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(from Jersey Coast Anglers Association May 2000 Newsletter)
NMFS proposes to change the line dividing the Northern Angler BFT and Southern Angler BFT management areas. The current line is the center of Delaware Bay or 38-47'N. The proposal is to move this dividing line just north of The Ocean City, NJ inlet, better known as Great Egg Inlet at 39-18'N. Another NMFS proposal is moving the line south of Ocean City,MD to 38-03'N. NMFS also offered a rolling opening and closing by area program. Neither of the latter two items will address NMFS over-estimating of northern anglers’ landings. his is the problem with the current N-S line. NMFS other proposal of moving the line to 38-03N is south of Ocean City, MD and would make the problem worse.
This issue was raised with NMFS by anglers involved in the process. The reasons for this change are simple and straightforward. The present line causes a modest landing of School and Large school by south Jersey boats (Cape May) to be multiplied by NMFS TOTAL list of New Jersey BFT permitted boats. Two/Thirds of the NJ boats are based above Ocean City. This causes the northern zone to be closed even though the areas above Ocean City usually caught at the most an occasional fish. The real problem is NMFS statistical program. However, NMFS's refuses to divide NJ for their statistical purposes of estimating angler landings. Moving the N/S line is the only alternative NMFS will consider at this time.
The positive result of this change should be an increase in available the number of northern fish actually landed. In the past, the current Delaware Bay line has resulted in an early closure of the northern angler BFT category by fish landed only by Cape May boats.
To compensate the southern zone for shifting New Jersey (Cape May) boats to their zone,anglers proposed that the current N-S split be swapped. The split is currently 52.8% N and 47.2% south. The current North quota would be assigned to the south and the south quota assigned to the north. The difference in School Bluefin is 5 MT of fish. The difference in large school and small medium is near 7 MT. Anglers who supported this change believe the change will extend the north zone season. They believe this change and allocation swap will allow the northern zone to remain open for a longer time during the BFT season.
We have requested documentation from NMFS to support this proposal. We trust such documentation will be received in time to document this proposal at the April JCAA meeting.
NMFS just released a federal register notice that opens the angler bluefin tuna season on June 23 and closes it on July 30, 2000. If the quota is not caught, BFT will reopen in September and close in October. The daily retention limit is two School BFT and one large school or small medium per vessel trip. Catch and release is allowed. During the 1999 season anglers fell way short around 50% of their 1999 quota. These under ages will be added to anglers’ 2000 season quota. The Atlantic Tunas Information and permitting line is 1-(888) 872-8862.
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