SHOULD YOU BE ABLE TO OPEN AN OCTOPUS FARM?

 

I have represented recreational fishermen on New York’s Marine Resources Advisory Council for just over 20 years, and throughout that time, the Council’s April meeting was reserved for reviewing and commenting on pending bills in the New York State Legislature.  This year, the April meeting will be held on April 14, so yesterday morning found me perusing the bills that were likely to be on the meeting agenda.

Typically, the list of pending bills includes some that would create new duties for the Department of Environmental Conservation (without also creating the new funding and new positions needed to get those jobs done), some that would create tax breaks or other privileges for one special interest group or another, some that extend the DEC’s authority to regulate various species, some that impact licenses and permits of various kinds, and some that would supposedly provide—or sometimes remove—protections for particular species.  But this time I came across one bill that stopped me cold. 

It was A 08043,

“AN ACT to amend the environmental conservation law, in relation to octopus farming.”

That was unexpected.

According to the bill memo, the legislation

“Provides that no person shall sell any octopus that was bred, raised, or harvested under controlled conditions for the purpose of human consumption.”

My immediate question was why?

As far as I knew, no one was farming octopus here in New York, and I wasn’t aware of anyone planning to start an octopus farm.  In truth, I didn’t know that octopus could be farmed.  After looking into the matter, I learned that there isn’t a single octopus farm anywhere in the world, although a company in Spain is trying to start one; the United States once had a single such farm, located in Hawaii, but it ran into problems and eventually shut down.

The sponsors of the Assembly bill—and to my surprise, there are 23 of them; A 08043 seems to have substantial support—claim that

“The farming of octopus is a highly concerning practice quickly gaining global momentum.  Numerous environmental organizations, scientists, and policymakers have expressed grave concern over the practice, as it poses severe animal welfare, environmental, public health, and economic risks.  Currently there are no businesses engaged in octopus farming in New York and this bill, modeled after the ones passed in Washington and California, aims to ban the practice to ensure no one can in the future.”

The bill would impose severe penalties, in the form of a fine

“not to exceed one thousand dollars for each octopus, or parts of such octopus, sold, offered for sale, or traded  [emphasis added]”

in violation of the proposed new law.

To put that in context, the fine for illegal sale of a single fish, mollusk (and an octopus is a mollusk, after all), or other wildlife, so long as its value is under $250, cannot exceed $500, and the fine for illegally selling any number of fish, regardless of value, can’t exceed $1,500, so A 08043 is effectively declaring octopus farming to be a greater offense than illegally commercializing any fish, shellfish, or other creature that naturally occurs in New York waters—presumably including the common octopus, Octopus vulgaris, which, although uncommon, does live off New York’s coast.

Apparently, the New York City Bar Association agrees with the bill’s sponsor, for its Animal Law Committee came out with a report endorsing the bill, saying that

“The Committee’s support is grounded in animal welfare, environmental, and public health concerns.  The report highlights scientific evidence of octopus sentience and the difficulty of providing humane captive care, pointing out that octopuses’ intelligence, solitary nature, high feed requirements, and susceptibility to stress and disease make farming ethically and practically problematic.  It also cites potential environmental risks such as pollution, wild fish depletion to produce feed, and escape of farmed animals and the lack of clear benefits for local fisheries or communities…”

That made me curious about why such considerations were so unique to octopus farming, and not to other forms of aquaculture—or land-based agriculture, for that matter—that they justified the current bill, so I turned to Google for answers.

When I did, I quickly found a plethora of articles opposing octopus farms, and the identities of the website owners said a lot about where the opposition to such farms was coming from.  In just the first two pages of my search, I found negative articles published by groups with names such as “Animal Survival International,” “Animal Welfare Institute,” “Compassion in World Farming,” “Eurogroup for Animals,” and “Viva!  The Vegan Charity,” which provided a pretty strong clue that much of the opposition to octopus farms arose from pure emotion, rather from the sort of facts and hard data that ought to be used to make decisions on fisheries policy.

An article appearing on the Vox news and opinion website cemented that impression when it noted that

“public interest in octopuses swelled 2021, when the hit Netflix documentary My Octopus Teacher—which captivated audiences with a story of a human relationship with a wild octopus in South Africa—won the Oscar for best documentary…A year later, the UK passed a law declaring that all vertebrate animals and some invertebrates—including cephalopods—are sentient, and that future laws need to consider their welfare.”

Once again, we seem to have emotion, rather than data, driving policy.  That even extends to legitimate and respected scientists who also oppose octopus farming.  For example, an article, “The Case Against Octopus Farming,” which was written by four bona fide academics engaged in cephalopod research and appeared in the journal Issues in Science and Technology, begins,

“Octopuses stand out among invertebrates for their complex behavior.  They are capable of problem solving, mimicking their surroundings using color changes that take place on a scale of seconds, outwitting predatory sharks, discriminating individual humans, engaging in playful behavior, and hunting in response to cooperative signals sent by fish.  As these patterns of behavior suggest, octopuses (as well as some other cephalopods) have sophisticated nervous systems and large brains.

“Given their exceptional abilities, one might ask whether humans should be eating octopuses at all, but here we want to raise a different ethical question.  As global demand for octopus grows, especially in affluent markets, so have efforts to farm them.  We believe that octopuses are particularly ill-suited to a life in captivity and mass production, for reasons both ethical and ecological.”

Reading that, one might ask why the same concerns shouldn’t stand in the way of farming animals such as chickens, cattle, sheep, and that intellectual giant of the barnyard, the pig, which has reportedly been observed

“using a joystick to move a pointer on a computer screen, understanding human instructions, and using primitive tools.”

Yet, despite the pig’s proven intelligence, A 08043 makes no effort to disrupt the supply chain of bacon, ham, and lard, but only to outlaw octopus farms, which merely demonstrates the sort of irrational inconsistency that results when emotion, rather than data-driven logic, inspires lawmakers’ actions.

The authors of the above-referenced article try to justify treating the octopus differently from other farmed animals by saying that issues related to land-based animal husbandry

“should lead us to ask whether we want to repeat mistakes already made with terrestrial animals with aquatic animals, especially octopus.”

Of course, that question assumes that creating a system that provides hundreds of millions of persons in the United States with readily available and largely affordable protein is really a “mistake,” an assumption that, once again, seems to be based, at least in part, on emotion although, to be fair, the authors note that, unlike chicken or other commonly farmed animals, octopus are a luxury food, and not something needed for day-to-day survival.

Still, emotions aside, the authors do point to some very problematic aspects of octopus farming that should be considered before any such farm is approved.

“The environmental impacts of aquaculture are well known.  They include pollution from nitrogen and phosphorus released from feces and food decomposition; contamination from fertilizers, algaecides, herbicides, and disinfectants; excessive use of antibiotics; interbreeding and disease transmission between escaped fish and wild varieties; and loss of natural habitat (such as mangrove swamps) needed for farms.  But the biggest ecological concern is less familiar.

“Unlike terrestrial farmed animals, the majority of which evolved as herbivores, most farmed aquatic animal species, including salmon, trout, and shrimp, are carnivorous, and depend on fish protein and oil during certain development stages.  Feeding most farmed aquatic animals puts additional pressure on wild fish and invertebrates for fishmeal.  Around one-third of the global fish catch is turned into feed for other animals, roughly half of which goes to aquaculture.  Many fishmeal fisheries are subject to overfishing and are declining.

“Reducing the ecological impact of catching fish to feed fish means reducing the reliance on wild fish and invertebrates for fishmeal.  One option is to focus aquatic farming on invertebrates and other species lower on the food web, yet the percentage of farmed aquatic species that need to be fed is increasing relative to species such as freshwater carps, bivalves, and aquatic plants that require little to no feed…

“…But octopuses are atypical invertebrates as well as atypical mollusks.  They are both carnivorous (none can survive on plants or algae alone) and behaviorally sophisticated.  Farming octopus in counterproductive from perspective of environmental sustainability…”

The New York City Bar Association’s Animal Law Committee made a similar argument, writing

“Octopuses are asocial, obligate carnivores and cannot survive on plants and algae.  Their carnivorous diet requires large quantities of animal protein and they are behaviorally sophisticated.  Octopuses are known as ‘picky eaters’ and will not thrive on discarded bycatch of fishermen.  Their solitary nature require multiple tanks or compartments, complicating the waste management system.  The plan to farm multiple octopuses in a sterile setting will allow feces and uneaten food to accumulate.  Decomposition of feces and uneaten food fuels bacterial activity that consumes oxygen and releases toxic nitrogenous compounds like ammonia and nitrite.  Wastewater from aquaculture is typically discharged into the ocean.  Even if the wastewater is filtered before release, residual chemicals and bacteria will be discharged and could linger and harm the local marine environment.  Pollution from octopus farming could alter coastal ecosystems, promote harmful algae blooms and harm biodiversity…

“A related concern is the sustainability of octopus farming due to the octopuses’ high ‘feed conversion ratio’…According to [the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations’] 2024 SOFIA report, roughly one-fifth of the global marine catch is reduced to fishmeal and fish oil, and recent FAO-summarized analyses indicates that 75 percent of these marine ingredients are used in aquaculture feed.  The industrial production of fishmeal and fish oil depletes marine resources in traditional fishing areas, reducing the availability of fish for human consumption and driving up the cost of fish…  [footnotes omitted]”

Those ecological concerns are valid, as are others regarding the escape of aquacultured animals, the possibility of aquaculture introducing diseases to wild populations, etc.  But they are not limited to octopus farms.  Any sort of open-water aquaculture operation, other than those limited to bivalves or algae, creates the same sort of issues.

We have already seen hundreds of thousands of potentially invasive Atlantic salmon escape from net pens in Washington state.  In Australia, wild fish in areas adjacent to salmon farms were found to be “not fit for human consumption” due to contamination with antibiotics that had rised to five times the maximum safe level.  Other consequences of open-water aquaculture, including pollution from feces and uneaten food, the introduction of pesticides into the marine environment, and the introduction of pathogens and parasites into wild fish populations, have been recognized by scientists for a long time.

And that’s where A 08043, and all of the critics of octopus farming, go wrong.

They succumb to the siren song of My Octopus Teacher, obsess over the emotionally captivating topic of supposed octopus sentience, and so focus on banning octopus farms, which exist nowhere in the United States and, unless things have recently changed, nowhere in the world.

They waste time and resources attacking a nonexistent industry that may never be biologically practical nor economically viable while, at the same time, a very large and very real open-water aquaculture industry, favored by the current presidential administration, creates the very problems of pollution, antibiotic contamination, parasitism, escape, and disease, on a far larger scale than octopus farming could ever do, in the waters of the United States, as well as in the waters of many nations throughout the world.

So, should you be able to open an octopus farm?

Probably not.

But then, you shouldn’t be able to open a farm for salmon, striped bass, rainbow trout, Almaco jacks, or any other species of free-swimming marine animal.  At least not in open water.  They all create the same real-world problems as octopus farms do, and on a far larger scale. 

Octopus farms, since they don’t yet exist, just make an easier target.

 

 

 

 

 

 

UNITED STATES ACTION THREATENS ATLANTIC BLUEFIN TUNA MANAGEMENT

The letter, addressed to the executive secretary of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), was short. Dated January 27, 2026, it read:

This letter is to acknowledge that the Western Bluefin Recommendation 22-10 does not require Western harvesters to count their recreational catch of Bluefin toward their quota. As such, beginning January 1, 2026 and henceforth, the United States will continue to report its recreational catch for management purposes but will not count its recreational catch toward its current quota of 1572 mt, which will be solely allocated to its commercial catch.

It was signed by Andrew “Drew” Lawler, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, NOAA International Fisheries.

In those few lines, the United States had effectively announced that it intended to exceed its 2026 Atlantic bluefin tuna quota, as established by ICCAT, by about 341 metric tons (751,776 pounds), 22.6% of its 2026 bluefin quota.

There seems to be no legal basis for the United States’ action.

ICCAT’s Recommendation 22-10 states that “an annual [total allowable catch], inclusive of dead discards, of 2,726 [metric tons] is established for 2023, 2024, and 2025…” Recommendation 25-05, adopted at ICCAT’s 2025 annual meeting (and probably the recommendation that Mr. Lawler should have referenced in his letter), employed similar language, but raised the total allowable catch for the years 2026-2029 to 3,081.6 metric tons, and increased the United States’ quota to 1,509.98 metric tons.

Nothing in either recommendation suggested that ICCAT intended to establish a total allowable catch for Western Atlantic bluefin tuna which included dead discards, but excluded all bluefin killed in the United States’ recreational fishery.

To the extent that the recommendations address the recreational fishery for bluefin tuna at all, it is only to require that “[Contracting Parties and Cooperating non-Contracting Parties, Entities, and Fishing Entities (CPCs)] shall prohibit fishermen from selling or offering for sale recreationally harvested fish of any size,” and “CPCs will encourage their commercial and recreational fishermen to tag and release all fish less than 30 kg or, in the alternative, having a fork length less than 115 cm and report on steps taken in this regard in their Annual Report.”

Recreationally-caught bluefin were thus clearly governed by the recommendations, and since the only mention of “commercial” fishermen in either recommendation was in the previously quoted sentence relating to tagging and releasing small fish, there seems to be no textual support for the United States’ argument that Recommendation 22-10 required it to count only commercial, and not recreational, landings against its quota. That matters, because in ICCAT’s parlance, a “recommendation” is not merely a suggestion that a Contracting Party take a particular action. It is a mandatory fishery management measure that all Contracting Parties must adopt.

Other ICCAT members have taken strong exception to the United States’ position.

In a letter to ICCAT’s executive secretary, dated February 11, 2026, Mark Waddell, Canada’s Head of Delegation to ICCAT, wrote,

Canada does not have the same interpretation as the United States of Recommendation 22-10, which is replaced by Recommendation 25-05. Canada’s interpretation is that catches from recreational fisheries shall count against a CPC’s annual allocation. When the western Bluefin measure grants differential treatment to recreational fisheries, it does so explicitly, as is the case in paragraph 11 of Recommendation 25-05 [which prohibits the sale of recreationally-caught fish]. Therefore, short of an explicit exemption for recreational fisheries in allocation-related provisions, the measure cannot be interpreted as excluding recreational catches from the annual [total allowable catch] set out in the measure…

There is nothing in the western BFT Recommendation (22-10 nor 25-05) that would allow some types of fishing mortality (commercial) to apply to a CPC’s allocations of the [total allowable catch] while allowing other types of fishing mortality (recreational) to be excluded from compliance totals…

In developing the management procedure, the [management strategy evaluation] assumed the total fishing mortality for Atlantic bluefin tuna would reflect all sources of mortality, whether commercial or recreational, landed or discarded. Not accounting for the significant mortality arising from recreational fisheries would be outside the framework of the management procedure and would invalidate all of the testing results provided during the [management strategy evaluation]…

The European Union took a similar position, in a February 23, 2026 letter which stated, in part,

The EU would like to recall that the annual Total Allowable Catch (TAC) was determined based on a Management Procedure that considers the total fishing mortality of Western Atlantic bluefin tuna, encompassing removals from recreational fisheries as well, and represents the maximum amount of fishing mortality that can be applied each year…

Should the US not account for recreational catches within the bluefin tuna quota it has been attributed, the EU is of the position that:

–Exceptional circumstances would occur for the Western stock and that would require the [Standing Committee on Research and Statistics] to evaluate whether a change in the advice is necessary and could lead to a situation where ICCAT would have an obligation to adjust the TAC for the Western stock.

–The US would be bound to pay back next year any bluefin tuna caught in excess of its quota this year…

Japan also submitted an objection on February 23, arguing that

the management procedure was developed based on the total fishing mortality for Atlantic bluefin tuna by taking into account all sources of removals, including both commercial and recreational fisheries. Counting no recreational catches against the national annual quota is therefore inconsistent with the scientific assumptions underpinning the stock assessment and the Management Procedure agreed to by the ICCAT. Also, there is no specific text in the Recommendation that excludes recreational catches from the national catch amount, which shall be within the quota.

In the past several years, United States’ recreational catches of Western Atlantic bluefin tuna reached over 200 metric tons, and was 451 metric tons in 2024. Exclusion of such amount of recreational catches from the catch amount against the quota may result in actual removals exceeding the level assumed under the management framework. Such a situation would trigger conditions comparable to those envisaged under the [exceptional circumstances] provisions of the Management Procedure. The fishing mortality would deviate substantially from the assumptions on which the Management Procedure is based and provide adverse impacts on the stock.

If the total catch of the United States including recreational catches exceeds its quota, the amount of overharvest shall be deducted from the next year’s quota in accordance with paragraph 8 b) of Recommendation 25-05…

The environmental community in the United States has also challenged the nation’s new position on recreational Atlantic bluefin landings, with three organizations — Earthjustice, Wild Oceans, and the Safina Center — sending a joint letter to Mr. Lawler outlining their objections. While much of that letter reiterates points already made in the documents quoted above, the environmental groups also question whether NOAA Fisheries could legally alter its past practice of counting recreational landings against the United States’ bluefin quota without first going through a formal rulemaking process as described in the federal Administrative Procedures Act, something that was not done prior to Mr. Lawler sending his letter to ICCAT, although it is likely that such a rulemaking process will be initiated in the near future.

The joint letter also noted that the failure to count recreational bluefin landings against the quota could have real, adverse impacts on the United States’ bluefin fisheries.

In addition to the significant conservation concerns associated with exceeding the ICCAT quota, this action could also have serious commercial ramifications. Exceeding the ICCAT quota triggers a payback requirement in subsequent years, as high as 125% if the quota is exceeded in two or more consecutive years. And by violating ICCAT terms and agreements regarding catch accounting, this action could subject U.S. commercial fishermen to trade penalties that would prevent them from exporting the bluefin they catch.

So far, neither objections from other fishing nations nor the threat of ICCAT sanctions have dissuaded NOAA Fisheries from leaving recreational bluefin landings out of its 2026 quota calculations. An ICCAT panel that met early in March 2026 had the issue on its agenda, but the report of that meeting has not yet been released.

Unless NOAA Fisheries has a belated change of heart and returns to counting recreational landings against the United States’ Atlantic bluefin quota, it is likely that such quota will be exceeded, probably by a substantial amount. The United States’ action could also threaten ICCAT’s ability to effectively manage highly migratory species, for if the United States can ignore an ICCAT recommendation with impunity, then other contracting parties may well become reluctant to comply with recommendations that negatively impact those parties’ fisheries.

An even greater threat could emerge should the United States, by omitting recreational landings from its bluefin quota, end up substantially exceeding that quota. In that situation, should ICCAT impose the appropriate sanctions, it is very possible that the current U.S. administration, in a fit of pique, would respond by pulling out of the underlying treaty. While such unilateral executive action would probably run afoul of the Atlantic Tunas Convention Act, which states that “The Secretary [of Commerce] as authorized and directed to administer and enforce all of the provisions of the [emphasis added]” treaty which created ICCAT and its management authority, the administration might not pay much regard to such legal niceties.

And should the United States, the predominant tuna fishing nation in the western Atlantic, withdraw from ICCAT, it would cripple the international management of highly migratory species like bluefin tuna and tempt other parties to fish outside of the ICCAT framework.

Hopefully, things won’t get to that point.

Hopefully, perhaps after encountering significant resistance during the rulemaking process, NOAA Fisheries will reverse course and continue to count recreational bluefin landings against the United States quota.

While the ICCAT process has sometimes been flawed, for the past 50 years the Commission has served to coordinate international management of not only Atlantic bluefin tuna, but also of other tunas, swordfish, marlin, and some sharks, including the depleted shortfin mako. It has had some notable successes in the recovery of bluefin tuna and swordfish populations, while still having much work to do to rebuild and effectively manage other species. But, even with that work yet undone, ICCAT has, on balance, had a very positive impact on highly migratory fisheries management in the Atlantic.

Both highly migratory species and the Atlantic fishing nations would suffer should ICCAT’s impact be lessened by the ill-considered actions of the United States or other contracting party.

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This essay first appeared in “From the Waterfront,” the blog of the Marine Fish Conservation Network, which can be found at http://conservefish.org/blog/

 

WHAT DO RECREATIONAL FISHERMEN REALLY WANT--AND HOW CAN MANAGERS KNOW?

 

Recreational fisheries management is a complicated mix of science, law, and politics—with some economics supposedly tossed in as well—that sees managers try to maintain healthy and sustainable fish stocks, while complying with all applicable laws, not putting anyone out of business, and keeping stakeholders happy.

That’s pretty much an impossible task, and everyone should be more-or-less content if the laws are observed, the fish stocks are healthy, and the adverse impacts on fishing-related businesses are less than they’d be if the fish stocks collapsed.

Generally, fishery managers try to give anglers what they want, within the confines imposed by science and law.  Yet what anglers want isn’t completely clear.  There are a lot of voices out there purporting to speak for recreational fishermen, although it’s not clear who appointed them on anglers’ behalf.  And individual anglers are, by and large, not particularly good at speaking for themselves.

We saw a good example of that last fall, when the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board was debating the Draft Addendum III to Amendment 7 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass.  The Management Board had solicited public comments on the various measures contained in the Draft Addendum, including a proposal to reduce commercial and recreational landings by 12% in order to make it more likely that the stock would rebuild by 2029, the deadline mandated by the fishery management plan.

One of the comment letters received by the Management Board was signed by six organizations closely affiliated with the recreational fishing and boating industries—the American Sportfishing Association, Boat Owners Association of the United States, Center for Sportfishing Policy, Coastal Conservation Association, Marine Retailers Association of the Americas, and National Marine Manufacturers Association—which claimed

“We represent the entire recreational fishing and boating community.”

That was a pretty bold, and clearly false, claim, as the only broad-based membership organization of the six was the Coastal Conservation Association (despite its name, the Boat Owners Association of the United States is not a membership organization, in the sense that angler- and hunter-based groups such as Trout Unlimited, Ducks Unlimited, or the Coastal Conservation Association are, but is instead a sort of maritime AAA, that provides towing services, reduced-rate insurance coverage, discounts at West Marine stores, etc.), and the CCA doesn’t come close to representing the “entire,” or even a substantial minority, of the saltwater angling community.  The CCA represents an even smaller proportion of striped bass anglers.

It claims a little over 125,000 members, most of whom are located in Texas, Louisiana, and Florida, with much of the remainder scattered across other states bordering the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. While it has a few small chapters on the striper coast, in New Hampshire, Maryland, and Virginia (an active North Carolina chapter is also technically in a striped bass state, although it concentrates on bass spawning in North Carolina rivers rather than on coastwide striped bass issues; three former chapters, in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York, dissolved years ago, and the status of the Maine chapter is unclear, although the last seemingly “official” post on its Facebook page was made nearly five years ago), they don’t come close to representing most, much less all, of all striped bass anglers, who collectively took over 14 million fishing trips primarily targeting the species last year.

Yet the CCA wasn’t shy to march in lockstep with the rest of the industry organizations who purported to represent the “entire” angling community, and oppose the 12% landings reduction, largely on economic grounds, even though its own New Hampshire chapter supported the management measure, and encouraged the Management Board to put the reduction in place.

Thus, fisheries managers are wise to be skeptical of any organization that purports to represent anglers as a whole, and not merely its own limited membership.

But while that sort of skepticism might prevent managers from mistakenly accepting an organization’s position as that of the broader angling community, it doesn’t help them know how most anglers want them to approach a management problem.

As a practical matter, when addressing a recreational fisheries issue, managers are limited to three basic tools—size limits, bag limits, and seasons, which all have to be set before a season begins.  And the thing about size limits, bag limits, and seasons is that they force tradeoffs.  You can, for example, have a small size limit, but that’s going to lead to a small bag limit and/or a short season.  A larger bag limit may lead to a smaller bag and/or shorter season, while a long season is necessarily going to result in a larger size limit and/or smaller bag. 

Thus, we often hear things like, “Commercial fishermen can keep 14-inch fluke.  Why can’t recreational fishermen keep 14-inch fluke, too?”  And the answer is that they can, if they’re willing to settle for a 1-fish bag limit and a season that lasts through the first two weeks of June (that’s probably an exaggeration, but you get the point—a small size limit, acceptably high bag limit and long season isn’t going to happen in most popular fisheries).

Thus, the trick for fisheries managers is to find the sweet spot—that combination of size limit, bag limit, and season that will adequately protect the resource, while coming closest to satisfying anglers.

It’s not an easy thing to do.

Many times, the ASMFC, or a regional fishery management council, or even a state, will hold hearings and solicit public comments, in an attempt to solicit opinions.  It’s a viable approach although, depending on when the hearings are held, anglers’ ability to attend may be limited (hearings held during the workday, or so early in the evening that people don’t have enough time between when they get out of work and when the hearing is held, are particularly problematic), and there are always the problems of people being afraid to speak in public, or of interest groups packing the hearing and, at times, trying to shout down and intimidate those with different views.

Recently, we have seen states try to survey anglers on various issues, but that, too, is an imperfect solution, because a survey doesn’t accurately reflect the views of a population—in this case, the population of anglers—if the people surveyed don’t represent an accurate cross-section of that population.  In the case of state surveys, which typically aren’t sent out to a pre-selected subset of anglers, but are instead posted online so that the public may voluntarily respond, it is nearly impossible to keep biases out of the sample.

Younger anglers, for example, may be more willing to complete—or even more able to access—an online survey than older, less computer-savvy individuals.  Native English-speakers may be more likely to respond than those who only learned the language later in life.  Education, economic condition, and similar factors may also tend to skew survey results toward findings that don’t accurately reflect public sentiment.

Then there is the issue of someone intentionally trying to bias the results.  Angler surveys generally draw a small enough response that a group of like-minded individuals, whether a business, an industry group, a large fishing club, or a publication with a particular editorial viewpoint can urge customers, readers, or members to respond to a survey in disproportionate numbers, and so distort the outcome. 

For example, the ASMFC received 4,525 comments on the question of whether to reduce striped bass landings by 12% in Addendum III to the management plan.  The American Sportfishing Association, which is the trade association for the fishing tackle industry, generated a form letter that resulted in 929 comments opposing the 12% cut.  That amounted to 20.5% of all comments received by the Management Board, and 34.1% of all comments opposing the reduction.  Yet the ASA solicited those comments through its “Keep America Fishing” advocacy program, which reaches out to anglers all across the United States, many—perhaps most—of whom do not live on the striper coast and do not fish for wild striped bass. 

Yet their opinions counted just as much as those of the most ardent striped bass angler, even though they didn’t necessarily provide any insight into what such striped bass anglers wanted the Management Board to do.

In another instance, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation conducted an on-line survey of anglers last January, asking what changes they’d like to see in the state’s black sea bass regulations.  One of New York’s largest party boat fleets put the news up on its Facebook page, urging its followers—which likely included a large percentage of anglers who fished from for-hire boats—to participate.  It’s likely that other businesses encouraged their customers to participate in the survey as well.

Only 2,060 stakeholders responded to the black sea bass survey.  Of those, 1,915 were anglers, while the rest represented for-hire businesses or bait and tackle shops.  It’s impossible to know how many of the 1,915 anglers only responded because they were urged to do so by a for-hire operation or other business, but it’s probably safe to assume that at least some of the respondents fell into that category. 

And that sort of encouragement could have easily biased the survey.

In 2025, New York anglers took just slightly more than 335,000 fishing trips in which black sea bass were the primary target.  Of those 335,000 trips, only about 34,500—10.3%--were taken by anglers fishing from for-hire vessels.  The 138 members of the for-hire industry who responded to the survey comprised 6.7% of all respondents.  So, if more than 75 of the 1,915 anglers who responded did most of their black sea bass fishing from for-hire vessels, the percentage of respondents representing the for-hire sector would have exceeded that sector’s 10.3% share of the black sea bass fishery as a whole.

While, as a practical matter, a couple of percentage points one way or another wouldn’t really matter, it’s easy to see how, if a few businesses made a concerted effort to get customers to respond, they could badly bias the results of a survey, and provide a false impression of what the overall angling community preferred.

Fortunately, in the case of New York’s black sea bass survey, that sort of bias didn’t seem to occur.  Responses were remarkably consistent across all identifiable groups of stakeholders, with a little more than half of the respondents prioritizing a reduction in the minimum size, with an increase in the bag limit during the first part of the season (ending on August 31) and an earlier start to the season effectively tied for second place.  As a result, New York will reduce its size limit from 16 ½ to 16 inches in 2026, and start its season on May 16 rather than on June 23.

In that instance, it looks as if the survey helped managers to get the changes right; anglers generally seem content with the agency’s decision.  And there is no question that the people at the DEC’s Marine Resources Division put in a lot of effort to reach the right outcome.

But there was still an element of good fortune involved, for in the end, while determining how many fish the recreational sector might land is a matter of science, setting regulations that will adequately constrain recreational landings, while leaving anglers reasonably content, is just as much a matter of art, performed by managers who know their constituents well enough to sort through the noise that surrounds the rulemaking process.

All things considered, it’s remarkable how often they manage to get it right.

COMMERCIAL FISHERMEN RETURNING TO MARINE NATIONAL MONUMENTS

 

When Donald Trump issued the executive order “Restoring America’s Seafood Competitiveness” on April 17, 2025, he included language that read,

“Within 180 days of the date of this order, the Secretary of Commerce, in consultation with the Secretary of the Interior, shall review all existing marine national monuments and provide recommendations to the President of any that should be opened to commercial fishing.  In making these recommendations, the Secretary of Commerce will consider whether the opening of the monuments to commercial fishing would be consistent with the preservation of the historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest originally identified in the proclamations establishing the marine national monuments.”

Currently, five such marine national monuments exist.  One, the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument is located in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 130 miles southeast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts.  The other four, which include the Mariana Trench Marine National Monument, Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument, Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, and Rose Atoll Marine National Monument, are scattered across the central Pacific Ocean.

Until very recently, commercial fishing was banned in all five marine national monuments. As a result of the executive order, it appears that commercial fishing is now going to be allowed in all of them.

The first one to open to commercial fishing was Northeast Canyons and Seamounts. 

Commercial fishing was not allowed there when the monument was initially established, a prohibition that probably had a minimal economic impact on the commercial fishing industry.  In 2017, the Natural Resources Defense Council published a brief impact study which asserted that

“The monument’s deep and rugged canyon and seamount areas were historically some of the least fished in the U.S. Atlantic and not unusually important for any fishery.  The six to eight red crab and lobster vessels active in the monument area have been provided a seven year grace period.  Because the monument does not affect catch limits or allocations, other types of fishing effort, such as the small amount of trawling that occurred in the shallowest portion of the monument, have likely been relocated to other areas.  The canyon and inter-canyon area in the original monument proposal was also reduced by almost 60 percent to leave out the relatively more active trawling areas.”

Despite the minimal economic impact of the commercial fishing prohibition, Trump opened the monument to commercial fishing on June 5, 2020, near the end of his first term.  Then the Biden administration outlawed commercial fishing in the marine national monument again, with NOAA Fisheries issuing the final rule in early 2024.  After returning to office for his second term, Trump reopened the monument to commercial fishing, issuing a new executive order, “Unleashing American Commercial Fishing in the Atlantic,” on February 6, 2026.  The executive order alleged that

“appropriately managed commercial fishing would not put the objects of historic and scientific interest that the monument protects at risk,”

as the fish species identified in the proclamation creating the marine national monument are adequately protected under existing laws and agency actions, and that many of those species are highly migratory, “and not unique to the monument.:

Predictably, the reopening drew criticism from the marine conservation community, with Erica Fuller, speaking for the Conservation Law Foundation, an organization that is particularly focused on marine issues that arise off the New England coast, saying,

“This latest attempt to undermine the monument is not only unlawful, but demonstrates a blatant disregard for the health of our oceans,”

while Brad Sewell, Managing Director of Oceans at the Natural Resources Defense Council, stated that

“Northeast Canyons and Seamounts is a truly special place; a living scientific laboratory, a refuge for creatures as varied as cold-water corals and sperm whales.  Trump’s move to dismantle those protections is unlawful, and we’re confident that it won’t stand.”

Such comments suggest that litigation challenging the reopening might be forthcoming.

Litigation has already delayed opening of the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument to commercial fishing.  A federal district court in Hawaii ruled that NOAA Fisheries could not merely issue a letter, based on Trump’s April 2025 executive order, allowing commercial fishing in that national monument, but would instead have to go through a formal rulemaking process that included public comment on the issue.

Such rulemaking had to begin at the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council, which has jurisdiction over the waters in all four of the Pacific marine national monuments.  Historically, the Western Pacific Council has looked askance at marine sanctuaries and marine national monuments, with one Council document observing that

“The islands in the Western Pacific Region were inhabited for millennia prior to Western contact.  Today the indigenous communities comprise between 20 and 90 percent of the population, depending on the island.  With little land and terrestrial resources, the communities have in the past, and continue today, to depend on fishing for sustenance and cultural purposes.

“Ensuring continued opportunities for fishery-related livelihoods and cultural practices is challenging.  Marine protected areas and military activities have increasingly marginalized fisheries and displaced fishermen.  Today, nearly 25 percent of the region’s EEZ has been designated as either a national marine sanctuary or a national marine monument.”

A 2025 article in the Hawaiian news outlet, Honolulu Civil Beat, noted that

“[The Western Pacific Fishery Management Council] has for years opposed commercial fishing bans in the Pacific.  A brewing legal battle leaves it unclear whether [the Council] backed by the Honolulu-based longline industry and other seafood interests, will ultimately prevail [in opening the national marine monuments to commercial fishing].

“Kitty Simonds, [the Council’s] longtime executive director, told Civil Beat…that the group considers it a priority to resume bottomfishing and trolling in Papahanaumokuakea’s waters that extend 50 miles out from shore, and to restart longline fishing in the waters 50 to 200 miles out from shore.

“’We haven’t changed what we’d like to see from the time of (establishing) the monument, right?  Simonds said.  ‘We made our arguments.’”

Thus, it is hardly surprising that, last week, the Western Pacific Council voted to allow commercial fishing between 50 and 200 nautical miles around Jarvis Island, Wake Island, and Johnston Atoll within the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument.  Such vote to allow commercial fishing is the first step in the rulemaking process required by federal law and last year’s court decision.  The Council’s action will now be forwarded to NOAA Fisheries, which will issue a proposed rule for public comment and, assuming that no legal obstacles arise, will ultimately issue a final rule allowing commercial fishing.

At the same meeting, the Council also voted to allow commercial fishing in waters 12 to 50 nautical miles from Rose Atoll in the Rose Atoll Marine National Monument and from shore out to 50 nautical miles in the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument, while also allowing fishing for bottom fish and pelagic species in parts of the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument.  However, those changes will not go through normal agency rulemaking, but will instead be referred to the White House for further action pursuant to the April 2025 executive order, which could mean that they will face the same sort of legal action that delayed opening the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument to commercial fishing last year.

In her justification of the Council’s actions, Ms. Simonds said,

“This is not about removing monument protections—it’s about restoring sustainable fishing in limited areas under fishery regulations the Council has developed over decades.  Those regulations were built to balance access and conservation, and that remains the Council’s guiding principle under the Magnuson-Stevens [Fishery Conservation and Management] Act.”

Council Chair Nathan Ilaoa made similar comments, saying

“This action does not remove the monument; it supports local fishermen, the cannery and the small businesses that depend on a viable fishing economy.”

But an article in the National Fisherman notes that others

“raised concerns about impacts to protected species, ecosystems, and the cultural significance of monument areas—particularly in Papahanaumokuakea.”

So, how much real harm will be caused by allowing commercial fishing in the marine national monuments?

It’s not easy to say.  Opening up any area to longlining is always going to create some threats to marine mammals, sea turtles, seabirds, billfish, and other incidentally caught fish species.  And allowing the use of bottom-tending gear, whether lobster and/or red crab pots off New England or other gear types in the Pacific creates threats to corals and other sessile animals, while also creating the risk of entanglement for marine mammals.

And in Papahanaumokuakea, there may be additional risks to the endangered Hawaiian monk seal.

But the question that no one has satisfactorily answered is whether opening the commercial fishery in the marine national monuments is creating additional risk for a host of marine species, or whether it is merely shifting existing risk into the monuments.

That is, if lobster and red crab traps are allowed in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, to use one example, will that increase the likelihood that a whale might become entangled?  Or does the likelihood remain the same, because traps previously banned from the monument would still be fished somewhere, and so their exclusion from the monument would only create an entanglement risk somewhere else.

Similarly, if a longline is fished within the boundaries of the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument, would endangered turtles, or perhaps seabirds, face greater risks than they would if the same longline was fished somewhere on the high seas?

The answer might well depend on whether concentrations of protected species were higher in the marine national monuments, resulting in more interactions with fishing gear than would occur elsewhere.  But, again, it’s not clear that there is enough reliable data to provide a conclusive answer.

And in the absence of data, it is only sensible to take a precautionary approach. 

If you don’t know whether an action will cause harm, assume that it will until evidence to the contrary appears.

Unfortunately, the administration’s current efforts to open up marine national monuments to commercial fishing takes the opposite approach, and assumes, in the lack of clear evidence to the contrary, that the fishing will do no harm.  It is the more risk-prone approach.

And it is thus the wrong way to proceed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

NEWLY RELEASED PAPER LOOKS INTO JUST WHERE WESTERN ATLANTIC BLUEFIN TUNA SPAWN

 

Throughout most of my life as an offshore angler, it seemed that scientists had a very firm grasp on where Atlantic bluefin tuna spawned.  There was a large eastern stock that spawned in the Mediterranean Sea, often at relatively young ages and smaller sizes, and a much smaller western stock that spawned in the northern Gulf of Mexico, but generally not until they were about nine years old and somewhere around 80 inches (fork length) long.

The stocks mixed on the feeding grounds, with eastern stock fish crossing over to North America and western stock fish crossing over to Europe from time to time, but when it came to spawning, the Mediterranean and Gulf were the only games in town.

That picture began to change about a decade ago, after a group of biologists published a paper, titled "Discovery of a spawning ground reveals diverse migration strategies in Atlantic bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus),” which argued that western stock bluefin were also spawning, and spawning at younger ages, perhaps as young as five years old, in the Slope Sea, an area at the edge of the continental shelf off southern New England and the upper mid-Atlantic.

The paper created substantial controversy when it came out, but biologists have now generally accepted the evidence that bluefin do, in fact, also spawn in the Slope Sea.

Now, there is some evidence that the western Atlantic stock of bluefin tuna may spawn over a much broader area—perhaps even in a continuous swath of water that ranges from the Yucatan Channel, in the southern Gulf of Mexico, all the way up to the Slope Sea.  Just two weeks ago, the National Marine Fisheries Service issued a release announcing that

“New Research Reveals Broad Spawning Distribution for Bluefin Tuna,”

which said that

“Working with partners, NOAA Fisheries scientists did a deep dive into bluefin tuna spawning patterns.  They compiled a large data set from fisheries surveys, archive and museum specimens, and research cruise reports going back to the 1950s.  Their analysis included more than 35,000 plankton tows, and they examined nearly 5,000 individual tuna larvae.  The results…indicate that bluefin tuna have a much broader spawning distribution than previously recognized…

“The results suggest that bluefin spawn in a continuous area during a prolonged spawning season.  Spawning starts in April in the southernmost areas—the northwest Caribbean and southern Gulf of America—and ends in early August in the Slope Sea.”

The NMFS release was referring to the paper “A re-evaluation of Atlantic bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus) spawning distribution in the western Atlantic Ocean,” which appeared in the February 2026 issue of the journal, Progress in Oceanography.  In that paper, the researchers stated that

“Our work documented persistent spawning by bluefin in the Yucatan Channel, southern and northern Gulf [of Mexico], Blake Plateau [located 80-200 miles off the southeastern United States], an area off the Carolinas shoreward of the Florida Current, and the western Slope Sea, despite changing temperatures in each of these regions over the past decades.  This work also revealed how uneven the allocation of sampling effort has been in space and time, leaving open the possibility of additional spawning grounds.  One hypothesis, consistent with the available data, is that bluefin have a continuous spawning distribution in the western Atlantic from the southern Gulf in early-spring to the western Slope Sea in early-summer that is only interrupted by narrow areas of the fast-moving western boundary current (i.e., Florida Current; Gulf Stream) or shallow bathymetry.  An alternate hypothesis, also consistent with the data, is that the western Slope Sea and Gulf are discrete spawning grounds of near equal magnitude with some limited spawning elsewhere.  While sampling throughout the western north Atlantic would be useful, we consider a larval survey to evaluate spawning in June in the waters south of the Gulf Stream and east of the Florida Current to be the most critical to testing these alternate hypotheses.”

The researchers came to their conclusion not by conducting extensive new surveys, but by conducting a comprehensive analysis of data that was already available, having been collected by research cruises dating back to 1956.  While most of those cruises were not directly investigating bluefin tuna, they nonetheless collected plankton samples, which were preserved for future use, as well as data on water temperature, etc.  Electronic tagging data and information generated by longline tuna fisheries was also included in the data set.

The available information, along with unprocessed plankton samples in which bluefin tuna larvae might be found, was analyzed as scientists searched for patterns that might suggest the presence of spawning bluefin tuna in areas outside of the Gulf of Mexico and the Slope Sea.  The researchers were careful to avoid assuming that the presence of larval bluefin was a definite indicator of spawning activity, as larvae could also be transported by currents from a known spawning area; instead, only larvae that were too young to have been transported from such a known area were considered likely indicators of spawning activity.

After analyzing the data, the researchers came to a conclusion that arguably resurrected, if not actual knowledge, then at least hypotheses that existed decades before.  Their paper reminded readers that research conducted as early as 1974 suggested that bluefin also spawned, not only in the Slope Sea, but also between Cuba and Haiti, in the so-called Windward Passage, as well as north and east of the Bahamas, and that another paper, published in 1995, proposed that western Atlantic bluefin spawning migrations varied, depending on the size of the fish involved.

The new paper appears to validate at least some of those old proposals.

As noted in the new paper, more work will have to be done to determine whether the spawning grounds for western Atlantic bluefin form a continuous band between the Gulf of Mexico and the Slope Sea, or whether those two areas account for most of the spawning, with only sporadic episodes in-between.

And it is still too early to tell whether the new paper will attract the same sort of negative attention the paper discussing the Slope Sea spawning ground drew ten years ago, or whether it will serve as a jumping off place for additional research that will confirm, refine, or rebut its conclusions at some point down the road.

Challenging, testing, and confirmation are all part of the scientific process, and are all valid responses to the new work.  And it’s important to get the science right, because as one of the authors, Trika Gerard, a deputy director of NMFS’ Southeast Fisheries Science Center, observed,

“These new data tell us where bluefin tuna are spawning and when, which gives us an idea of where they are migrating and how much they are contributing to future generations.  This, combined with information about genetics and population structure, helps managers decide the most appropriate way to sustainably fish for this prized species.”

The conclusions reached in the recent paper aren’t merely of academic interest.  They can have a real impact on the health and the future of the western Atlantic bluefin stock.

Then, too, there is another lesson taught by this new paper that its authors certainly did not intend, but is vitally important, nonetheless.

All of the analysis leading up to its findings were based on prior research, much of it performed by NMFS in the course of surveying aquatic life on various portions of the continental shelf, surveying protected species, or performing other ongoing studies.  The data developed in the course of that research was maintained and curated by NMFS and by other institutions, just as the processed and unprocessed ichthyoplankton samples, which contained the bluefin tuna larvae, were.

Those earlier surveys could not have been performed without an adequately funded National Marine Fisheries Service, and the data and plankton samples could not have been maintained and readily accessed unless there was enough funding to both archive the survey records and maintain people on staff who can locate and utilize the information.  In addition, eight of the sixteen authors of the paper, including the lead author, are NMFS scientists employed at one of the agency’s regional fisheries science centers.

Good fisheries science can’t exist without adequate funding.  As I noted in last Sunday’s blog post, and in some earlier essays, right now NMFS’s fisheries science is under assault, with some members of Congress, and some members of the current Administration, seeking to cut needed funding.  Already, cuts in scientific personnel are hampering NMFS’ ability to conduct surveys, perform stock assessments, and execute the other tasks necessary to its role as the steward of the nation’s marine resources.

It’s very possible that, if NMFS had been in similar financial straits over the last 50 or 75 years, the recent paper would never have been written, as the data that underlies it would never have been compiled.

If the researchers are correct, and western Atlantic bluefin tuna are spawning over a greater expanse of ocean than previously believed, it is possible that the stock is larger and more resilient than biologists had thought, and might be able to withstand a modestly higher level of harvest, to the benefit of both the commercial and the recreational fishing industries of the United States.

But unless NMFS is funded at levels that will allow meaningful research to continue, and hopefully expand, and for fisheries to be monitored closely enough to ensure that higher harvest levels don’t negatively impact the health of fish stocks, there is a very good chance that such benefits to the nation, whether accruing from bluefin or from other fish stocks, will never be realized.

 

 

 

 

CUTS TO NMFS BUDGET CREATE NEW THREAT TO FISH STOCKS

 

A few weeks ago, I found myself in a familiar place doing a very familiar thing—wandering around Capitol Hill, visiting Senate and House offices during the appropriations season, trying to maintain, or hopefully increase, funding for fisheries management.

This year, it seemed a particularly urgent mission, given that the 2025 staffing reductions at the  National Marine Fisheries Service, and particularly to its regional science centers, crippled the agency’s ability to conduct the surveys and perform the stock assessments needed to maintain the health of the nation’s fish stocks. 

While the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act is arguably the most comprehensive and most successful fishery management law in the world, it has one big vulnerability:  The management system that it created is very science-dependent.  In fact, one of the findings listed near the very beginning of the statute acknowledges that

“The collection of reliable data is essential to the effective conservation, management, and scientific understanding of the fishery resources of the United States.”

Magnuson-Stevens requires that

“Conservation and management measures shall be based upon the best scientific information available.”

To that end, the law requires that

“Each [regional fishery management] Council shall establish, maintain, and appoint the members of a scientific and statistical committee to assist in the development, collection, evaluation, and peer review of such statistical, biological, economic, social, and other scientific information as is relevant to such Council’s development and amendment of any fishery management plan,”

and further provides that regional fishery management councils shall develop annual catch limits for the fisheries that they manage, but such catch limits

“may not exceed the fishing level recommendation of its scientific and statistical committee [or that resulting from a peer review process described elsewhere in the law].”

That all sounds nice in theory, but the truth of the matter is that scientific information can’t be snatched out of thin air.  It takes money to conduct the surveys and other research needed to develop the fisheries-related data, and it takes more money to hire and retain the qualified scientists needed to design the surveys, analyze the resulting data, perform stock assessments, and determine what must be done in order to restore stocks to health and maintain healthy stocks at sustainable levels.

That money has never been easy to obtain, but for many years, Congress has largely recognized that maintaining the long-term health of the United States’ fish stocks was in the best interests of the nation, and addressed fisheries management as a bipartisan issue.  While funding was often less than ideal, it was generally sufficient to enable NMFS to manage fish stocks.

But the current Administration, consistent with its general antipathy toward the sciences and toward agencies that advance scientific knowledge, crippled NMFS’ management capabilities last year, when it cut agency personnel, including biologists at NMFS’ regional science centers.

The problem was highlighted at the May 2025 meeting of the Council Coordinating Committee, the body that represents, and expresses the concerns, of all of the regional fishery management councils.  The report from that meeting states, in part,

“Ms. Kelly Denit, NOAA Fisheries Director of the Office of Sustainable Fisheries…discussed the need to better align NOAA and Council priorities, challenges of managing over 500 stocks, and the need to prioritize fisheries management given limited resources.  Ms. Denit’s presentation touched on the National Standards Guidelines and suggested the need to evaluate narrowing the scope of management in light of current resourcing and administration priorities.

“A risk-value matrix was presented to the [Council Coordinating Committee] as a way to help evaluate which stocks require the most intensive management.  Underpinning this exercise is the reality that NOAA Fisheries cannot continue managing all current stocks and stock complexes that are currently in [fishery management plans] with existing and anticipated resources.  Ms. Denit spoke about the need to strategically choose where to take increased management risks.  The proposed matrix would categorize stocks based on ‘value’ (commercial/recreational/social importance) and ‘risk’ (ratio of catch to [annual catch limit], stock status, ecosystem role, climate vulnerability).  She suggested stocks in the high-risk, high-value quadrants might be strong candidates to receive the most detailed management, while low-risk, low-value stocks might be moved to ecosystem components or removed from management plans entirely.  Ms. Denit emphasized this report requires Council input and collaboration and stressed the need to explore more flexibility in management given current constraints…”

I have to admit that my first reaction upon reading those words was to recall a passage penned by pioneer ecologist Aldo Leopold, who wrote

“The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant, ‘What good is it?’  If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not.  If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts?  To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.”

For the very act of designating a fish stock as “high value” or “low value,” based solely on whether is supports a significant commercial or recreational fishery, or has some other societal value, seems completely contrary to Leopold’s principle, and to common sense. 

But now, nearly a year after that Council Coordinating Committee meeting was held, those designations are beginning to grow real teeth, and are threatening to bite chunks out of the federal fisheries management system, marine ecosystems, and probably state budgets as well.

Recently, the Pacific Fisheries Management Council voted to cease actively managing 47 groundfish stocks, in response to a roughly 40% reduction in NMFS scientific and regulatory staff in the Pacific region. Many of those were species of Pacific rockfish, members of Scorpaenidae, the scorpionfish family, popular food fish that tend to have longer lives than many other species, and are thus particularly vulnerable to overfishing.

Instead of actively managing such stocks, the Pacific Council downgraded some of them from “stocks that require conservation and management” to “ecosystem component species.”  Such ecosystem component species are not actively managed to prevent them from becoming overfished or experiencing overfishing; there are no annual catch limits or and no attempts to maintain optimum yield, although NMFS’ Guidelines for compliance with Magnuson-Stevens provide that

“Councils may choose to identify stocks within their [fishery management plans] as ecosystem component (EC) species…if a Council determines that the stocks do not require conservation and management…EC species may be identified at the species or stock level, and may be grouped into complexes…management measures can be adopted in order to, for example, collect data on the EC species, minimize bycatch or bycatch mortality of an EC species, protect the associated role of EC species in the ecosystem, and/or to address other ecosystem issues.”

The problem here, of course, is that the Pacific Council has already acknowledged that the 47 stocks in question were “stocks in need of conservation and management.”  It designated them as ecosystem component species not because the “Council determine[d] that the stocks do not require conservation and management,” but because funds allocated to conservation and management were cut to the point that some stocks that, in fact, were in need of conservation and management had to be sacrificed to the “ecosystem component” designation, and these particular 47 stocks were deemed “low-value” enough to draw the short straw.

Yet, despite drawing the short straw and losing most management protections, the stocks designated as “ecosystem component species” were the fortunate ones, as the great majority of the 47 stocks will be completely removed from the management plan, and have no protections at all.

And the list of species under the Pacific Council’s jurisdiction that are no longer “in need of conservation and management” may grow larger.  National Public Radio reported that Merrick Burden, the Pacific Council’s executive director, observed that

“We have coastal pelagics, which are the sardines and anchovies and mackerels—the small, silvery things that everybody eats.  We have the tunas and billfish, and we have salmon…I expect us, to some degree, to consider this type of action for each of those.”

The same National Public Radio article that quoted Merrick Burden also noted that NMFS’ decision to shed the burden of managing ecosystem component stock is going to shift at least some of that burden onto the shoulders of coastal states.

“As a result of the federal charges, the [Washington] state department [of Fish and Wildlife] may need to ask the Washington Legislature for more staff to help cover new duties…But the state’s conservation mission won’t change, and the process they use to set sustainable harvest levels with stakeholder input will continue.

“In Oregon, where there is s more active commercial and recreational fishery for some groundfish, state officials opted to take over management for at least six of the species federal regulators will drop starting in 2030.  Oregon wildlife officials want the stocks to remain in federal management.  But barring that, taking on oversight will give them more control—and enough time to develop a state management plan.”

The Pacific Fishery Management Council is only the first to address the problem of removing species from federal fishery management plan.  It is an issue that is likely to impact all of the regional fishery management councils.  Thus, on February 2, 2026, the Council Coordinating Committee sent a letter to NMFS chief Eugenio Pineiro Soler which, after a brief introductory paragraph, said,

“The [Council Coordinating Committee] has considered this issue carefully over the course of the course of several recent discussions, including presentations from NMFS Headquarters and subsequent deliberations among Council Executive Directors.  While the CCC supports constructive dialogue regarding capacity constraints and opportunities to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of fishery management and science, we have significant concerns regarding both the process used to develop the Risk/Value Matrix and the implications of the framework as currently framed.

“First, the Councils have not been adequately consulted or involved in the development of the Risk/Value Matrix or its underlying methodology.  Councils were asked to react to, and potentially apply, a framework that appears to have been substantially developed in advance, including embedded assumptions regarding objectives, priorities, and acceptable tradeoffs.  Engagement at this stage risks being perceived as endorsement of a predetermined methodology rather than meaningful collaboration.  This approach does not align with the Councils’ statutory role under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act.

“Second, the CCC is concerned that the Risk/Value Matrix appears likely to function as a de facto prioritization tool for stock assessments, monitoring, and associated scientific resources, with potential implications for the allocation of funding between NMFS Regions and Science Centers…The CCC is concerned that adoption of the Risk/Value Matrix could diminish or displace meaningful Council and constituent input into decisions fundamental to fisheries science and management.

“Third, the implications of the framework remain unclear, but several Councils have identified substantive concerns when attempting to apply the Risk/Value criteria to their fisheries…raising fundamental questions about what management actions would follow and what management problems the framework is intended to address.  These outcomes suggest that the Risk/Value Matrix incorporates policy choices and management objectives that have not been discussed with, or agreed to, by the Councils.

“Fourth, the CCC notes that similar national-level stock or assessment prioritization concepts have been proposed previously and were not supported by the Councils…The current Risk/Value Matrix appears, in important respects, to revisit those concepts without addressing the concerns previously raised by the Councils.

“Finally, the CCC is concerned about the compressed timeline proposed for Council engagement, the lack of clarity concerning current and future resource levels, and uncertainty regarding how Council input would ultimately be used.  Councils are already pursuing scope-reduction, prioritization, and efficiency efforts through Magnuson-Stevens-compliant public processes.  Participating in a parallel national exercise under the current conditions creates a risk that Council input could be used to justify predetermined outcomes or become binding regardless of future budget realities…”

The letter makes it clear that the Risk/Value Matrix being forced on the regional fisheries management councils is, at best, problematic and, at worst, illegal, although the latter point is probably of little concern to the higher-ups in the Administration.

It also should provide incentive for concerned lawmakers—and my last trip to Capitol Hill made it clear that there are concerned lawmakers out there—to redouble efforts to adequately fund NMFS, and its regional science centers, so that initiatives like the Risk/Value Matrix, and its potentially arbitrary criteria, can be gracefully retired, and no longer pose a threat to an informed fishery management process.