THE ASMFC PUNTS ON TAUTOG MANAGEMENT--AGAIN

 

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has never been known for its fast responses to fisheries issues.

We saw that in 2014, when the Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board ignored its own management plan, and failed to initiate a ten-year rebuilding plan even after a so-called “management trigger” requiring them to do just that was tripped in the 2013 benchmark stock assessment.\

We saw it again in 2019, after a new benchmark assessment also tripped a trigger requiring a striped bass rebuilding plan, and the Bass Board decided to initiate a full-blown Amendment 7—a process that took two full years—before addressing the rebuilding issue (although, to be fair, it did at least adopt the emergency regulations in 2023, after high recreational landings in 2022 rendered timely rebuilding, without additional management action, unlikely).

And we saw it last October, when the Bass Board took a wait-and-see approach to rebuilding the stock by the 2029 deadline, rather than impose the 12% reduction in fishing mortality that would have made rebuilding more likely.

I mention striped bass because they’ve been called the ASMFC’s “flagship species,” but the history of ASMFC delays extends well into the past, and touches on multiple species.

I was down in Alexandria, Virginia for the January 1999 meeting of the Winter Flounder Management Board, and so was a witness when that Board approved a motion to

“suspend consideration of any state’s compliance with the F40 contained in Addendum I, as amended by Addendum 2 [sic], pending development of a new amendment to the [fishery management plan], as long as a state maintains and continues to implement and enforce its current regulations,”

and in doing so perhaps dashed the last hope of preventing the collapse of the Southern New England/Mid-Atlantic winter flounder stock.

And a lot of us were listening to the Atlantic Menhaden Management Board meeting last October when, despite knowing that the fishing mortality rate was far above the fishing mortality target (although not above threshold), and that fecundity (total egg production, used in lieu of a spawning stock biomass reference point) was well below target and only 5% above the threshold that defines an overfished stock, the Board took no meaningful action to reduce menhaden landings, merely reducing the annual catch limit by 20%--when the fishery was already falling 20% short of catching its quota—setting it at 186,840 metric tons, rather than beginning the process of reducing the total allowable catch to the 108,000 metric tons needed to achieve a 50% probability of constraining the fishing mortality rate to or below its target.

So no, the ASMFC isn’t particularly quick to take action to rebuild stocks or reduce fishing mortality to levels that are sustainable in the long term.  But even within the ASMFC universe, some species seem to be singled out for greater delays and less management action. 

Of those, American lobster have probably suffered the most malign neglect, with the American Lobster Management Board presiding over the collapse of the Southern New England stock, pointedly ignoring repeated scientific advice to shut down the fishery for at least five years, and expressing far more concern for the short-term interests of lobster fishermen than the lobster resource itself.  Recently, as recruitment in the Gulf of Maine/Georges Bank stock declined, we see history repeating itself there, although in that case, the ASMFC was also plagued with a political climate that might well have frustrated the an efforts that it might have decided to make.

But right behind American lobster, we find the tautog, a fish that the ASMFC has managed since 1996 and, after 30 years, still can’t seem to get right.

The original fishery management plan, adopted in 1996, begins with the statement,

“The Plan defines overfishing as a rate of fishing mortality exceeding the natural mortality rate (M=0.15).  This overfishing definition is consistent with the slow growth and long lifespan of this species.  In addition, this conservative reference point is warranted given the uncertainty in stock structure and in the spawning biomass required to maintain at least average recruitment.”

That seemed like a pretty good start, because managers didn’t know very much about the tautog resource.

“The primary reason for the development of a tautog [fishery management plan] is the vulnerability of tautog to overfishing…Fisheries managers lack most of the biological and fisheries data necessary for effective management of the tautog resource.  Estimates of recreational and commercial catches are poor.  Information on migration and critical habitat utilization are lacking in most of the species range.  Inadequate data are available on size and age distribution, natural and fishing mortality rates, and recruitment.  Little information is available on critical habitat availability, current habitat status, or the capability of artificial habitats to expand species abundance…Because of the uncertainties associated with all aspects of the tautog resource, an interstate cooperative effort is needed to effectively manage this species.  [emphasis added]”      

Managers were effectively caught up in a fog of uncertainty, and as anyone who has ever run a boat in the fog knows all too well, when you can’t see where you’re going, you need to exercise extreme caution at all times to avoid running aground.

While biologists know more about the tautog’s life history today than they did 30 years ago, even in 1996, the ASMFC was already aware of the basic principles—conservative management based on the life history of the species, as well as the scientific (and later management) uncertainty surrounding the tautog and the tautog fishery—that should guide tautog management.

But as we soon learned, there was a big difference between the ASMFC knowing how to properly approach tautog management, and actually putting that knowledge into practice.

Management stumbled right from the start.  While the management plan defined overfishing as a fishing mortality rate that exceeded F=0.15, it also explicitly allowed overfishing to occur in 1997 and 1998, setting the target fishing mortality rate for those years at F=0.24, after which it was supposed to be lowered to the fishing mortality threshold of F=0.15.

And yes, the target fishing mortality was set to equal the overfishing threshold; the Tautog Management Board decided to skate along the razor’s edge, setting management measures that resided right at the threshold level.  It left no margin for error at all.

Thus, it set a commercial and recreational size limit of 13 inches in 1997 and 14 inches in 1998 and beyond, and left it up to the states to adopt whatever additional measures were needed to achieve the required reduction in fishing mortality.  It wasn’t quite clear what those additional management measures needed to be, but with the fishing mortality rate estimated at somewhere between F=0.58 and F=0.77, it was clear that very substantial restrictions were needed.

Facing the uncertainties inherent in the fisheries data, and the difficulties states would have in crafting management measures, it didn’t take long before the ASMFC decided to punt.

Stating that

“The implementation schedule approved in the original Tautog [Fishery Management Plan] may be problematic because (1) data are not available to evaluate scheduled regulatory obligations, and (2) the implementation schedule is not consistent for all states.  The FMP required all states to submit a commercial fishery management proposal in October 1996 for review by the Technical Committee and approval by the Board.  During this review it became apparent that the data are insufficient to satisfactorily evaluate the current fishing mortality in a number of states and to properly evaluate state fishing mortality reduction proposals.  Fortunately, many states began increased data collection efforts in 1996 that will lead to more accurate estimation of fishing mortality on both a coastwide and regional basis.  It will take time for this data to be analyzed and incorporated into the management program.  Also, some states have indicated that the differential compliance schedule is inequitable,”

the Tautog Management Board adopted Amendment 1 to the management plan in 1997.

Amendment 1 stood for the proposition that, instead of imposing some almost certainly imperfect management measures, that could later be amended, to reduce fishing mortality right away, the Board would allow overfishing to continue at a rate three, or four, or maybe even five times the overfishing threshold, allowing the stock to decline further until, in 1998, overfishing would continue at only a rate of F=0.24.  Finally, in 2000, states would have to reduce the fishing mortality rate to F=0.15, where the slightest miscalculation would subject the stock to overfishing once again.

It wasn’t a strategy designed for success, and it probably wouldn’t have worked, but we’ll never know, because in 1999, the ASMFC punted again, adopting Addendum II to the management plan, which stated that

“The implementation schedule in Addendum I has been a problem given the life history of tautog and the relatively short duration that the current regulations have been implemented.  According to Addendum I the states were required to implement management measures to meet the F=0.24 requirement by April 1, 1998.  Therefore, as of September 1999, these regulations have only been implemented for about 17 months.

“Addendum I also requires that the states submit proposals to meet the F=0.15 target by October 1, 1999.  The Technical Committee is developing a stock assessment to evaluate the effects of the current regulations and determine the extent of reductions that will need to be made by the states to meet the F=0.15 target.  During the development of the assessment the Technical Committee has often noted that the effects of the current regulations may not be reflected in the assessment.

“The assessment will use the data that has been collected through 1998.  Therefore, only nine months (April-December 1998) of data reflecting the new management regime will be included in the assessment.  Given the fact that the assessment will supply limited advice on the effects of the current regulations, the Management Board approved delaying the implementation of the F=0.15 target for two years, until April 1, 2022.  [emphasis added]”

So, once again, the Management Board was willing to let overfishing continue, rather than impose some sort of precautionary management that might get it under control.

By this time, we’re starting to see a pattern emerge where, when faced with uncertainty, the Tautog Management Board is far more willing to let overfishing continue, and risk further harm to the stock, than it is to impose more restrictive management measures that might end up reducing the fishing mortality rate more than is absolutely necessary.

That bias toward risking overharvest, rather than reducing landings more than might be required, has often haunted ASMFC deliberations, but has been a particular trait of the Tautog Management Board for the past three full decades.

By 2002, when fishing mortality was supposed to have been reduced to F=0.15, biologists had finally amassed some meaningful information on the tautog’s life history, which suggested that the stock could sustain a fishing mortality rate of F=0.29.  A recent stock assessment indicated that fishing mortality had been reduced from F=0.71 to F=0.41, so additional management measures were still needed, but it appeared that abundance had increased modestly, although spawning stock biomass had declined.

In response, the Tautog Management Board adopted Addendum III to the management plan, which placed all of the conservation burden on the shoulders of the recreational fishery, requiring states to adopt regulations that would reduce the overall fishing mortality rate to F=0.29.  The commercial fishery would not be affected at all.

It turned out that Addendum III was a little too optimistic, although it didn’t appear to do any harm.  So, in 2007, the Management Board adopted Addendum IV to the management plan, which backtracked on the fishing mortality target, reducing it to F=0.20.  But Addendum III had successfully reduced the fishing mortality rate to F=0.28, just below Addendum III’s fishing mortality target, and biomass and recruitment showed what Addendum IV called a “slight increase.”

Things seemed to still be headed in the right direction, albeit very slowly.  But later in the same year, the Management Board decided to rethink its decision to make the recreational sector pay the full price of rebuilding the tautog stock, while commercial fishermen got a pass.  It adopted Addendum V to the management plan, which allowed states to achieve the required 25.6% reduction in fishing mortality by imposing new measures on both recreational and commercial fishermen.

But by 2011, all of those good feelings came crashing down, and fisheries managers realized that they had been overly optimistic all along.  Another management action, Addendum VI to the management plan, was needed.  That addendum began by admitting the failure of previous efforts:

“The 2011 tautog stock assessment update estimated that the tautog stock is overfished with overfishing occurring.  Spawning stock biomass (SSB) has remained at low levels for the last decade.  A reduction in the target F is necessary to rebuild the stock.  [emphasis added]”

It turned out that the original tautog management plan, adopted in 1996, had gotten things right all along, despite the lack of needed biological information.  To rebuild the stock, the fishing mortality rate needed to be reduced to the same F=0.15 proposed in that original plan.  Raising the target fishing mortality rate in the interim, although done in good faith, ultimately resulted in nothing more than a stalled rebuilding timeline.

Finally, in 2017, fisheries managers finally had enough information to make a comprehensive, and somewhat successful, change to the tautog management program, which came in the form of Amendment 1 to the management plan.  Amendment 1 admitted that

“Based on the 2015 Benchmark Stock Assessment and Peer Review Report, tautog is overfished and overfishing is occurring on a coastwide scale,”

so it became clear that Addendum VI, despite its reduced fishing mortality target, was nowhere near restrictive enough to turn things around. 

Up in New England, Massachusetts and Rhode Island were acting on their own, putting more restrictive regulations in place in an effort to recover their local tautog population.  Their efforts seemed to be working, with spawning stock biomass increasing and the fishing mortality rate trending down.

Amendment 1 made that sort of thing easier to do, as it recognized that the coastwide tautog stock is made up of local populations that don’t engage in extensive migrations.  The Amendment broke the stock up into four regional populations, Massachusetts/Rhode Island, Long Island Sound, New Jersey/New York Bight, and Delaware/Maryland/Virginia, each of which would have different, regionally-appropriate biological reference points for spawning stock biomass and fishing mortality rate, and be governed by different regulations.

Amendment 1’s new approach held a lot of promise, and was arguably the first truly meaningful effort to manage tautog in over 20 years.  Before Amendment 1, tautog management could be characterized as a light-handed approach, where half-measures were imposed in an effort to minimize disruptions to the fishery.  Amendment 1, on the other hand, seemed an earnest effort to overhaul tautog management and fully rebuild all four local populations.

At the same time, Amendment 1 didn’t go as far as it should have to reduce fishing mortality and rebuild the stock, due to substantial opposition from the for-hire fishing industry, which took an aggressive stand against any landings reductions. 

I attended the hearing on Amendment 1 that was held at the offices of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation’s Marine Division in June17, where the room was packed—standing room only—with party and charter boat operators who showed no respect for the forum or for the process as they loudly opposed any additional restrictions, hooted and cheered when one party boat captain told the ASMFC representative that “We don’t care about your science.  Your science is bullcrap,” regularly interrupted the proceedings with various hostile comments, threatened to sue somebody—it wasn’t completely clear who—for lost profits resulting from any new restrictions, claimed that “fraud was committed” and, in one case, yelled and screamed and cursed at the hearing officer, and somehow got away with it all.

More than got away with it, as things turned out, because they convinced New York’s ASMFC delegation to oppose any management measures with a measurable probability of success.

And New York wasn’t alone, as at the October 2017 Tautog Management Board meeting, where Amendment 1 was approved, Toni Kearns, the ASMFC’s Fisheries Policy Director, noted that

“As a reminder of the option in the document itself, for the probability of achieving the F target.  The addendum [sic] had two options; either status quo, which was no probability or Option B, which was a 50 percent probability of achieving the F target.

“There was a range of support for status quo throughout the different hearings, as well as some support for the 50 percent probability.”

What that basically meant is that most of the stakeholders who commented wanted an amendment more likely to fail than succeed, just so long as they could keep killing tautog.  And in some places, such as Long Island Sound and New Jersey/New York Bight, they got exactly what they asked for.

That sort-of worked out for Long Island Sound, where the stock is no longer overfished nor subject to overfishing, but it didn’t do so well for the New Jersey/New York Bight population, which still experiences overfishing (as did the Delaware/Maryland/Virginia population, although there, the best estimates are that overfishing no longer occurs).

So, the Management Board set about drafting a new Addendum I that would impose a 40% reduction in fishing mortality, and have a 50% probability of getting the fishing mortality rate down to or below target by the year 2030.

I have to admit that I was happy about that, as the New Jersey/New York Bight population is the one that we catch here on the South Shore of Long Island.  I have fond memories of hooking up to one of the pilings of the Robert Moses Bridge back in the mid-1980s, and going through four dozen—sometimes six dozen—green crabs on a single tide while fishing alone, hooking up tautog almost as soon as my bait hit the bottom.  Yes, many were throwbacks, but there were enough 2- to 5-pounders in those old, no-bag limit days to put enough fish in the freezer to last well into the winter.  While I never expect to see that kind of fishing again, the ability to get out and reliably put even a couple of blackfish on ice would certainly be a good thing,.

But at the same time, given the history of tautog management, and the ASMFC’s tendency to delay action on all things tautog, I have to admit that, deep in my gut, I had doubts that Addendum I would move go anywhere.

And, unfortunately, my gut turned out to be right.

Once again, uncertainty in the data gave members of the Management Board pause.

And, once again, given the choice between doing nothing, and perhaps allowing overfishing to continue, or taking action, and perhaps adopting regulations that were overly restrictive, and might allow a few more tautog than needed to remain alive, the Management Board opted for overfishing, apparently considering it the lesser evil of the two.

The problem was that the proposed 40% reduction was based on the average landings in the years 2022 through 2024.  While 2022 and 2023 landings were fairly high, 2024 landings were lower and 2025 landings a little lower yet.  So folks began to worry that the 40% reduction might have a greater than 50% probability of reducing fishing mortality to target, and create more than the minimum acceptable probability of success, and might even achieve the target fishing mortality level ahead of the 2023 deadline.  To avoid those possible outcomes, New York’s administrative representative on the Board, Jesse Hornstein, moved

“that further action on Tautog Addendum I is postponed until projections to determine the reduction required to meet a 50% probability of achieving the F target in 2030 are updated using the most recent three-year average removals from 2024-2026 (in the current MRIP currency) after final 2026 MRIP estimates are released.  An option to allow the Board to take management action via Board action following the results of the Benchmark Assessment should be developed by the [Plan Development Team].  Board action can only be used if the upcoming Benchmark Assessment shows that Fishing Mortality needs to be reduced or that it can be liberalized by 10% or greater to have a 50% probability of achieving the F-target by 2030.  [emphasis added]”

The motion was seconded by New Jersey fisheries manager Joseph Cimino.

And so, a full 30 years after the ASMFC decided to involve itself with tautog management, much remains unchanged.  Uncertainly still plagues the management process, particularly with regard to current landings, and the Tautog Management Board is still biased against taking action to protect the stock, if there is a risk that, by doing so, they might unnecessarily limit landings.

Mr. Hornstein’s rationale for making the motion was straightforward.

“…in 2024, removals in the Bight and in the DelMarVa region as well declined and they were even lower in 2025 in the Bight.  The projection that we used to calculate the required reduction in fishing mortality use the 2022 to 2024 average to estimate removals in 2025 and 2026.  And now that we have the final 2025 removals, we know that the estimate used in the projections was an overestimate.  And given the decline in removals over the last two years, we’re potentially responding to a level of fishing mortality that may no longer be occurring to the same magnitude that it once did.  Generally speaking, there is a lot of uncertainty around tautog.  MRIP plays a big role in our assessments.  Tautog has higher [percent standard error] compared to other popular fisheries, and removals are highly variable from year to year.  In addition, New York data is split between—our MRIP data is split in a way that was never intended to be for MRIP data to be used between the Sound and the Bight, so we can manage those two stocks separately.  We’re going to be receiving calibrated MRIP data and get a new assessment in the next couple of years which will include new regional surveys and further evaluation of the large retrospective pattern that we see in the assessments. So there’s a lot changing that should improve our confidence and our understanding of the tautog population.”

And everything that he said was completely true.  But that still begs the critical question.

Uncertainty cuts both ways.  If there is a lot of room for error in the recreational landings estimates, we can’t assume that landings are, and will always be, lower than previously predicted.  It is very possible, given the higher percent standard error in the MRIP estimates, that recreational landings in 2024 and 2025 were actually higher than the point estimates, and that the uncertainty that managers are facing could be masking a greater level or removals than previously believed.

In such a highly uncertain environment, doesn’t it make sense to adopt more precautionary regulations, that hedge against unexpectedly high landings, rather than to potentially allow overfishing to continue, and erode the tautog stock, perhaps at a faster than expected rate?

Maybe so, but the Tautog Management Board, over the last three decades, has never thought that way, and has consistently avoided the more risk-averse outcomes.

Mr. Hornstein at least acknowledged the risk, although he immediately dismissed it, saying,

“While there’s risk involved in waiting another year to take action, there’s a high probability that [spawning stock biomass] is not in danger of becoming overfished during this time.  And although this will delay action likely until the annual meeting in 2027, it will still allow for the implementation of new measures by 2028 as required by the [fishery management plan].”

But one part of Mr. Hornstein’s motion did seem a little odd, and that was allowing the Management Board to liberalize tautog regulations without going through the addendum and public hearing process.  Such unilateral Board action is unusual, and generally disfavored by members of ASMFC management boards; we saw that in December 2024, when the Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board decided not to take unilateral action to protect the large 2018 year class from recreational harvest in 2025, when it would be entering the slot size limit, even though the survival of the 2018s is needed if the currently overfished striped bass stock is to be rebuilt. 

Usually, such unilateral Board action is reserved for those rare times when it is needed to stem a stock decline; using Board action, rather than the addendum process, to allow fishermen to increase their landings might well be unprecedented in the history of the ASMFC.

Yet, if such a precedent is being broken, it doesn’t surprise me that it is the Tautog Management Board who is doing so.  It just fits in with how they’ve managed the stock from the very start.  Mr. Hornstein ultimately laid out what seems to be the Tautog Management Board’s guiding philosophy for the last 30 years:

“Cuts to any fishery always inflict some economic pain and we owe it to the public not to cause more pain than is necessary…This is still a cautious approach as SSB is not at risk of changing status, and we’re taking a justifiable path to make sure that we’re getting it as right as we can.  And I think this is, you know, help build trust between the public and management.  And I’m concerned that if we continue to move forward without pausing to rerun these numbers, we’re in a less defensible position, especially if the next assessment completely changes our understanding of the population.”

Fair enough.

But once again, the traditional Tautog Management Board bias is all too apparent.

Yes, unnecessary harvest reductions do inflict unnecessary economic pain.  But so does the failure to impose necessary harvest reductions.  Just consider the economic losses attributable to fishery managers’ failure to avoid the collapse of the Southern New England/Mid-Atlantic winter flounder stock.  The failure to initiate a striped bass rebuilding plan in 2014, which could well have positioned the stock to better endure the its current recruitment problems.  And yes, the Tautog Management Board’s failure to buckle down and adopt precautionary measures back in 1996, which could have rendered Amendment I completely unnecessary.

A lot of potential economic benefits were lost when those three fisheries went into decline.

But the Tautog Board always worries about the economic consequences of reducing landings, and ignores the economic consequences of declining fish stocks, even though the latter consequences are just as real and can endure for a far longer time.

The same sort of bias attends the notion of “building trust,” because at this point, the only thing that I, and other folks whom I know, trust the Tautog Management Board to do is delay, and fail, and then delay again, because that’s just what it’s done for the past 30 years, demonstrating that they are more afraid of being blamed for declining landings than they are of being blamed for declining tautog abundance.  The Board might want people to trust that it won’t require unneeded landings reductions, but doesn’t seem to care if no one trusts them to return the stock to full and sustainable health.

Even with respect to the stock assessment, we see the same sort of thing; a Management Board worried that the next stock assessment will reveal that the stock is healthier than they believed.  But there seems to be no worry that the next assessment will show a stock in worse shape than managers thought, even though, if that occurred, it would seem to cast even more doubt on their credibility as competent fisheries managers.

At least a few of the Board members disagreed with that risk-prone approach.  Dr. Jason McNamee, the Rhode Island fishery manager, acknowledged that the motion didn’t affect his state’s fishery, but asked that, since none of the data appeared problematic, why would the Board want to delay the management process until new data might be obtained. 

He went on to say that

“This just feels like a really bad idea.  This is not a species that you can knock down.  It does not come back quickly.  So, I am nervous for us and the folks that may be having issues with their fishery.”

Unfortunately, Dr. McNamee held the minority view. 

Adam Nowalsky, New Jersey’s Legislative Proxy, argued that

“to go ahead and essentially penalize the fishing community in the New Jersey/New York Bight region, which does not have an overfished status, with 40% reductions that were based on at least one year of projections that we know now are not correct, I think that’s a very valid data issue.”

Nowalsky’s comments were interesting, given that he seemed willing to give full credence to the 2025 MRIP tautog data, saying that, based on that data, we have “one year of projections that we know now are not correct.”  But at the Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board meeting last October, he struck a very different pose, making it a point to oppose a projection using just one year of MRIP data to support a 12% landings reduction.

It seems that he’s only willing to rely on one year of data when it can be used to justify killing more fish.

But the discussion went on from there, and in the end, a thin sort of compromise was reached. 

Mr. Hornstein’s motion was divided, and then the first half was amended by Dr. McNamee, so that instead of waiting for final 2026 data, Addendum I’s reductions would be based upon projections derived from landings in 2023, 2024, and 2025.  That motion passed on a vote of 8 in favor and 1 opposed.

So Addendum I isn’t dead, and there is a very real hope that we might see a new draft of that addendum approved for public comment in the not-too-distant future, maybe this fall, or maybe in the first half of 2027.

But given the history and the biases of the Tautog Management Board, and its 30-year trend of subordinating the long-term health of the tautog stock to the short-term interests of fishermen, you still might not want to hope too hard.

Things can always be delayed again.