 |
 |
|
|
||
Summer Flounder, Scup Seabass and Bluefish
by Tom Fote
(from Jersey Coast Anglers Association September 2002 Newsletter)
Tuesday and Wednesday (August 6 & 7) I attended the joint meeting of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission and the Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Management Council. I have been attending these meetings since the first joint plan on summer flounder, scup and seabass was put in place in the early 90’s. As always, this was a very unique experience.
I understand that there are valid commercial issues that must be addressed at these joint meetings and we need to spend whatever time is needed to address these issues adequately. I also understand that we must protect the small boats from being eliminated from the fishery by larger vessels. We spend a great deal of time at these joint meetings addressing this issue in a variety of ways. The state directors, council members and commissioners invest a great deal of time and energy on all the commercial issues. It is only fair that we spend whatever time is necessary to hammer out plans that address the concerns of all commercial interests as fairly as possible.
What disturbs me is that we do not allot the same time, interest and energy to the recreational issues. In fact, when I raise recreational concerns I get little response. One or two commissioners and council members express the same concerns but the overwhelming majority of state directors, council members and commissioners are in denial and prefer to simply ignore these issues. It appears to me that the only time that they are concerned about recreational issues is when there is a perceived impact on the commercial sector. Rather than addressing important underlying problems they choose to focus on how they can make the recreational community adhere to their ill-conceived management plans.
For example, for months I have been talking to commissioners, council members and staff about my belief that it is inappropriate to develop the recreational measures for 2003 in December at a meeting at Duck Island, North Carolina. Geographically, this meeting is clearly out of the reach of most recreational anglers and members of the recreational industry that depend on these species. You can’t get to Duck Island in less than a full day by plane or car unless you actually live in North Carolina.
At this meeting they will set the recreational measures for scup for 2003. Scup is a very important recreational fishery from North Jersey to Massachusetts. Recreational anglers have not caught scup south of Barnegat Inlet in the last 20 years. How many recreational anglers, charter boat captains, party boat captains, tackle store owners and people from the other related industries from Barnegat Inlet north can make it to Duck Island? When we talk about summer flounder New York and New Jersey are the areas of greatest harvest by recreational anglers. Again, this fishery goes from North Carolina to Massachusetts. Sea Bass has a similar geographic area. After months of complaining about this I raised the issue at the joint meeting. I pointed out that we would never have a meeting primarily about commercial issues at a site that was so unreachable by the majority of commercial interests. They would not consider having a lobster meeting anywhere south of New England unless everyone could fly to Washington, DC for the day.
After I made my concerns known I asked Rick Cole, chairman of the demersal committee, to respond to them. I suggested we could have a special meeting on this topic at a more accessible place or that we could reschedule for the January Council Meeting. His response was that the meeting would be held in Duck Island. End of discussion! No one else insisted on finding another option. Members of the Mid-Atlantic Council will be at the meeting in Duck Island whether they discuss scup, summer flounder and sea bass.
I have asked the other New Jersey commissioners to join me in asking Governor McGreevey to send a letter to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission requesting a change in this meeting location. I am hoping commissioners from other states will ask their governors for the same support. We will also reach out to the Mid-Atlantic Council members from New Jersey and our federal legislators. We want them to contact the Mid-Atlantic Council and the National Marine Fisheries Service with a request to change this meeting. I hope we receive support from New York, Delaware, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maryland and Connecticut.
Another example of their lack of interest in recreational issues is the negative impact that the increased size limits on summer flounder and other species has on certain segments of the recreational industry. I have been discussing this particular issue for years. When the size limit is raised, charter boats, party boats and some private boats move further off shore to locate the larger fish. Recreational anglers with smaller boats or those who fish from piers, bulkheads, canals, shorelines or the beach are in large measure being eliminated from the summer flounder fishery. Because the season closes early, before the larger summer flounder are available in the surf, surf fishermen are able to catch few, if any, keeper summer flounder. The people affected the most are the poor or subsistence fishermen. This is a point I make regularly at these meetings to no avail. The council and commission members never want to talk about it. This is essentially the same issue as the commercial concerns about big boats and small boats and yet we have no difficulty spending whatever time is needed to discuss this commercial concern. Small boat commercial fishermen do get council appointments or are able to demand that their representatives on the council and state directors pay attention to their concerns. This is not true of the poor and subsistence anglers. How many of them will be at Duck Island or any council meeting?
SUMMER FLOUNDER
First, years ago there was a large discrepancy between what the National Marine Fisheries Service reported as landings for summer flounder by commercial fishermen in New York State and the results of a survey conducted by the New York DEP. As a result, New York tightened its reporting requirements and amended their regulations to address the problem. But there was never any discussion about handling the discrepancy with a payback.
Second, there was a lawsuit initiated by North Carolina commercial fishermen that resulted in an award of 3 million pounds of summer flounder to the commercial sector. Although a higher court later overturned this award, no effort was made to recoup the 3 million pounds from the commercial sector. In these two cases, the stocks were really down and the recreational sector was unable to even catch the allowed quota.
Third, whenever a court case addresses illegal commercial landings of summer flounder, it seems to take a long time for rulings to be made. The National Marine Fisheries Service generally responds to these rulings by deciding that it is unnecessary to require a payback where this illegal catch occurred because of the time lapse between illegal catch and court ruling. This makes no sense at all.
Fourth, in order to extend the commercial summer flounder season and protect the small commercial boats, states have allowed for trip limits. When states implement trip limits they know full well that they are promoting discards. It is impossible for a dragger to set a net to catch exact poundage of fish. Trip limits promote discards, high grading, and sometimes, illegal transfers at sea.
In each of these situations, there has been a negative impact on the recovery of summer flounder, yet there has been very little discussion at council or commission meetings about paybacks. Instead, all we discuss is when the recreational anglers exceed the targets set by the council and the commission using the Marine Recreational Survey. Whether or not the division of the quota (a 60/40 split) is appropriate or whether we are underestimating the recovery of the stock using questionable reference points are issues that certainly deserve a lengthy discussion at another time. Right now we need to focus on the proposed addendum to the plan that would require a recreational payback.
First, we need to look carefully at how the quotas are developed. We use data from the Marine Recreational Survey and this survey was never designed to provide data that accurately estimates the current recreational catch. This survey was never designed to provide data that accurately estimates the current recreational catch - it was designed to show trends. In some states, because the number of intercepts are so low, the data is extremely questionable and the confidence level does not meet accepted standards. At this time there is no method in place to accurately assess the recreational landings state by state. We have only good guestimates to work with. Even the coast wide Marine Recreational Survey, which has a higher confidence level for this type of survey, leaves considerable room for disagreement.
Four or five years ago, when states used the available charts and tables designed by ASMFC, they may have used the existing data to get the best deal with the least pain. For the last two or three years states have made serious efforts to use the tables available in order to make the necessary reductions and remain within their quota. States are making their best effort not to exceed their target level and to avoid the consequences of exceeding that target level. This is not an easy process. They use the best available science from ASMFC and the Mid-Atlantic Council and make the tough decisions necessary to stay within the quota. Even with every state making a “best effort” plan, it has been difficult for states to remain within the quota. There may be a variety of reasons why this happens but there has been no intentional manipulation to exceed the quota. If we use the number of summer flounder caught in 1994 by both commercial and recreational fishermen, we can see that our current catch in number of fish is down dramatically. Here are the numbers of summer flounder caught by age in the following years:
1984 - 50,956,000
1994 – 20,227,000
2001 - 13,399,000
The weight also has gone up in both the recreational and commercial fishery. The commercial average weight of a summer flounder went from 1.21lbs (.55kg) in 1982 to 2.2lbs (1.01kg) in 2001 and the recreational weight went from 0.97lbs (.44kg) in 1982 to 1.89lbs (.86kg). We are clearly catching fewer fish to remain within our quota but the size and weight have almost doubled since 1982. This means fewer fish were landed. Instead of catching summer flounder before they spawn we are now catching these fish after they have spawned a number of times. It is important that any discussion of recreational paybacks considers all of these factors. Personally, I think if we are considering recreational paybacks a coast-wide quota makes more sense than a state-by-state quota. Paybacks would require that we give up the flexibility of conservation equivalencies.
SCUP
Scup presented an interesting problem for the council and the commission. We all agree that the science in the scup stock assessment is very weak. We have very little data to work with. Stock assessment for scup is really a work in progress. Because of this lack of confidence in the stock assessment the approach has been conservative. According to the stock assessment the quota could be between 50 and 80 million pounds. None of us felt comfortable with those numbers. However, that is the best science available and historically we have often been forced to use this type of data. Let me remind you that we have been forced to use a 50% probability for summer flounder due to a court case. There was considerable discussion about a very conservative, slightly higher quota that would have allowed for a slight expansion of the recreational fishery over 2001. However, we finally decided on a more conservative quota that will set the recreational target at the same number of landings in 2001. If the stock assessment has any value as a predictor the recreational catch in 2002 will easily exceed the 2001 catch. This means when we set the regulations for 2003 we may well have to further restrict the recreational catch with bag limits, size limits and shortened seasons. I continue to find it interesting that we sometimes choose to use science and at other times we are comfortable using our experience. My observation is that we generally use our experience when we want to be more conservative.
BLUEFISH
Most people assume that I got involved with ASMFC because of striped bass. However, my original motivation was a bluefish management plan. The proposal for the original plan from the late 70’s was to insure the protection of the recreational catch of bluefish from large purse seiners. When that plan was finalized in the mid 90’s the recreational catch was set at 80% of the total catch with 20% for the commercial fishermen. There were major problems, however, in how the quota was set since it used the recreational catch as the basis. To resolve problems inherent in the original plan we went to a different system for establishing a quota and decided on an 87/13 split. In reality, due to the varied interpretations of the plan and the transfer of quota, we have never had either an 80/20 or an 87/13 split. Most years the commercial number is considerably higher and frequently approaches 50/50. When the quota was based on the recreational catch I felt it unfairly impacted the commercial fishery and I supported the transfer of slightly more than a million pounds within a single year to maintain the historical levels for the commercial industry. I was aware that recreational anglers had reduced their catch and I was hoping to see the same recovery I had seen in striped bass, summer flounder and scup. We had also increased our catch and release of bluefish and I hoped that would increase the stocks over time as well. However, the statistics available for the current recreational catch are disturbing. If I use the science and the statistical tables, I see that the recreational catch has not gone up dramatically and that the stocks are not near numbers available in the 70’s and 80’s. It also appears that the size of the fish kept by recreational anglers has decreased dramatically. We have gone from an average weight of 3.99lbs in 1982 to 2.79lbs in 1996 to 1.99lbs in 2001. In most species that dramatic decrease in size arouses concerns and has an immediate response from fisheries managers. The current management plan is allowing for a larger quota than the recreational anglers are catching. This suggests that the stocks are not rebuilding or that other variables are driving down the recreational catch. Despite these problems there was a proposal to transfer 4.9 million pounds of the projected unused recreational quota for 2003 to the commercial fishermen. I was curious about the current commercial catch, particularly about the size of fish caught. It seemed appropriate to know if the same downtrend in size was reported commercially. The information I requested was not available and, so, with that in mind I could not in good faith support the transfer. The same state directors who worried about an overage in summer flounder on a stock that is seven times higher than in the 90’s and shows an average size that has gone up dramatically were not at all worried about a transfer of 4.9 million pounds to the commercial fishermen. With the exception of New Jersey every state delegation voted for the transfer. The vote by the council was close to unanimous. My concern is that the current down trend will continue for bluefish and we will penalize the recreational sector with size limits and bag limit reductions.
There is also an indication that the message we are sending anglers is that they should release bluefish to be caught by the commercial industry. That is starting to make some of the recreational anglers questions catch and release.
All and all a very interesting meeting.