RED DRUM: ANOTHER TROUBLED, STATE-MANAGED FISHERY

 

Back in 2014, a coalition of fishing industry, boating industry, and anglers’ rights organizations seeking to weaken the National Marine Fisheries Service’s power to constrain anglers’ harvests issued a manifesto.  It was called “A Vision for Managing America’s Saltwater Recreational Fisheries,” and was based on the premise that the federal fishery management system, which relies on science-based annual catch limits to maintain the long-term health of fish stocks, was not suited to managing recreational fisheries.

The various organizations argued that, while the poundage-based federal management system was fine for managing the commercial fleet, anglers were better served by state fishery managers, who established regulations that were more aspirational than prescriptive; that is, while such managers hoped that state recreational regulations would protect stocks from excessive harvest, such regulations weren’t tied to an annual landings limit, and regulators weren’t required to reduce landings if overfishing occurred or the stock became overfished.

The “Vision” statement argued that

“Many state natural resource agencies, especially those in the South, recognize the benefits of a vibrant recreational fishing community and have managed to promote it while conserving their saltwater resources.  Striped bass, red drum, black drum, summer flounder, sheepshead, snook, spotted seatrout, and tarpon are examples of successfully managed state fisheries that sufficiently meet the needs of recreational anglers while providing extensive economic benefits to their state and the national economies.”

Nearly nine years have passed since the manifesto was issued.  In the years since, we have seen the same coalition of industry-affiliated groups continue to harp on the “statemanagement is best” theme, particularly with respect to Gulf of Mexico redsnapper, a species that federal regulators are doing their best to rebuild in the face of continued recreational overharvest.  We have seen passage of a watered-down “Modern Fish Act,” which wasoriginally intended to weaken the federal recreational fishery managementprocess, but was rendered more-or-less harmless before it reached thePresident’s desk. 

There is no evidence to suggest that their efforts to undercut the federal fishery management system will abate in the foreseeable future.

Thus, it’s probably worth analyzing how well their central premise—that state managers are successfully managing recreational fisheries—has held up over the past few years.

We can start with the fact that striped bass are overfished, and summer flounder are federally managed (states do set local regulations, but abide by NMFS’ annual catch limits), while snook are overfished on Florida’s Atlantic coast (but not in the Gulf).  There is no stock assessment for tarpon, making it difficult to convincingly argue that the fish are doing well, although one scientific paper noted that

“multiple lines of evidence suggest that populations of M. atlanticus [ the Atlantic tarpon] appear to have declined from historical levels throughout their range…Using a generation time of 12.7 years for tarpon, the estimated decline in FAO landings over three generations (38 years) is >80%.”

So tarpon probably aren’t doing all that well, either.

It’s harder to tell about sheepshead, since no one has yet established reference points to denote overfishing or an overfished stock, although Florida wildlife managers think that the species is probably doing OK.  Black drum are in a similar situation.   As of 2015, Louisiana deemed the stock healthy; on the East Coast, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission believes the stock to be healthy, although “declining slowly.”

When we get to speckled trout or, more properly, “spotted seatrout,” the news isn’t as good.  The ASMFC lists the stock’s status in the Atlantic as “unknown,” Texas admits that it can only sustain its current recreational harvest level by introducing hatchery-produced fish into state waters, and Louisiana is only now reluctantly addressing its badly depleted speckled trout stock, which it has allowed anglers to overfish for years—and some of the same folks who have loudly praised state managers are nonetheless objecting to the size limit proposed to rebuild that badly overfished population.

So, out of the eight popular recreational fisheries that the “Vision” report held up as examples of successful state-level fishery management, we find one stock that actually sees NMFS, not the states, establish the annual catch limits; three that are overfished in all or part of their range; one that is unassessed, but seems to be depleted; one that lacks the reference points needed to determine stock status, but might be OK; and another that, while healthy, is in long-term decline over a substantial portion of its range.

The "Vision" report might call that sort of record a success, but I--and I suspect many others--disagree.

Red drum are the last of the state-managed fisheries praised in the "Vision" report.  As it turns out, that species is having its problems too, particularly in the Gulf of Mexico, the very place where the “Redfish Wars” of the late 20^th Century, which outlawed the commercial fishery in a number of states, took place.  Which means that the drum's current decline can be laid directly at the recreational fishermen’s door.

News of the red drum’s troubles came in a stock assessment recently performed by the State of Louisiana, which revealed that

“Management thresholds have been established, through the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council (GMFMC), for Red Drum in the state of Louisiana as a 20% spawning potential ratio, which is based on a 30% escapement rate from the inshore fishery.  Based on results of this assessment, the Louisiana Red Drum stock is currently not overfished, but is experiencing overfishing.  The current spawning potential ratio estimate is 40% and the current escapement rate estimate is 20%.  The recent downturn in recreational landings are [sic] due to a series of below average annual recruitment to the stock where the most recent annual recruitment estimates are the lowest in the time-series examined.  Management actions will be needed in order to prevent future overfishing and prevent the stock from becoming overfished.”

While the stock assessment is specific to red drum “occurring in [Louisiana] and adjacent federal waters,” it has implications for the broader Gulf of Mexico population, as adult red drum may migrate 700 to 900 kilometers (approximately 450 to 500 miles) from their natal estuaries.

Louisiana deserves credit for conducting the stock assessment and concluding that management action is needed to end overfishing and to prevent the stock from becoming overfished, although it’s probably also worth noting that the reference points used to evaluate the health of the red drum stock were developed by federal fishery managers and not by the state.

The next question is what Louisiana is going to do to correct the problem.

If red drum were a federally-managed species, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act would require that annual catch limits, set low enough to prevent overfishing, be established each year; Magnuson-Stevens would also require that anglers be held accountable should they exceed such catch limits.  Louisiana fishery managers are not bound by any such requirements.  While they may, in good faith, intend to adopt rules that prevent recreational fishermen from overfishing the red drum resource, they have no legal obligation to do so, and their efforts to end overfishing could be stymied by angling organizations that employ political influence to avoid harvest reductions.

We’ve already seen that happen with Louisiana’s speckled trout.

All the way back in 2016, I noted that Louisiana’s speckled trout population was overfished, with abundance only about half of the target level.   More than six years have passed, yet Louisiana regulators have yet to adopt management measures that will end overfishing and rebuild the stock; potentially effective regulations have been proposed, but are meeting resistance from some members of the angling community.

Given how important red drum are to Louisiana’s inshore anglers, it is likely that more restrictive red drum regulations could follow the same trajectory, although Louisiana fishery managers are talking about having such rules in place for at least part of the 2023 season.

How strict must the new rules be?

The current escapement rate of red drum is only 20%, just half of the escapement target.  Because too few fish are entering the adult population, the spawning stock biomass is decreasing as well; fisheries managers expect that, unless landings are reduced, spawning stock biomass will fall below the level needed to maintain the 30% spawning potential ratio by 2025.

Once that occurs, it will take a 35% reduction in landings to return to a 30% SPR by 2050.  A 40% reduction will cut 10 years off the rebuilding time, while a 50% reduction would probably achieve the 30% target by 2034.  Further reductions would only speed up the recovery by a few years; even a 65% harvest reduction would only slice another three years off the rebuilding period, achieving 30% SPR by 2031.

The target 40% escapement rate could be achieved far more quickly.  As 30% harvest reduction is likely to achieve 40% escapement by 2028, a 35% reduction by 2026, and a 45% reduction by 2024. 

Louisiana fishery managers believe that they could achieve a 35% reduction by imposing a 16- to 22-inch slot limit and 2-fish bag, including an over-slot fish.  Other combinations that would achieve the same result might include a 16- to 20-inch slot and 3-fish bag, a 17- to 26-inch slot and 2-fish bag, a 17- to 20-inch slot and 5-fish bag, an 18- to 25-inch slot and 3-fish bag, or a 19- to 27-inch slot with a 4-fish bag; for all possible combinations, one over-slot fish might be retained.

A 50% reduction could be achieved with, among other combinations, a 16- to 24-inch slot and 1-fish bag, a 17- to 20-inch slot and 2-fish bag, and 18- to 20-inch slot and 4-fish bag, or a 19- to 21-inch slot and a 5-fish bag, again with one over-slot fish included in each of the possible options.

Removing the over-slot fish from any of the slot size/bag limit options would significantly increase the resulting reduction.

All of the above size and bag limit options are significantly more restrictive than Louisiana’s current 16- to 27-inch slot and five fish bag limit, with one over-slot drum included.  Louisiana will soon be seeking public input on the proposed management measures, but there is no reason to believe that adopting new regulations for red drum will be any less controversial, or take any less time to adopt, than the proposed speckled trout rules.

While federal law includes a legally enforceable requirement to prevent overfishing, as well as legally enforceable deadlines for rebuilding overfished stocks, such features missing from most state management systems; without such legal requirements to guide their actions, state managers are far more susceptible to, and too frequently are guided by, political and economic concerns.

So why does the angling industry, and industry-affiliated angler groups, insist that state management is the superior system?  The answer might lie in the "Vision" statement paragraph quoted above, which claims that state fishery managers “sufficiently meet the needs of recreational anglers while providing extensive economic benefits to their state and the national economies. [emphasis added]”

In other words, state fishery managers do a good enough job of providing fishing opportunities for anglers, while providing extensive benefits to the angling industry.

Anglers might not want to settle for "good enough," but given that the “Vision” document was produced by an industry coalition, and released at an industry trade show, it’s not surprising that promoting economic activity, rather than healthy and abundant fish stocks, was its primary goal.  And there is little doubt that state fishery managers are more aware of, and more responsive to, economic concerns than their federal counterparts.

On the other hand, state managers don’t have a very good record of maintaining fish stocks at healthy and abundant levels over the long term.  Evidence of any such success is difficult, perhaps close to impossible, to find.  Gulf red drum provide just one more example of state managers failing to adopt management measures that prevent overfishing and the decline of an important fish stock.

And so long as state managers eschew firm catch limits, and are not legally bound to prevent overfishing or rebuild overfished stocks, that “one more” example will be far from the last.

FALSE ALBACORE: ANGLING INDUSTRY RESEARCH DONE RIGHT

 

There isn’t enough money available for fisheries research, and there probably never will be.  There are just too many stocks of fish, and too many other budget priorities.

The National Marine Fisheries Service currently manages 460 fish stocks in the Atlantic, Pacific, Caribbean, and Gulf of Mexico, and those are only the stocks that are typically found in federal waters more than three miles from shore.  Other important recreational and commercial fish species, including striped bass, menhaden, weakfish, red drum, and spotted seatrout, have no federal fishery management plans, and are managed solely by the states, which sometimes act independently and sometimes coordinate their actions through bodies such as the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.

Then there are the species that support fisheries but are not managed at all, species such as Atlantic bonito, northern and southern kingfish, jack crevalle, and little tunny, the latter better known as “false albacore.”

Whether or not to manage a stock is largely a practical decision based on the species’ perceived value.  The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act states that one of the duties of each regional fishery management council is

“for each fishery under its authority that requires conservation and management, prepare and submit to the Secretary [of Commerce] a fishery management plan and amendments to each such plan that are necessary from time to time…  [internal formatting omitted]”

Magnuson-Stevens goes on to explain that

“The term ‘conservation and management’ refers to all the rules, regulations, conditions, methods, and other measures which are required to rebuild, restore, or maintain, and which are useful in rebuilding, restoring, or maintaining, any fishery resource and the marine environment; and which are designed to assure that a supply of food and other products may be taken, and that recreational benefits may be obtained, on a continuing basis; irreversible or long-term adverse effects on fishery resources and the marine environment are avoided; and there will be a multiplicity of options available with respect to future uses of these resources.  [internal formatting omitted]”

But that definition doesn’t shed much light on how a regional fishery management council can, as a practical matter, determine whether a stock “requires conservation and management,” and is thus  in need of a management plan.

Another section of Magnuson-Stevens provides something close to an answer, saying

“If a Council determines that additional information would be beneficial for developing, implementing, or revising a fishery management plan or for determining whether a fishery is in need of management, the Council may request that the Secretary implement an information collection program for the fishery which would provide the types of information specified by the Council.  The Secretary can undertake such an information collection program if he determines that the need is justified…”

Still, species that might require conservation and management can easily go ignored, because the budget for research is limited.  Research funding typically goes to species that support large and economically important commercial and/or recreational fisheries—and, ideally, species that support both important commercial and important recreational fisheries. 

NMFS is generally willing to fund research, including regular stock assessments, for Atlantic cod, red snapper, summer flounder and the like, which have large and often vocal commercial and recreational constituencies.

But when it comes to the species that aren’t valued as food and don’t have high commercial and recreational landings, the likelihood of federal funding for research is low, and a sort of Catch-22 exists:  There is no fishery management plan because no one knows whether the species requires conservation and management, no one knows whether the species requires conservation and management because there is not enough information to make such determination, and there is no way to obtain the needed information because there is no money available to gather information on a stock that doesn';t generate a large economic return.

That’s where cooperative management comes into play, when individuals and organizations with an interest in a particular fish stock team up with government or private sector scientists to develop needed management information.  The individuals and organization provide funding, logistical support, and/or labor, while the scientists provide technical facilities and expertise.

Unfortunately, when such arrangements are made, the research is often agenda-driven. 

Thus, in the upper mid-Atlantic, we saw a group that called itself the “Save the Summer Flounder Fishery Fund,” which stated that

“We seek to safeguard and improve fishing access to summer flounder, for those who enjoy it and to ensure the survival of those who depend on it, through scientific and legislative means,”

support research that, the organization hoped, would reach conclusions beneficial to the recreational fishing industry, as opposed to research that might primarily benefit the summer flounder themselves.

More recently, in the Gulf of Mexico, a coalition of industry-associated organizations convinced federal legislators to provide funding for a project that has come to be called “The Great Red Snapper Count.”  While that project did uncover new scientific information, concluding that the Gulf red snapper population was three times as large as previously believed, primarily because most of the fish were widely scattered over low-profile bottom, instead of sitting on the reefs, rockpiles, and wrecks where everyone fished for them, the underlying purpose of the study was to convince regulators to adopt more liberal red snapper regulations that would lead to a larger red snapper harvest. 

That became obvious immediately after the preliminary results of the Count were released, when the Texas chapter of the Coastal Conservation Association immediately attacked federal red snapper managers, braying that

“This week, the public and Congress finally heard why nothing seemed to add up in federal management of Gulf red snapper.  It turns out that NOAA just doesn’t count snapper very well…

“NOAA has had decades to get red snapper right.  In the end, the states, Congress and independent marine science institutions had to step in and clean up their mess.  After decades of enduring the chaos of a fishery managed on so much wrong, we finally have a chance to start over and manage it right.”

Managing red snapper “right” meaning that managers should increase the recreational kill to a level far larger than the biologists on the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee recommend.

That’s why recent news about a collaborative research project between the American Saltwater Guides Association and the New England Aquarium was so refreshing. 

Last June, the Guides Association announced that it was teaming up with the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium.  Some of the association's guides would work with scientists from the Aquarium to implant acoustic tags in false albacore caught off southeastern Massachusetts, with the work primarily underwritten by the wind energy company Orsted and sunglass manufacturer Costa del Mar.

False albacore are a logical research subject for the Guides Association, as the species is very important to the association’s members.  Particularly now, with striped bass and bluefish stocks overfished, false albacore are a primary target of fly and light tackle anglers fishing anywhere between Massachusetts and North Carolina; even as far south as Florida, where a number of species vie for the light tackle fisherman’s attention, they remain important to guides and their customers.

Yet, as the association explains on its website,

“Despite their popularity, we know almost nothing about false albacore biology and movements, likely due in large part to their lack of commercial value.  For example, are the fish anglers target off southern New England a separate sub-population from the fish found off North Carolina and Florida, or do they all represent a single well-mixed group?  Do schools of fish ‘set up shop’ in a general area for weeks at a time or are they always on the move?  Better understanding the degree of population connectivity is especially urgent given emerging potential threats to this species—for example, a fishery in south Florida to supply the bait market and the rapid expansion of offshore wind energy projects in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.

“An additional unknown when it comes to albies is the impact of recreational fishing on the species.  According to NOAA Fisheries, over the past decade, anglers along the Atlantic coast have caught and released between one and two million false albacore annually.  However, no research has been conducted to estimate the percentage of fish that survive after release or inform what steps anglers can take to maximize the chance of survival.”

The paragraph quoted immediately above highlights what is truly unique about the Guides Association’s false albacore study.  While other angling groups support research that might lead to a smaller summer flounder size limit or a larger red snapper bag, the Guides Association willingly initiated a research project that could potentially cast their members, and their members' clients, in a bad light.

That sort of altruism is far too rare among today’s recreational fishing organizations.

And, as things turned out, preliminary data suggests that the angling community has nothing to fear or to hide when it comes to false albacore.

When the acoustic tagging program was announced, it was met with some degree of skepticism.  Some fishermen believed that false albacore didn’t take handling well, and that many—perhaps most—died shortly after being released.  Others believed that, due to the species’ fast metabolism and high oxygen requirements, false albacore would not be amenable to tag implantation, and that few would survive the process.

But the preliminary data strongly suggests that the skeptics were wrong.  The tagged fish, once released, lit up the acoustic receiver arrays off Massachusetts, with 57 of the 63 albacore tagged being repeatedly detected.  That translates to a release mortality rate of just 9.5%, similar to the mortality rate for striped bass and summer flounder, and well below the release mortality rate for bluefish, black sea bass, and scup.

It was a good start, and both the Guides Association and the scientists working with them are looking forward to future data dumps, to see what new information the tags will provide.

Are the false albacore caught off Massachusetts the same fish that show up off New York and New Jersey?  How far do the Massachusetts fish migrate?  Do they make it as far south as North Carolina, or perhaps even Florida?  Or, after leaving Massachusetts, do they fall off the grid, perhaps moving far offshore to find warmer water and escape autumn’s chill.  Once they leave Massachusetts, will the fish demonstrate site fidelity, and return to Nantucket Sound next year?  Or are the migrations haphazard, with fish summering off Martha’s Vineyard one year, and off Block Island or Montauk the next?

And if the false albacore do return to their waters around their tagging site, how many of the tagged fish will be among them, and how many will have fallen victim to fishing mortality and natural predation?  Will the acoustic tagging data allow the scientists to determine anything about stock structure and/or stock health?

The answers to those questions, and perhaps to other questions that the Guides Association may never even have thought to ask, lie in the future.

For now, it is enough that the Guides Association has facilitated research into a species that, despite its importance to the recreational fishery, remains data poor and largely an enigma to the fisheries management community.  Perhaps, with the investment of additional money and time, the information developed by the Guides Association and its partners will lead to an initial fishery management plan for false albacore, meaningful management measures, and a false albacore stock capable of generating recreational opportunities and economic benefits long into the future.

For conserving and managing the false albacore resource, regardless of what form the conservation and management measures must take, is what the Guides Association false albacore project is all about.

 

-----

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT:  I have a professional relationship with the American Saltwater Guides Association, and also have a number of friends among its leadership.  Notwithstanding such relationships, I personally share and endorse the Association’s goals with respect to false albacore and many other species, and believe that I would be reporting on its conservation activities whether or not such relationships existed.

 

SOME GOOD NEWS FOR GULF RED SNAPPER

 

One week ago, the National Marine Fisheries Service issued regulations that should help end the chronic recreational overharvest of red snapper in the Gulf of Mexico.

The regulations address one of the biggest problems currently facing the red snapper stock:  The different methodologies used by NMFS and by the five Gulf Coast states to calculate annual private-boat recreational red snapper landings, which result in each data collection program coming up with different estimates of the red snapper catch.

NMFS depends on the Marine Recreational Information Program,often referred to by the acronym “MRIP,” which was adopted a few years ago to replace the badly flawed Marine Recreational Fishing Statistics Survey.  MRIP got generally good marks when it wasreviewed by a National Academy of Sciences panel a few years ago, but it hasone major flaw—collecting, analyzing, and reviewing MRIP data takes a longtime.  Preliminary data for each two-month “wave” isn’t available until about 45 days after the wave has ended, so preliminary data for Wave 3, May and June, isn’t available until about August 15^th, data for Wave 4, July and August, isn’t available until October 15^th, etc.

Final data for each fishing year doesn’t come out until mid-April.

That sort of delay makes the use of MRIP somewhat problematic when setting annual catch limits for the next fishing year.  When a fishery requires in-season quota management, which shuts down the season once recreational catch approaches the annual catch limit rather than setting a fixed closing date, the delays associated with MRIP data render such data all but useless.

That has proven to be the case in the private-boat recreational red snapper fishery in the Gulf of Mexico.

In an effort to improve the situation, NMFS has worked with the states to develop state-specific programs that supplement MRIP and provide more timely and, perhaps, more precise estimates of recreational fishing mortality.  

Some of those programs, such as Alabama’s Snapper Check and Mississippi’s Tales n’ Scales, are designed as a census intended to capture data from every private-boat red snapper angler each time they go fishing.  Others, including  Louisiana’s LACreel and Florida’s Gulf Reef Fish Survey, are surveys.  All four state programs have been certified by NMFS as appropriate adjuncts to MRIP.  Texas also tries to estimate its anglers’ red snapper landings, but uses an archaic, uncertified program of dubious precision that is not MRIP-certified.

NMFS bears the overall responsibility for managing red snapper in the Gulf of Mexico.  Pursuant to such authority, the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council has adopted Amendment 50 A-F to the Fishery Management Plan for the Reef Fish Resources of the Gulf of Mexico,  which provides the five Gulf Coast states with a limited ability to set private-boat red snapper regulations for both state waters and the federal waters of each state’s shores, provided that such regulations constrain recreational catch to or below the recreational red snapper allocation assigned to each state by NMFS.

That’s where things begin to get tricky, because of the different surveys used to estimate recreational red snapper harvest.

NMFS uses MRIP to set the state allocations, and MRIP-based landings estimates are used in the stock assessments that determine the health of the Gulf’s red snapper stock.  But the five Gulf Coast states use their own data collection systems to determine when their anglers are approaching the state red snapper allocation, and the season needs to be closed.

That’s not a problem in Louisiana and Florida, where the state surveys generally concur with MRIP.  It also isn’t a problem in Texas, where NMFS has basically thrown up its hands and stopped trying to find any accord between MRIP and Texas’ aged recreational data program, and just blindly accepts the Texas numbers.  But there is a real issue when it comes to Mississippi’s and Alabama’s estimates, because such estimates are much lower than those generated by MRIP.  As a result, Mississippi’s and Alabama’s private-boat recreational red snapper seasons run far longer than they would if MRIP data was used.

The result is a substantial overharvest of such states’ annual allocations.  To get recreational landings under control, NMFS must make the state data compatible with MRIP.  As explained by NMFS,

“The Federal Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP) based catch limits for Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana are not directly comparable to the landings estimates generated by each of those states, and the state estimates are not directly comparable to each other.  In other words, each state is estimating landings in a different ‘currency.’  Therefore, [NMFS] worked with the Gulf States to develop calibration ratios so that each state’s catch limit could be converted from the Federal ‘currency’ to the currency in which each state monitors landings.”

The regulations recently issued by NMFS adopt calibration factors for each state, which are intended to constrain each state’s landings to their NMFS-assigned allocations, despite the use of state data to estimate such landings.  

In the case of Florida and Louisiana, calibrating the MRIP-based federal allocations to state landings estimates will allow such states to increase their private-boat recreational red snapper landings by about 6%.  Predictably, neither the anglers in those states nor the various organizations that purport to represent them are complaining about such increases or arguing that they are inappropriate.

But when it comes to Alabama and Mississippi, things are very different.  Both states’ recreational data programs provided catch estimates far lower than those generated by MRIP.  Thus, when Alabama’s MRIP-based 1,145,026 pound allocation is converted into the “currency” used by the state’s Snapper Check program, the allocation is cut in half, to 558,200 pounds.  Something similar happens in Mississippi, where a 154,568 pound allocation based on federal data is converted into a Tails n' Scales-compatible 59,354 pounds.

Unlike fishermen in Florida and Louisiana (and in Texas, where state data is the only data available), anglers in Alabama and Mississippi aren’t happy with the calibration process, and are doing their best to oppose their resulting 2023 quotas.

The result is a cornucopia of hypocrisy, vitriol, and disinformation.

For many years, federal data, now provided by MRIP, has been incorporated into stock assessments, where higher levels of recreational landings and increased recreationakl catch per unit of effort suggest increased red snapper abundance.   Federal data is also used to set state allocations, including the 1,122,662 pounds of red snapper allocated to Alabama’s anglers in 2022.  Anglers were perfectly happy when the higher MRIP estimates were used for such purposes. 

In another Gulf fishery, red grouper, MRIP data was recently used to shift the allocation from 76% commercial/24% recreational to 59.3% commercial/40.7% recreational—a substantial change—and anglers were just fine with that, too.  They even suggested that such data could be used to change the allocation of other Gulf species.

But when it came to estimating the recreational red snapper landings caught by Alabama and Mississippi, the same anglers—along with the organizations which purport to represent them—suddenly decided that MRIP data was no good, and that the lower state estimates of red snapper landings, which allowed anglers to take home more fish, was the right information to use.

Thus, it appeared that "good data", at least in the recreational fishermen’s eyes, was whatever data allowed them to kill more snapper, grouper, or anything else.

Organizations associated with the recreational fishing industry have repeatedly attacked the calibration effort.  They seek to maintain the current level of red snapper landings, and as a part of that process, to convince anglers that the federal data was badly flawed.  

Last summer, a letter signed by the Center for Sportfishing Policy and four member organizations, sent to the Southeast Regional Office, argued against calibration by saying, in part, that

“we are disappointed with the lack of progress by the Gulf MRIP Transition Team in understanding the differences between MRIP and state data collection programs, the apparent inability of the state programs to be used in the ongoing red snapper research track assessment, and in calibrating the state data to an MRIP currency without first having the basic understanding of the vast discrepancies caused by MRIP.  As such, we urge NOAA Fisheries to refrain from requiring any calibration until those differences are understood and a more appropriate calibration methodology is developed, if necessary, while also moving forward with any new harvest level increases across sectors.”

It's a remarkable bit of doubletalk, since (a) the Transition Team does understand the differences between MRIP and state data collection programs; such differences are what calibration is all about, (b) the reason state data can’t be used in the stock assessment is because it isn’t calibrated and thus isn't compatible with MRIP or the data from other Gulf states, (c) it fails to explain why the “vast discrepancies” between MRIP and state data are “caused” by MRIP and not by inconsistencies in the state programs, and finally—and here we get to the heart of the matter—(d) it calls for delaying calibration, but for moving forward with any increases in the harvest level.

It's a clear ploy intended to keep recreational red snapper landings as high as possible for as long as possible.  It's also dismayingly typical of the recreational rhetoric throughout the red snapper debate.

Opposition to calibration isn’t limited to the angling industry and the anglers' rights crowd.  Politicians are always sensitive to public opinion and, given that Mississippi fishermen are unhappy with how the calibration process is working out for them, it's not surprising that Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) has jumped aboard the no-calibration bandwagon, issuing a press release saying, in part, that

“NOAA’s flawed rule is intended to prevent overfishing by modifying each state’s annual catch limits (ACLs) for red snapper.  This new formula will require calibrating Mississippi’s high quality ‘Tales n’ Scales’ data, which records accurate information for more than 95% of Mississippi’s annual red snapper catch, to the low-quality Federal Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP) data.

“The new calibration required by the rule will reduce Mississippi’s red snapper quota by 60 percent in 2023, meaning private anglers could reach their yearly quota in as little as three weeks…”

Is the calibration approach chosen by NMFS really that bad?

NMFS doesn’t think so.  In the narrative accompanying its recent regulation, it states,

“The federal surveys have been heavily tested, scrutinized, and reviewed, and NMFS remains committed to continue improving both state and federal survey methods, all of which are subject to sampling and non-sampling errors (measurement, coverage, and non-response).  MRIP uses standardized designs across states, which ensures comparability of estimates.  Conversely, due to the differing designs by the Gulf States, it is not possible to directly compare the estimates derived from the state surveys to each other or to the estimates produced by MRIP…”

As to the claims that the Alabama and Mississippi surveys are “better,” NMFS advises that

“It is difficult to know which surveys provide the best estimates of catch.  Different statistical sampling designs can produce different estimates due to variations in sampling frames and non-sampling error such as coverage error, nonresponse error, and measurement error.  It is not unusual for established surveys to produce very different estimates for the same population parameter.”

In that regard, it may be significant that the three surveys that seek to sample red snapper anglers—MRIP, LACreel, and Florida’s Gulf Reef Fish Survey—tend to yield similar results, while the two that seek to conduct a census of all recreational red snapper fishermen—Tales n’ Scales and Snapper Check—yield results very different from those produced by MRIP, while having very substantial, and not too different, calibration ratios of 0.3840  and 0.4875, respectively.

Such result might well stem, at least in part, from anglers who fail to comply with the Mississippi and Alabama programs.  Only about 70% of Mississippi’s red snapper anglers are believed to comply with the Tales n’ Scales requirements; in the case of Alabama’s Snapper Check, the compliance rate falls to a dismal 30%.  With respect to both programs, it has also been noted that

“The self-reporting of red snapper trips and catch may be susceptible to measurement errors if permit holders are either unaware of the mandatory reporting requirements or aware and choose to deliberately try to promote a given outcome.  The pairing of the mandatory reporting with a dockside sampling survey allows for direct measurements of differences between permit holder reports of landed fish and observations of landed fish made by trained dockside survey interviewers…”

It is possible that Alabama and Mississippi anglers are intentionally providing inaccurate reports in an effort to influence future management measures.  While dockside interviews are intended to capture and account for such bad information, it isn't very difficult for unethical anglers to get around such supposed safeguard, merely by submitting their false reports only after they were certain that no interviewers were on hand.  

Thanks to the new regulations, calibration of the Gulf States’ recreational red snapper data will finally take place in 2023, provided that such regulations aren’t blocked by federal legislation or by litigation.  Either could still occur, although the likelihood of a divided 118^th Congress passing such legislation is not very high, and the probability of a federal court invalidating the regulations probably isn't too much higher.

After being involved with red snapper issues for far too many years, and having known a few of the people who are fighting to keep landings high, I have little doubt that the private boat fleet will continue their fight to over-exploit the red snapper resource.

Still, with the issuance of its most recent regulations, it looks like NMFS may finally be taking action that will address the chronic recreational overharvest of Gulf of Mexico red snapper.  That, in itself, is good news.

 

 

 

 

THE STRANGE APPEAL OF MEDIOCRE FISHERIES MANAGEMENT

 

We were trying to protect the blowfish, and for a few hours, it looked like we would. Then things got derailed by a group of folks who clung to the status quo.

Blowfish, more properly known as “northern puffer,” range along the entire eastern seaboard of the United States, although they’re probably most common between southern New England and North Carolina. Unlike many members of the family Tetraodontidae, or pufferfish, the northern puffer has flesh that lacks tetrodotoxin, the toxin that makes eating other pufferfish, such as the notorious Japanese fugu, a true adventure in dining.

 

Commercial blowfish landings are modest, so most blowfish end up in markets and restaurants close to where the fish were caught; consumers outside coastal New England and the mid-Atlantic states are generally unfamiliar with the species. Nonetheless, the fish are popular where they are sold. Not only is the meat white and firm, but it is practically boneless, with only a flat and easily removed backbone separating two solid pieces of flesh that resemble nothing so much as large chicken nuggets. For that reason, northern puffers are often marketed as “chicken of the sea” or “sea squab.” Their good-tasting meat has also earned then the nickname of “sugar toads” along the shores of the Chesapeake Bay.

 

There is also a small recreational fishery. Some anglers target the species, while others catch them incidentally while fishing for something else. Because puffers are often found deep inside sheltered bays and estuaries, and because they are not fussy about what they’ll eat, they are an ideal fish for shorebound and novice anglers, and are a particular favorite of young fishermen, who enjoy watching them swallow air and puff up into the somewhat bristly ball that gave the species its name.

No state currently regulates either the commercial or the recreational blowfish fishery, a fact that probably contributes to the extreme swings in puffer abundance. They can be very abundant for a few years, and then all but disappear from a waterway for many years before returning in unexpected abundance. When that happens, landings spike as both commercial and recreational fishermen take advantage of the unregulated fishery, only to drive down abundance and cause another drought until an unusually strong year class arises.

The boom-and-bust nature of the northern puffer fishery is revealed in Marine Recreational Information Program data for the past forty years. Such data shows recreational landings of 77,000 northern puffers in 1981, which increased for a couple of years before falling back to 55,000 fish in 1984, then increasing modestly before suddenly spiking to over 2,170,000 fish in 1988 and staying well over 1,000,000 puffers per year until another decline began in 1993. Over the next 16 years, recreational puffer landings swung between 180,00 and 1,070,000 fish per year, remaining somewhere between 200,000 and 600,000 fish for most of that time.

Annual puffer landings began spiking again in 2010, hit a high of 5,100,000 in 2011, and have remained above 1,500,000 fish in all but three of the years since.

Recently, members of New York’s Marine Resources Advisory Council (MRAC) have asked the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) to consider adopting regulations to protect the northern puffer, in the hopes of eliminating the wild swings between abundance and absence and create a more stable fishery.

The recreational sector, in particular, would benefit from a dependable puffer fishery. Ever since the winter flounder fishery collapsed two decades ago; since larger minimum sizes on summer flounder, scup, and black sea bass, adopted at about the same time, pushed anglers seeking those fish into deeper water; and, more recently, since bluefish became overfished, there has been little for anglers limited to sheltered bays and other protected waters to pursue during most of the summer, when recreational activity is at its peak.

A healthy population of puffers would provide a good-to-eat and easy-to-catch alternative for casual family fishermen who do not want to expend the time and effort needed to successfully hunt striped bass and weakfish, and for anglers who, for whatever reason, must seek their fish from the beach, docks, and piers. An abundance of puffers would also provide a viable target for both party boats and private vessels on those days when the wind blows and makes it unpleasant, and often unsafe, to venture into the ocean to target other species.

Crafting blowfish regulations is a difficult task, as there is little information available to guide fishery managers’ decisions. Still, some things are known. Puffers are a short-lived fish, with few surviving for more than four years. They spawn from late spring through late summer.

About 50% of puffers spawn when they are seven inches long, a length that some reach by the end of their first summer; 100% spawn at a length of eight inches. A seven-inch-long puffer can produce about 80,000 eggs, while an eight-inch puffer can produce nearly twice as many. Few puffers grow to be more than ten inches long.

The DEC conducts regular, fishery-independent surveys in New York’s inshore waters. A substantial majority of the puffers caught in such surveys are less than one year old, suggesting that fishing mortality might be attenuating the age structure of the population. Puffers are slow, and not strong swimmers, so they probably don’t engage in significant migrations; if that is the case, state management can have a meaningful impact on local populations.

MRAC meetings often see heated debates over management measures, but when faced with the information that the DEC provided with respect to northern puffers, those MRAC members who attended the November 2022 meeting seemed to reach a quick consensus, at least with respect to recreational regulations. No one seemed to oppose an 8-inch minimum size, and all seemed to agree on a bag limit that fell somewhere between 10 or 12 fish at the low end to perhaps 25 to 30 fish on the high side.

The DEC agreed to draft a few sets of potential regulations that the MRAC could review early in 2023.

But the consensus reached at the November meeting lasted for less than one day. By the middle of the following morning, at least one member was having second thoughts, concerned that the 8-inch minimum size was too high, and would prevent shorebound anglers from retaining the immature, 4-, 5-, and 6-inch puffers that some currently took home by the pailful.

It’s not completely clear why some MRAC members had such a quick change of heart, although it was rumored that one member of the public, who was observing the November meeting, had telephoned members of the recreational fishing industry later that day and gave them a heads-up about what was said. Such calls led to worry that the eight-inch minimum size might cause some decline in bait and tackle sales.

 

The benefits that might accrue from such a size limit were apparently given far less consideration.

It’s a pattern that we’ve seen far too often, in too many commercial and recreational fisheries. The fishing industry tends to worry that regulations intended to rebuild and manage fish stocks might cause an immediate reduction in the income already accruing from a stressed, or even a depleted, fishery, and thus opposes new management measures, even though such measures, if successful, might lead to far greater long-term benefits for both the fish and the fishing industry.

New York’s winter flounder provide a perfect example, for they, too, once supported an unregulated recreational fishery that has since fallen upon hard times.

When the flounder population began to decline during the late 1980s, the DEC sought to adopt regulations that might halt, and perhaps reverse, the slide. A strict bag limit was proposed. The recreational fishing industry, and in particular the party boat fleet, immediately objected, saying that, while some regulations might be needed, their customers must retain the “perception” that they could have a “big day,” and go home with a pailful of fish.

Such comments led to regulations that were significantly less restrictive than those that DEC biologists had originally recommended. The industry was pleased. Flounder abundance continued to decline.

Eventually, scientists determined that the winter flounder population was badly overfished. In response, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission adopted very restrictive regulations, that included a 2-fish bag limit, a 12-inch minimum size, and a 60-day season. At a 2009 MRAC meeting, one member suggested shutting the fishery down completely in an effort to increase flounder abundance.

 

A recreational fishing industry representative objected, “noting that the recreational fishing community is in trouble and they needed to have the opportunity to fish. She pleaded that the Council not take the more conservative approach (i.e., harvest moratorium). They need to keep the shops open.”

 

New York didn’t close its winter flounder season, even though very few flounder remained in its waters. While New York anglers landed nearly 14,500,000 winter flounder in 1984, by 2022 estimated landings for the entire state had fallen to a mere 21 fish. Winter flounder don’t “keep the shops open” anymore.

 

Perhaps a changing climate made the flounder’s collapse inevitable; it is possible that no management action, however severe, could have prevented the stock’s demise. But if the angling industry had been willing to accept meaningful management measures thirty or forty years ago, when the flounder began its decline, it is also possible that a smaller but nonetheless viable winter flounder fishery might yet remain.

Given the reaction to proposed blowfish management measures, it seems that the industry is willing to repeat the mistake that it made with winter flounder, not that many years ago.

Northern puffers are a data-poor species. The DEC has no way of knowing whether New York’s puffer population is currently healthy and sustainable, or whether it is badly overfished and on the verge of collapse. When data is so scarce, fishery managers are wise to compensate with an abundance of caution.

Right now, in New York, puffers support a very modest fishery; for the years 2017 through 2021, annual landings averaged about 216,000 fish, well below the 860,000 bluefish, 930,000 black sea bass, or 7,000,000 scup that the state’s anglers took home in 2021. Because most of those blowfish are either caught from shore or from small boats, the economic benefits accruing from the recreational fishery are probably very modest as well. But older anglers, who participated in New York’s fishery during the 1950s and 1960s, say that puffers were far more abundant then than they are today, and could be caught in much greater numbers.

 

It is very possible that, with appropriate management, puffers could be returned to their past abundance, an abundance that could generate far more recreational opportunities, many more good meals, and far greater economic benefits than the fishery does today. But to make that happen, the recreational fishing industry must be willing to invest in the future, by accepting some restrictions on today’s so-so fishery.

It’s possible such investment will never pan out, and that tackle shops might suffer the lost sales of a few packs of bait, a few dozen hooks, and a handful of sinkers, but fail to reap compensatory rewards. The fear of such failure may well underlie the industry’s reluctance to accept regulation; the mediocrity that they know may seem a far better alternative than an uncertain bet on future abundance.

Yet, if our fisheries—not just blowfish, but every fishery that is currently under stress—are ever to reach their full potential, whether that potential is measured in recreational opportunities, food production, or economic benefits, both fishermen and the fishing industry must reject “good enough” and insist that managers take whatever actions are needed to develop fisheries that are healthy and sustainable in the long term.

Some mistakes will be made, and some management efforts will fail. Yet fisheries that are merely “good enough” just—aren’t.

For while mediocrity may seem familiar and safe, it is also unstable. As the winter flounder, as well as the Atlantic cod, the shortfin mako, and a host of other species, have taught us, mediocrity too easily morphs into decline. And that, in the end, is far, far harder to fix.

 

-----

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 ARE FISH FOR?

 

One of my favorite conservation-related quotes was written by pioneer ecologist Aldo Leopold, who noted,

“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.”

I was first struck by its relevance to fisheries management two decades ago, when I sat on the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council.  Spiny dogfish management was a big issue back then, with quotas being cut back in response to an apparent decline in dogfish abundance.  One of the other Council members, who otherwise seemed to be a very bright and perceptive person, made a comment that could be summed up as “Who cares?  They’re not good for anything, and if they disappear, maybe something more useful will take their place.”

It struck me as an amazingly ignorant comment when it was made, particularly given the context.  Here we were, sitting on a panel created for the very purpose of conserving and managing the region’s marine resources and maintaining a healthy marine ecosystem, yet we had members who were not only indifferent to, but mildly supportive of, the possible demise of a significant ecosystem component.

I’ll admit that I curse dogfish as much as the next guy, when they swarm baits meant for cod, bluefish, or fluke, or when they climb all over jigs intended for black sea bass, and then try to wrap around my arm and poke a spine through my skin as I do my best to unhook them without causing any significant harm.  

I don’t particularly like them, but that doesn’t mean that I wish their kind ill.

Yet, as I look back, that sort of live-and-let-live attitude had to be learned.

When I encountered my first spiny dogfish, I was maybe ten years old, fishing for cod on a party boat out of Plymouth, Massachusetts (I’d caught dogfish before, in Long Island Sound, but they were all of the smooth variety, fish with no spines and flat, dull teeth, which usually don’t come in swarms and are far less trouble to handle).  Quite a few were caught by the boat’s anglers that day, and without exception, once they were unhooked by one of the mates, that mate would bend back their snout, break their spine, and toss them back into the water where, their ability to swim lost, they would flip onto their backs and drift into the depths, to eventually die.

At the time, I thought that’s just how things were done.  And now that I think of it, a lot of the smooth dogfish that we caught in the Sound didn’t survive the encounter, either.

It’s just how folks dealt with “trash fish” back then.  If you caught an ocean pout while fishing for cod, you stomped on its back just behind its head, and tossed it back into the sea.  The skate or sea robin that was unfortunate enough to take a bait meant for flounder or fluke was quickly reeled to shore and tossed into the rocks, while the cunner hooked while fishing for blackfish was quickly unhooked, slammed against the boat’s rail, and fed to the gulls.  Windowpane flounder caught off the docks while fishing for smelt were tossed into the local lobsterman’s boat, destined to be bait.

When I went south, I noted that fishermen inevitably cut the tails off stingrays before trying to remove the hook, while the cutlassfish that hit snook baits at night were always left to die on the bridge catwalks.

That was just 1960s thinking, when the term “ecosystem” was not yet in common use and a fish that wasn’t somehow useful for people was considered “trash.”  The irony is that, sixty years later, most of the fish that I mentioned above—the skates and sea robins, the cunners and windowpanes, and even the dogfish—actually provide a good meal, if one knows how to clean and prepare them, but in our ignorance, we left them to rot.  

Because they weren’t “any good.”

Today, most anglers know better, although some skates and sea robins still meet their ends gasping for oxygen between jetty rocks.  But the question of what a fish “is for”—do they exist merely to satisfy human wants and needs (and if so, whose wants and needs)?—still remains.

That question often arises in allocation fights, when advocates from the recreational sector argue that fishing for sport provides the greatest social and economic benefits, and fish should be reserved for that purpose, while those supporting the commercial sector, and sometimes the for-hire fishery as well, maintain that fish should be utilized for food, and not treated like playthings.  Some will even suggest that catch-and-release fishing, a game in which fish and angler participate, but only the angler truly consents to join, is a cruel and somewhat sadistic enterprise.

And, of course, the lines between sport, food, and commercial fishing aren’t all that cut and dried.

I love to cast plugs and bucktails around western Connecticut’s sod banks and boulders, searching for striped bass.  Although I no longer live along those shores, they’re where I grew up and where I learned to fish, and I still enjoy fishing with friends there.  I catch my share of legal-sized fish, but haven’t brought a striped bass home in over 30 years.

On the other hand, when I’m headed offshore, there’s always ice in the fish box.  I might be fishing for sharks, which will all be released, but if a dolphin (the mahi-mahi kind, not the mammal) comes into my chum slick, I’ll do my best to invite it into the boat for dinner.  When I’m trolling, the first tuna to hit (provided that it’s of legal size) comes aboard, while subsequent fish will probably be released.

So don’t ask me to decide whether a yellowfin is a “sport” or a “food” fish; it can be either or both, depending on who catches it, and their inclination at the time.

We see the same sort of thing when we try to draw a sharp line between “recreational” and “commercial” fisheries.  In theory, it’s easy.  As the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act tells us,

“The term ‘commercial fishing’ means fishing in which the fish harvested, either in whole or in part, are intended to enter commerce or enter commerce through sale, barter, or trade,”

while

“The term ‘recreational fishing’ means fishing for sport or pleasure.”

But are the two mutually exclusive?  Years ago, I used to fish in a tournament sponsored by a local club, which encouraged all entrants to donate their fish to the sponsors, who would then sell them, in a live auction, to people watching the weigh-in.  Fish that weren’t sold on the dock were shipped to market, and all proceeds from the sales were donated to a well-respected charity.  The anglers received nothing for their catch.

I got some of the tournament workers upset with me when I refused to donate my fish, because I didn’t hold a commercial tuna permit.  They kept telling me that my permit didn’t matter, because I wasn’t selling the fish directly and, after all, the proceeds were going to charity.  The argument went on for a few years, but in the end, the enforcement folks from the National Marine Fisheries Service learned about the sales, and politely informed the club that, if they continued, there would be legal consequences.

NMFS had no doubt about what commercial fishing was, but there were plenty of folks at the club who disagreed.

Things get even foggier when you think about the anglers who charter a boat and fish for bluefin tuna.  Bluefin less than 73 inches long may not be sold; bluefin over 73 inches may be sent to market, provided that the boat from which they’re caught have a commercial permit.  Many charter boats opt for a commercial endorsement so that they may sell their customers’ catch.

If the first fish landed is less than 73 inches in length, and the customers decide to keep it, the boat is deemed to be fishing recreationally, and no fish caught on that trip may be sold.  If the first fish is over 73 inches and is retained, the boat is deemed to be fishing commercially, and no fish under 73 inches may be kept.  Under such circumstances, are the anglers who chartered the boat, but may or may not receive some of the proceeds from any fish sold, commercial fishermen?

And, from a regulatory standpoint, does being a “commercial fisherman” mean more than just selling an occasional fish?  

In Massachusetts, anyone who opts to pay the commerciallicense fee may sell striped bass; in New York, commercial striped bass permits are only issued to people who can prove that they earn a significant amountof their income from fishing, and even so, no new fishermen are currentlyallowed to enter the commercial bass fishery.  

To the extent that a portion of the annual striped bass landings are set aside and labelled “commercial quota,” should those fish go to those who support themselves and their families, in whole or in part, through fishing, or should so-called “recremercial fishermen,” who hold down good-paying jobs, fish strictly “for sport and pleasure,” but sell a handful of fish each year to cover the cost of gas, bait, and beer, be allowed to compete with professional fishermen for a part of the commercial quota?

Again, we confront the question, what are fish—in this case, fish designated for the commercial sector—really for?

Finally, we get to one of the more difficult philosophical end ethical questions:  What is a particular fish for—that is, what is its highest and best use—not only when human and ecological considerations clash, but when different human needs and uses clash as well?

Consider the alewife.

In parts of eastern Canada, they call the fish “gaspereau.”  An article in Hakai magazine reports that, with the decline of Atlantic herring and mackerel, alewives are drawing more attention as an alternative lobster bait.  But alewives are an important forage fish, both for larger ocean denizens and for creatures such as bald eagles once the gaspereau ascent coastal rivers to spawn.  Alewife runs are often vulnerable to overfishing; many in the eastern United States have all but disappeared, while others are struggling.  Canadian runs, including some that are healthy today, have also been overfished in the past.

Aside for the growing interest in alewives as lobster bait, the fish have long been targeted in a commercial food fishery that sent inexpensive, salted gaspereau to Haiti, where it provides affordable protein in one of the poorest nations in the world.

There is concern that Canadian alewife runs won’t be able to fully support all those uses without going into decline.

That raises the question of what an alewife is for.

Is the highest and best use of an alewife to fulfill its ecosystem role as a forage fish?  To feed desperately poor people in Haiti?  Or to provide bait in a fishery targeting a luxury food that no one must eat to survive, but also supports the fishermen who catch the lobster?

If one takes the hopefully dying view that the worth of a fish, or any other resource, is only gauged by the value that it provides for people, then the ecosystem role is discounted, but the ethical dilemma of using gaspereau to feed the poor, or using them for bait for the lobster which occasionally feed the at least semi-wealthy (while providing support for others who might be less well off) remains.

It’s a completely subjective decision.  I suggest that the right answer is none of the above.

Alewives—and every other fish—are not for anything or anyone.  Like any other form of life on Earth—whether a sumac tree, a box turtle, a blue whale, or a human—fish merely are.  They are among the current survivors of an evolutionary process that has been ongoing for more than 3.5 billion years, and will continue for another billion years into the future.  To assume that they evolved with a purpose, much less the purpose of serving a particularly prolific, tool-making primate that first walked the earth a mere 300,000 years ago, represents folly at best, and at worst a reprehensible arrogance.

Instead of trying to figure out what fish are for, and devaluing those that have no perceptible use, we should be caught up in wonder at their variety, their beauty, and their ubiquity, and thankful that they can satisfy some of our needs, so long as we remain mindful of their needs as well.