Striper Take Threatens Overall Fishery

Stripers Forever President Brad Burns charges that the recent Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) striped bass stock assessment (for 2006) is flawed. It fails to recognize that the recreational fishery for stripers on the Atlantic Coast is slipping away, he says.

“The spin message from the ASMFC assessment is that striped bass are not being over-fished,” says Burns. “But as commercial and recreational removals continue at historic levels, anglers from North Carolina to Maine are catching fewer and smaller stripers. Even through the fog created by the ASMFC’s wildly vacillating stock assessment numbers, the real message is clear: By every measurement, fishing mortality on stripers is rising and the spawning stock biomass is shrinking.”

The assessment concludes that striped bass are not being overfished, although the spawning stock biomass—the total weight of all spawning age fish—has declined each of the last four years. Further, it claims fishing mortality is at the “target” fishing mortality rate—the maximum rate at which striped bass can be harvested. Thus, the ASMFC has declined to take action on striped bass management this year. Another review is planned for next year.

Stripers Forever believes a more in-depth review is warranted. Concerns are that the stock assessment centers on the fluctuations that these statistics have had over the last five or six years, and that fishery managers are putting a positive spin on striped bass stocks by focusing on the good years.

Things may not be so rosy. Consider the serious negative indications of the 2004 stock assessment (covering the 2003 fishing year) in which the much-heralded Virtual Population Analysis (VPA) method determined the spawning stock biomass had fallen to 13,600 metric tons, a 30 percent drop from the record 18,900 tons registered just two years earlier. The fishing mortality rate, which hovered in the target .30 area for several years, shot up to an alarming .40 overall, and much higher on the larger breeding-size fish. These data suggest overfishing of adult striped bass.

For 2008, the VPA model has been scrapped in favor of a new formula which showed that the spawning stock peaked in 2003, not 2001, and not at 18,900 tons but actually at 33,000 (and has since declined to 25,000 metric tons). There seem to be inconsistencies and surprises in the new report that beg further explanation.

On the recreational side, all the data were derived from the Marine Recreational Fisheries Statistics Surveys (MRFSS), conducted annually by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). This survey is strictly anecdotal and was designed to observe long-term trends and was never intended for use in making stock allocation decisions. Reportedly, NMFS will develop a new recreational data collection system to replace MRFSS, but until such a system is developed, there will continue to be no other source of data for estimating harvest and releases.

Stripers Forever’s own annual survey of its own membership each year since 2003 suggests that fishing was worse, or much worse than five years earlier. In fact, 2006 was the third consecutive year that member anglers felt the fishery was declining in quality. Though anecdotal, responses from recreational anglers were consistent and not very encouraging. And 2007 was a year of increasingly negative reports from a majority of anglers.

In light of this, Stripers Forever stands by its stance for gamefish status for stripers throughout its range and a stoppage of the slaughter of the large breeding females. Their position is that rather than give in to the pressure of commercial quotas, the ASMFC should manage striped bass at a much lower fishing mortality rate to preserve the quality of this fishery for the millions of people who fish for striped bass, and for the striped bass recreational fishing industry that is now valued at upward of 2 billion annually.

To read the full commentary by Stripers Forever on the ASMFC stock assessment report, visit www.stripersforever.org under “recent items.”

New Tautog Regs a Good Start

It is common knowledge among New York state inshore anglers that the lucrative “live fish” market for tasty tautog (blackfish) is going strong, and if not kept in check, threatens to further decimate the fishery. In an effort to restore the stocks, New York state’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), which tracks and documents commercial landings, has issued new regulations effective this fall.

The new rules reduce the bag limit from 10 fish to four, and shorten the legal fishing season to a period from October 1 to December 20, and from January 17 to April 30. The 14-inch minimum size limit remains unchanged.

“The new regs should cut fishing mortality and allow spawning stock biomass to increase, so we can all start seeing more fish,” said Brian O’Keefe, Chair of CCA New York’s Government Relations Committee.

Most of New York’s recreationally caught tautog were landed during spring and fall. However, when cod and whiting fisheries collapsed, many for-hire vessels, particularly those out of New York City and western Long Island, started targeting tautog all winter, shifting the majority of the harvest to winter months. The for-hire industry lobbied hard for a delay in the opening of the fall season to extend the winter season—a move that would have effectively denied access to the fishery for “family fishermen” in small boats, or those unwilling or unable to brave winter seas and cold.

“We are gratified that the DEC has made maintaining access to this fishery for most of New York’s recreational anglers one of the goals of the new regulations,” said Bill Raab, CCA New York president.

Recreational anglers also praise the DEC for their plan to close the fishery on April 30. This will protect spawning aggregations in inshore waters, which occurs in May, June and sometimes July. CCA New York has lobbied for this measure for some time, but makes it clear that it is time to make efforts to stop the live fish market that is growing each year. Prices as high as $9 per pound being paid by area restaurants have attracted a number of both unlicensed and licensed commercial fishermen, some of whom are ignoring size and bag limits, and end up falsifying catch reports.

The DEC announced that it is preparing a public information document to be released later this year to obtain input on additional measures that might help rebuild local stocks of this important recreational fish. CCA New York hopes that such additional measures will include the outlawing of the live fish market for tautog.

“We must outlaw the live fish market for tautog,” declares Charles Witek, state Chair for CCA. “If the market continues unchecked and continues to pay high prices for live tautog, there will always be fishermen willing to break the rules. Only after the sale of live tautog, at the wholesale or retail level, is outlawed will we have a realistic chance of rebuilding a healthy tautog population.”

Florida Red Tide Blowin’ in the Wind?

With worsening red tide outbreaks causing mounting economic losses due to poor fishing and lost tourism dollars, more Southwest Florida inshore anglers suspect that the blooms are fueled by nutrient-rich discharges from Lake Okeechobee through the Lake’s west outlet, the Caloosahatchee River (the other being the St. Lucie River on the Florida Atlantic coast).

There might be a double whammy, as far as sources of “bloom fuel” are concerned, given recent research by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The NOAA report claims that nutrients from the Mississippi River are to blame, which is really nothing new. Scientists say that autumn wind shifts drive the runoff, and red tide algae colonies, toward Florida Gulf shores, rather than to the western Florida continental shelf. Meanwhile, anglers and residents who fish and recreate on the St. Lucie River are suing the Army Corps of Engineers over repeated Lake Okeechobee discharges that repeatedly degrade their estuarine river. Visit www.riverscoalition.org for more information.

Sportfishing is BIG Business

> Sportfishing really delivers—consider that the nearly one million jobs supported by recreational anglers are nearly three times the number of people working for the U.S. United Parcel Service.

> In 2006, the total number of fishing days in the U.S. equaled 1,289,300 years of fishing.

> If you converted all of the money spent by anglers into dollar bills, and placed them end to end, that “money trail” would reach to the moon and back nine times!

> In 2006, coastal states among the top 10 that attract the highest number of non-resident anglers include Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, New York and Texas. Just a little something for those states’ legislators to mull over.

> The amount of federal tax revenues generated by angler spending in 2006 ($8.9 billion) is roughly that of the entire 2006 budget for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

> While many industries are struggling, or disappearing altogether, the average amount that anglers spent on fishing tackle increased 16 percent from 2001 to 2006.