. He felt that the slot limit
should try to focus effort away from fish needed to rebuild the spawning stock
biomass—basically, the 2011, 2015, and 2018 year classes, and perhaps what
remained of some older year classes as well—and said that if the Board moved away
from a slot and instead set a minimum size, that minimum should be somewhere
between 36 and 40 inches.
While the proposal for a minimum size didn’t garner much
attention—which was somewhat surprising, as a 36-inch minimum would allow
harvest of the now-protected 2015s and 2011s, while a 40-inch minimum would
immediately put the 2011s at risk—the possibility of adopting a slot that
permitted anglers to keep fish smaller than 28 inches ignited debate.
Dr. Drew noted that the Plan Development Team would examine
the impacts of such a slot. She said
that a preliminary analysis had found it would increase removals, but that public
comments made by the public supported a smaller slot, and asked whether the
Board wanted the Technical Committee to perform “due diligence” on its merits.
Still, the general Board sentiment was negative.
The first to voice opposition was New Jersey’s Cimino, who
noted that the state regularly calculates the impact of taking bass less than
28 inches because of its “bonus fish” program, which allows the recreational
harvest of 24- to 28-inch bass as a way of utilizing New Jersey’s commercial
striped bass quota (New Jersey prohibits commercial striped bass fishing). He said that
“the loss of spawning potential is pretty intense.”
While that impact on spawning potential has not inspired New
Jersey to eliminate its “bonus” program, it did cause Mr. Cimino to oppose a
smaller slot. Ms. Meserve also opposed
the smaller slot, observing that the ASMFC’s Striped Bass Advisory Panel, which
seldom agrees on anything, was 100 percent opposed to taking bass less than 28
inches long. Still, Mr. Grout thought
that a smaller slot was worth looking into, arguing that after the past six
years of poor recruitment in Maryland, a thorough analysis would find that such
slot would reduce landings.
Mr. Cimino finally made a motion that such smaller slot not
be included in the draft addendum. In
doing so, he made the somewhat ominous prediction that
“When we get past this benchmark, the whole idea of what
striped bass management is, is going to change,”
although he made no effort to explain those remarks.
Ms. Meserve seconded his motion, noting that she was
hesitant to support a size limit change, due to any such change complicating
the Technical Committee’s efforts to predict future striped bass catch. She also noted that changing size limits lead
to compliance and enforcement issues.
Dr. McNamee also supported the motion, noting that he was uncomfortable
focusing the fishery on “sub-mature fish.”
Mr. Cimino’s motion passed easily, on a vote of 13 in favor,
with only New Hampshire voting against and the two federal agencies again
abstaining.
With the vote completed, Mr. Grout opined that any proposals
for a new slot limit should not consider slots narrower than three inches. No one disagreed.
Ms. Meserve also raised the issue of including a standard
method of measuring striped bass in the draft addendum. She said that some states require anglers to
pinch the tail, which provides the longest possible length, while some states
don’t. She noted that in Massachusetts,
there is no legally required way to measure a bass, which allows some anglers
to forcibly fan out the tail, creating the shortest possible measurement,
so that a fish that might otherwise be deemed too large can arguably fall below
the upper bound of the slot. Again, no
one argued against such a measure.
Recreational seasons
One might plausibly argue that the Board decided to initiate
Addendum III, rather than adopt new management measures for 2025, primarily
because the recreational seasons proposed by the Technical Committee, before
the December 16 meeting, were seen as unfair by many states, and ignited
controversy among anglers and the angling industry.
Mr. Grout, as a representative of New Hampshire, noted that
his state had a very short striped bass season, and argued for some sort of
equity that didn’t impose a disproportionate loss of access to the striped bass
resource on some states, particularly those which have little to fish for other
than striped bass. Another New Hampshire
representative, Dennis Abbott, the Legislative Proxy, noted that if his state’s
striped bass fishery is closed for a significant time, it could dissuade people
from fishing at all, and so from buying boats and fishing gear, because of the
lack of alternative species.
Because the striped bass fishery occurs at different times in different states, there was general agreement that seasons should be imposed on a regional basis, and that no single state should comprise its own region. Because coastwide regulatory consistency is important, Ms. Meserve argued that regions should be as large as possible, although she acknowledged that with seasons, a single coastwide measure wasn’t realistic.
Different Board members made different suggestions as to what the regions might be. Mr. Cimino said that New Jersey could live with being part of a Connecticut to North Carolina region, but regardless of the regional split, had to be in the same region as New York. Martin Gary, New York’s chief marine fisheries manager, agreed, while adding that New York also had to be in the same region as Connecticut.
As the
discussion ended, the Board seemed to agree that the Plan Development Team
should consider at least three regions:
Maine through Massachusetts, Rhode Island through New Jersey, and
Delaware through North Carolina. However,
it’s possible that other regions will also be considered as the process evolves.
Commercial measures
While most of the discussions addressed recreational
management measures, John Clark, a Delaware fisheries manager, proposed two
additions to the draft addendum that impacted the commercial fishery.
One would require that commercial fishermen tag all striped
bass caught either immediately upon landing or immediately upon returning to the
dock or the shore, with the latter considered a safer option for a fisherman
operating in rough seas. Currently, some
states don’t require tagging until the fish are sold, which Mr. Clark suggested
makes it more likely that bass will be illegally disposed of. No one contested adding such issue to the
draft addendum.
Mr. Clark also suggested that the draft addendum include a
reallocation of the commercial quota.
Although all of the coastal states have a commercial quota, only six—Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York,
Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia—have viable commercial fisheries. Four other states—Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut,
and New Jersey—have outlawed commercial striped bass fishing altogether. North Carolina permits
commercial fishing and has a reasonably large commercial quota, but lacks
striped bass; while it once had a substantial commercial striped bass fishery,
in recent years some combination of a depleted stock and warming waters led to the
species all but abandoning the state’s coastal waters.
So Mr. Clark proposed a reallocation that would provide more
fish to the states that are actively utilizing their commercial quotas. But, once again, that would lead to removing
more fish from the same population that the Board is trying to rebuild. When it came to a vote, Mr. Clark’s proposal
was decisively voted down, with only Delaware and Rhode Island voting in favor.
Maryland makes things a little strange
The purpose of Amendment III is to increase the likelihood
that the striped bass stock will rebuild by 2029. But some Board members seemed more interested
in using it to promote their own agendas.
At
the December 16 meeting, Mr. Luisi signaled that he was among the latter group,
saying,
“As we have managed the fishery to reduce fishing mortality,
we have continually added to the complexity of the regulations, that the states
or the regions are having to deal with their recreational anglers and their
public…
“I don’t support a continued effort to just add on to that
complexity. What I would like to do, or
what I think the Addendum does, is it provides us an opportunity to implement
the things that we have learned over time…
“Let’s learn from what we’ve experienced in the past, and let’s
try to use some creative outlook into the future to establishing [sic]
meaningful rules that apply during the times of the year.”
If that all sounds just a little cryptic, he made his
intentions a little clearer at Tuesday’s meeting, when he noted that Maryland
made eight different changes to its recreational regulations over the past ten
years, and said that Addendum III provided an opportunity “to develop a new
baseline.” When he said that, he didn’t
just mean any changes ushered in by the final version of Addendum III; instead,
he was talking about making wholesale changes to Maryland’s recreational
striped bass management program in addition to whatever changes Addendum III
might introduce, and using Addendum III as a vehicle to get around Amendment 7’s
prohibition on the use of conservation equivalency when the stock is overfished.
For the fact is that “complexity” isn’t a problem for most
states. From Maine through North
Carolina, the rules governing the recreational fishery are pretty simple: From January 1 through December 31 of each
year, anglers may retain one striped bass per day, provided that such bass
measures between 28 and 31 inches in length.
If an angler chooses to fish with bait, that angler must use a circle
hook, unless the bait is being fished on an artificial lure, in which case using
a traditional J-hook is OK. Gaffs may
not be used when landing a fish.
That’s it. On the
coast, from Maine to North Carolina, those are the only things that an angler usually
needs to know, although some states do have closed seasons on all or some of
their waters. The basic rules that the
ASMFC settled on for recreational fishing on the Chesapeake Bay are similar, except that the slot size limit is smaller, 19 to 24 inches.
The problem is that, over the years, Maryland decided that
it needed to dig a big hole for itself.
Most of that digging took place in 2019 and 2020, after the adoption of Addendum
VI to Amendment 6 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic
Striped Bass in 2019. Addendum VI, among other things, set a
recreational bag limit of one striped bass per day, with a 28- to 35-inch slot
limit on the coast and an 18-inch minimum size in the Chesapeake Bay, and
reduced commercial quotas by 18 percent.
Maryland
could have kept things simple, adopting the 1-fish bag and 18-inch minimum size
for its recreational fishery in the Chesapeake Bay. But Maryland didn’t want to do that. It only wanted to reduce its commercial quota
by 1.8 percent, and shift the rest of the conservation burden onto the
shoulders of its recreational fishery.
To accomplish that, Maryland invoked the
ASMFC’s doctrine of conservation equivalency, which allowed it to adopt different
management measures than those in Addendum VI, provided that such measures had
the same conservation effect.
“There are four options here, all of them include a spring
trophy season, 35 inch minimum from May 1 to May 15, and then the summer/fall
fishery is a 2-fish and 19-inch minimum, essentially status quo is my understanding,
where only 1 fish can be greater than 28 inches. Then in order to achieve the required
reductions, the options provide season closures from January to April, also
reducing the bag limit to 1-fish and 19 inches during August. That applies to Options A through C, also, no
harvest for charter captains and crew.
“There is an additional no-targeting provision to meet those
required reductions during parts of the winter and summer closures, depending
on which option you’re looking at. The
fourth option in this table is a little different, it’s a mode-specific option,
whether it be 1-fish, 19 inches for the private and shore modes, and a 2-fish
and 19-inches minimum with that 1-fish over 28 inches for the for-hire sector.”
“States are required to maintain the same seasons that were
in place in 2022.”
So Maryland is sitting at the bottom of a deep hole of its
own making, with a tapestry of closed seasons. At one time, it might have
used conservation equivalency to help it get out, but Amendment 7 doesn’t allow
CE to be used when the stock is overfished, so Mr. Luisi is trying to use
Addendum III to escape the pit that he, himself, has created.
Mr. Grout asked the obvious question,
“Doesn’t that sound like conservation equivalency under a new
name?”
but Ms. Franke opined that despite the language of Amendment
7, the Board could put such a provision into the draft addendum.
Quite a few Board members understood Maryland’s plight and
expressed some sympathy, but all were aware of the need to complete the final version
of Addendum III by October, and felt that the issue should be dealt with in a
separate management action.
Mr. Luisi kept trying to include the issue in the first
draft of the Addendum III. He told the
Board that they shouldn’t be worried about the matter slowing down the
addendum. He promised to remove the item
from the draft if it threatened to delay approval. And he argued that what he proposed wasn’t
really conservation equivalency, claiming that conservation equivalency only
applied to a state trying to meet a newly-imposed management measure, and not
to a state trying to create a new management structure “equivalent to what we
have.”
In order to move the meeting forward, Ms. Franke suggested
that Maryland develop the proposal outside of the Addendum III process so that,
at the May meeting, the Board could reconsider the issue and perhaps include it
in the draft addendum at that time. But
she also warned that if the Board took that route, the draft addendum couldn’t be
released for public comment until August, which would provide only another two
months for final approval.
That is more-or-less the direction the Board chose to take,
with a motion to postpone consideration of the issue passing on an 11-3 vote, with
the federal agencies abstaining.
What does it all mean?
By the time Tuesday’s meeting was over, the Board had effectively
provided the Plan Development Team with instructions to prepare a draft
addendum that would do what the Board could have done on its own last December—develop
measures to make it more likely that the stock would rebuild by 2029—but to do
it one year too late to protect the 2018 year class from substantial levels of
removals in 2025.
As a practical matter, fishing mortality through the first
ten months of 2024 was low enough that, barring a very steep increase November
and December, if the Technical Committee uses 2024 data as a proxy for what
will happen between now and 2029, there is probably a 50 percent probability
that the stock will rebuild without the need for any reductions at all.
If that is the case, there is no need for Addendum III, and the Board may decide to terminate the development process, perhaps
as early as May.
On the other hand, if the 60 percent probability calculations
show that a reduction is needed, and if the Board breaks from their traditional
habits and chooses to shoot for that higher chance of success, some modest
reductions may be called for, and the addendum might stay alive.
But even then, the Board could have a change of heart if the
Maryland and Virginia juvenile abundance surveys show that a strong year class
of young bass was produced in 2025, something that, given the colder winter we’re
experiencing this year, may very well happen.
So, the debate over Addendum III may prove to be, as William Shakespeare wrote in Macbeth, “much sound and fury signifying nothing.”
Or, even if the Technical Committee determines that no
reductions are needed, Addendum III might be used as a vehicle to promote
special interests, mode splits probably first among them.
Either way, unless new data alters the management landscape,
it seems highly unlikely that Addendum III will make a significant difference
in the long-term fortunes of the striped bass stock.
Once, the Management Board might have made such a
difference, but it chose not to do so about eight weeks ago.
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