Nice Flounder. But the definition of a "doormat" gets smaller every year.

Marine conservationists and saltwater anglers in North Carolina were handed another setback in their struggle to gain protection for the state’s southern flounder stocks. The species, which is one of the most popular catches among inshore saltwater anglers and also heavily commercialized, has been overfished for nearly two decades.

A questionable management plan approved last year by the state’s Marine Fisheries Commission (MFC) (and reported in Shallow Water Angler) was withdrawn after strong protests from recreational anglers and conservation groups. The plan would have achieved little more than half of the 24 percent harvest reduction required, and much of that would have come from the recreational sector, which takes only 15 percent of southern flounder.

The MFC also failed to follow the majority of recommendations of a southern flounder advisory committee. The plan has little chance of restoring the fishery within 10 years as required by North Carolina state law, so the main concern seems to be protecting the commercial fishery.

“It’s time that fisheries management leaders begin doing what is necessary to stop overfishing,” said Bill Mandulak, chairman of CCA North Carolina’s fisheries issues committee.

The new plan, which now goes to the Secretary of the Division of Environment and Natural Resources and the Joint Legislative Commission on Seafood and Aquaculture for review, is expected to achieve only a 17 percent reduction in annual take, far below the 24 percent required to recover the species. A Division of Marine Fisheries Assessment of the proposed regulations found only a one-in-four chance that the plan will eliminate overfishing by the year 2009. The MFC’s answer is to re-assess the stock status three years after the plan is implemented in 2006, and then make changes only if necessary to achieve recovery by 2014.

But, pointed out Chris Elkins, a member of CCA North Carolina’s fisheries issues committee, there has been no effort to determine what level of flounder stocks should be achieved by 2009, so there is little confidence that the MFC will take the necessary steps at that time. “I’m just afraid that there will be no movement toward recovery in three years, and the MFC will then say there just hasn’t been enough time.”

OTHER CONSERVATION NEWS:

Striper Harvest in the EEZ Postponed

Concerned about a high level of mortality in striped bass stocks, the National Marine Fisheries Service has decided to delay completion of an Environmental Impact Study that’s required before reopening federal waters to commercial harvest of the species.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) had earlier recommended removing the moratorium against harvest in the Exclusive Economic Zone—which is the federally controlled water that extends from state boundaries out to 200 miles offshore. A 2004 stock analysis, however, found that fishing mortality on striped bass was well above the level determined appropriate as defined in the ASMFC Striped Bass Fishery Management Plan. The results of the analysis have been questioned because of the current high level of striper abundance.

The ASMFC Technical Committee will conduct another stock assessment, due in the fall of 2005, that will either confirm the 2004 findings or possibly answer questions about the uncertainty of the high mortality levels in the last assessment.

SWA