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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 35 Number 3
November 2008
ASMFC to consider herring Area 1A options
REHOBOTH BEACH, DE – The Atlantic herring fishery in Area 1A may operate very differently next summer if the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) adopts new measures to reduce uncertainty in the fishery and better spread out the available quota.
“Right now, no one is happy,” said Terry Stockwell of Maine, chairman of ASMFC’s Atlantic Herring Section. “It seems like it might be time to change the way we do business.”
The section, which met Oct. 20 during ASMFC’s annual meeting here, voted to initiate a new addendum to the interstate herring plan to consider the following types of options for Area 1A:
• Monthly or bimonthly quotas with “payback” requirements for quota overages and “carryover” allowances for quota underages;
• Determination of “no-fishing” as well as “no-landing” days;
• A total prohibition on directed herring fishing in Area 1A prior to June 1;
• Ways to achieve “timely” reporting of landings by state-only permitted vessels; and
• Restrictions on the harvest of juvenile fish.
According to New Hampshire Commissioner Ritchie White, the goal of the section, which is a subgroup of ASMFC, is to bring more stability to the fishery.
“We’re trying to give the industry some sense of direction so they can plan their harvesting over the course of a season and produce a steady stream of product,” he said.
Referring to the tension, worry, and frustration associated with this year’s March, August, and September “days-out” meetings, where the section approved allowable “landing days” for Area 1A fish, White said, “The public was very upset at all three of those meetings. This is a response to that.”
According to current ASMFC rules, vessels cannot “land” herring during designated “days out” of the fishery. But the commission has nothing in place that bars vessels from “fishing” on designated “days out.”
Herring fishermen previously worked under a “gentlemen’s agreement” whereby major players voluntarily agreed to not fish on no-landing days.
However, the agreement has fallen apart – or, as some say, is “no longer applicable” – under the vastly changed landscape of the Area 1A fishery. The 1A quota is the lowest it has ever been and a number of vessel owners have invested large sums of money to outfit boats with purse seine capabilities to fish in the area during the June-September ban on midwater trawling.
Massachusetts representative David Pierce urged the section to stipulate that vessels cannot fish for herring during “no landing” days.
“We need to finally square away this issue of landing days and fishing days. Days off should apply to fishing and landing, not just landing,” he said.
Pierce further said he wanted to avoid situations where fishermen “stockpiled fish on a carrier” and then waited to offload on a designated landing day.
“It’s hard to project landings that way,” he said.
Vito Calomo, proxy for ASMFC Commissioner state Rep. Tony Verga of Massachusetts, said the section wasn’t prepared for what happened this summer because it failed to account for the fact that seiners would fish on no-landing days.
“We got snookered because the gentlemen’s agreement that was set up was broken,” he said. “I think we would have had a much better season if they had stuck to the agreement as we know it.”
The section agreed to include this issue in the list of items to be addressed in the addendum.
Juvenile fish
Calomo and Pierce also felt strongly that a prohibition on the harvest of juvenile herring needed to be instituted for Area 1A, which encompasses much of the inshore waters of the Gulf of Maine.
“We still run the risk of focusing a fishery on juvenile fish and that’s bound to have a very adverse outcome on the health of the industry and the fish,” said Pierce. “I’m going to be inclined to be cautious vs. liberal with Area 1A fish and this Gulf of Maine resource.”
ASMFC Law Enforcement Committee representative Jeff Marston of New Hampshire expressed concern about the proposal.
“We don’t want to be measuring fish when they come in,” he said.
But Calomo said that wouldn’t be necessary if ASMFC set a bycatch allowance – 10% for example – so that no more than a defined percentage of the catch could be made up of juveniles. Given that thousands and thousands of pounds of herring are harvested per vessel, enforcement officials could easily determine if hundreds and hundreds of pounds of herring were juveniles, Calomo said.
Dave Ellenton of Cape Seafoods Inc. and Western Sea Fishing Company urged the board to be “very careful” in defining what constitutes a juvenile.
“We do see roe in some pretty small fish these days – certainly smaller than 8",” he said. “The growth rate has changed.”
The section agreed to include alternatives to restrict juvenile catch in the draft addendum.
Industry reacts
Mary Beth Tooley of the Small Pelagic Group said she didn’t agree with all the items ASMFC intended to address in the addendum, and she expressed concern that spawning area closures were not on the list.
But, she said, “I think the discussion about these issues needs to occur.”
Tooley said this year’s fishery was chaotic and very hard on industry.
“In the past, vessels fished together and stayed with a body of fish for a period of time,” she explained. “But if you take the vessels off the water for 10 days, then they have to go back out and find the fish. With such little fishing opportunity, it poses a significant hardship on the industry.”
Ellenton expressed concern about “the loss of flexibility” that might occur if ASMFC adopts an addendum. One of ASMFC’s strengths, he said, is that it can respond relatively quickly to new developments. If additional restrictions are adopted, they’ll take more time to modify in the future.
For example, Ellenton said, “While I may agree today that no fishing in Area 1A until the first of June is a good thing, that may change in 2009 or 2010. Then we’ll need another addendum.”
Availability of mackerel and market demands are two factors that impact people’s decisions about when to fish for herring, he explained.
Late fall hearings?
The section’s ultimate goal is to select final measures in time for Area 1A states – Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts – to implement new regulations for the peak of the 2009 fishing year.
The section may adopt final measures as early as February during ASMFC’s winter meeting week, but a dizzying number of steps need to take place first, and several section members said they thought a final vote wouldn’t be cast until May.
For starters, ASMFC staffers, herring technical committee members, plan development team members, enforcement officials, and state agency representatives – with input from herring industry members and advisers – need to draft and analyze alternatives for each of the addendum options.
Stockwell said the section itself might hold another meeting later this fall to review a draft addendum and possibly approve public hearing alternatives – or at least identify a group of measures for further development for public hearings.
Stockwell warned that the timing would be tight.
“This is going to be a bucket-load of work,” he said.
For more information, call Chris Vonderweidt, ASMFC’s herring plan coordinator, at (202) 289-6400. He can be reached by e-mail at <cvonderweidt@asmfc.org>.
Janice M. Plante
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