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by John Koegler
(from Jersey Coast Anglers Association July 2003 Newsletter)
Why oh why is it that the more things change the more they remain the same?
This issue is worse when dealing with government agencies such as NMFS.
No issue has created more heat and steam and produced less than the management of Bluefin tuna in the Atlantic. Domestically, tough management rules have been in place for over 22 years. All this domestic smoke and mirrors is one-sided conservation. The other ICCAT member and non-member countries together catch almost everything we conserve.
Internationally, we are whistling Dixie with a broken whistle. Nobody but nobody is following ICCAT rules but the US. So, in effect, we are practicing unilateral conservation in an ocean-wide fishery. Sure, the responsible group is ICCAT who is mostly at fault, but are we not part of that group! Twenty-two years and we have yet to get the rest of the world to observe any of the rules they wrote and support, especially when it applies to them. In that time an entire generation of children has been born and have now graduated from college! And our regulators have the gall to call this fishery management! Back to line one!
Everywhere you turn on this issue the heavy hand of government is making angler participation in any fishery difficult. And it never stops. First, anglers did not exist. So, there was no need for anglers to have anything but a tiny quota. Besides, anglers could not catch many fish when there were few fish to catch. NMFS ignored the flood of reports from anglers, charter and headboat operators, who reported their data was wrong and always on the low side. Angler landings reports, data and information was mostly ignored when it came time to allocate quota. But after the quota was allocated! Wow, NMFS discovered a huge massive recreational fleet. So, now they had to make their rules draconian. Sure, anglers got a tiny piece of the quota, but compared to the number of the permitted boats in the fishery, angler’s allocation is less than 25% of one thirty pound bluefin tuna per permitted boat. This is not per trip nor per month but for the entire season.
On December 18, 2002, the NMFS published in the Federal Register a final rule establishing a new Atlantic Highly Migratory Species Angling category vessel permit.
Now an angler vessel needed this PAID $22.00 permit to fish for any HMS species, not just the bluefin tuna that the original permit was designed to regulate. Slowly, one issue at a time NMFS has extended their bluefin permits to cover all HMS that anglers seek. First bluefin tuna, then all tuna species, next came marlins and finally sharks. Naturally, there is no need for this regulation if they reasonably control the commercial fishery.
Also, in the December notice, General category permit holders can no longer fish recreationally for non-bluefin tuna HMS and may not participate in HMS recreational tournaments. (I do not believe the non-bluefin tuna HMS is stated correctly, but this is what was printed in the notice). This final rule also specified that vessel category change could not be made after a permit was issued for a fishing year.
Many New England recreational vessels chose general category permits so they can sell
The giant bluefin tuna they land each year. Many of these boats also enjoy and participate in recreational tournaments each year. Now they have to either give up selling their bluefin tuna or give up being part of recreational tournaments. Maybe not a tough choice for New Jersey boats, (since there are very few giants left to catch in New Jersey. This is due to the total ICCAT management failure that has done nothing for US anglers). This will be a real tough problem for many New England based boats and some in New Jersey. The real objective of this rule is?
In a ruling dated June 9, 2003 NMFS has allowed anglers “to make a permit category change under this temporary rule for the next 30 days.” Call the permit phone number
at 1-888-872-8862 to make any change. What a wonderful country we live in, such empathy.
Although, the angler bluefin tuna season is expected to open this week, final rules for the bluefin tuna season have yet to be published. But NMFS had plenty of time to publish and get into the federal registry rulings that are nothing but angler harassment.
Next year, there will be all types of reporting and other mandated requirements for anglers fishing for any HMS species. All of which have little to do with fishery management and lots to do with useless absurd rules. All this is nothing but government harassment pure and simple. There is no scientific data or information of any kind that indicates, proves or even suggests anglers are a management problem in these fisheries. But this agency must grow and control and manage totally for the value of more control and more management people and more programs. This is totally nonsense, and absolutely unnecessary and not required, mandated or even needed by any fishery management program domestically or internationally. ASMFC and ACCSP.
NMFS new program to better count fish landings is run through ASMFC and called ACCSP. The intent of the ACCSP program is noble; “Good fishery data results in good management decisions.” Everyone supports such a concept, but NMFS is twisting the data to destroy angler participation. Now ASMFC will count for the first time recreational fisheries and landings that were previously never counted and therefore ignored. Ignored, that is, before fish quota allocations were determined. What sense does it make to count previously unreported recreational landings? Angler’s quota will not be increased to accommodate these increased landings!
Angler’s quota allocations and fish species split with commercial fishermen have little chance of being expanded to accommodate these new landings. The only reason for this new survey data is to raise reported recreational fish landings of all species. The final dagger in recreational fishing’s heart of this new information will be shorter seasons, more rules, more permits, and more regulation. Nowhere but nowhere did I state anglers would get more fish.
ASMFC new for-hire survey, a statistical system, will replace the Vessel Trip Reports, a hard count system. The VTR report is currently mandated for charterboats and headboats operating in the Atlantic. The ACCSP program intent is good data. But what is the result of this new data?
In addition, there is great danger in substituting a statistical program (ACCSP) for hard count program (VTR). This makes the final numbers a product of the program’s parameters and not the real fish count. This change is doubly questionable when this new statistical program costs more to run and manage than the old hard count program.
Why would they do such a thing, if their only need were an honest count?
Anglers had been told for a long time of the important need for them to conserve fish now and for their future. Everyone assumed they were doing this so they, the anglers, could be allowed more fish! How silly were anglers to expect more fish? Where oh where is that pot of gold we expected at the end of the rainbow?
As fisheries begin their recovery, the commercials get more fish and anglers get more rules, fewer fish per trip and shorter seasons. Wow, isn’t regulation wonderful!