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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 36 Number 5
January 2009
NMFS reviewing midwater trawl Closed Area I data
DANVERS, MA – Preliminary information from an observed Closed Area I midwater trawl herring trip taken in October has led the New England Fishery Management Council to call for a review of pertinent observer data to determine whether haddock bycatch limits were exceeded.
During its Nov. 18-20 meeting here, the council voted to ask the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to conduct the review and then take action to prohibit midwater trawl access to groundfish closed areas if the 1% haddock bycatch cap for closed areas was, in fact, exceeded.
According to a report developed by observer program staffers for a Nov. 12 herring plan development team meeting, 28,055 pounds of haddock bycatch was documented on observed tows for the week ending Oct. 4. The amount of herring landed from those observed tows was 2,777,657 pounds.
The report was labeled as “draft … for discussion purposes only,” but it nonetheless was picked up by interested parties and widely circulated prior to the council meeting, prompting extensive discussion about the Closed Area I situation and triggering the council’s request for a formal review.
At press time in mid-December, the review was still underway, according to NMFS’s Sue Murphy, who confirmed the agency was waiting to receive fully vetted numbers.
“We really need to see if the preliminary information holds up with the audited data,” she said.
Furthermore, while the council specifically requested a review of recent data, Murphy said, “We also intend to look at the recent data in relationship to the historical data to see if there are any patterns.”
She said NMFS intended to look at a number of factors, including whether bycatch was higher on pair trawl trips vs. single midwater trawl trips.
Call for action
Prior to its November meeting, NMFS and the council received three letters about this highly charged issue. The letters came from the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fishermen’s Association, the Midcoast Fishermen’s Association, and Earthjustice on behalf of the Herring Alliance.
Current regulations state that if the NMFS regional administrator “determines, on the basis of sea sampling data or other credible information for this fishery, that the bycatch of regulated multispecies exceeds, or is likely to exceed, one percent of herring and mackerel harvested, by weight, in the fishery or by any individual fishing operation, the regional administrator may place restrictions and conditions in the letter of authorization for any or all individual fishing operations.”
Earthjustice Attorney Roger Fleming said preliminary information indicated that, “at a minimum, specific tows and trips by individual fishing operations in groundfish closed areas are resulting in greater than one percent” bycatch. In his letter, he cited a single tow where preliminary data indicated haddock bycatch totaled over 21,000 pounds.
Fleming asked that NMFS “immediately” impose several restrictions on midwater trawl activity in closed areas and then consult with the council about taking further action.
Regulations state that “the regional administrator may … after consulting with the council, suspend or prohibit any or all midwater trawl activities in the closed areas.”
NMFS Northeast Regional Administrator Pat Kurkul read this language out loud to council members and said, “We do need to consult with the council.”
Kurkul added that the council meeting discussion itself could be considered an opportunity for that consultation.
One bad tow
Midwater trawl fishermen and representatives expressed frustration and dismay over the intense spotlight being projected on what they said was an atypical trip.
Council member Mary Beth Tooley of Maine said, “It does appear there was a single bad tow. But fishermen made adjustments and the problem went away in a day. We really should look at whether this is a rare occurrence vs. a regular happening.”
Drew Minkiewicz of the law firm Kelley Drye & Warren spoke on behalf of NORPEL, Cape Seafoods Inc., and Lund’s Fisheries Inc, all major suppliers of herring to the market, including as bait to the lobster fishery.
Minkiewicz said, “The council is being asked to comment on a situation when it doesn’t know what the situation is. It’s appropriate to first get the information and then act from there.”
He further noted that midwater trawl fishermen had invested heavily in new nets specifically “to allow haddock to escape on their own.”
Minkiewicz added, “Haddock is a species that is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring.”
Strong outcry
Patrick Paquette, head of government affairs for the Massachusetts Striped Bass Association and acting Massachusetts chair of the Coastal Conservation Association, said the people he represented were following the situation closely and had made it a “number one priority” to “reach out to constituents to bring pressure here to you.”
Paquette said, “Haddock has been our saving grace. We rely on haddock. It’s our last groundfish for our charter fishery.”
Paul Parker of the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fishermen’s Association (CCCHFA) said hook fishermen were fishing in Closed Area I in October in a “successful” haddock hook-gear special access program that CCCHFA and others spent “three years and over a million dollars in scientific experiments with 100% catch sampling” to get approved.
Parker questioned why midwater trawlers were allowed access to closed areas based on far less data.
“This is about consistency,” he said.
As for the preliminary haddock bycatch information, Parker said, “There are a lot of people who are upset about this. One side thinks it’s indicative of the fishery, while the other side thinks it’s equivalent to one bad tow. I think the council needs to take some action today.”
Gary Libby of the Midcoast Fishermen’s Association emphasized that groundfish fishermen themselves were going through particularly difficult times, so any amount of groundfish bycatch was problematic.
“It doesn’t matter if it was a little or a lot,” he said. “We’re trying to protect our groundfish. To have them caught as bycatch when we’re struggling to stay in business is a concern to us.”
One boat vs. fishery
While no one disputed the premise that one vessel did have a particularly bad trip in Closed Area I, many council members expressed uncertainty over how to deal with the situation. Several had deep reservations about “punishing the whole fishery” vs. taking action to address the problem encountered by the vessel that harvested the haddock.
Maine council member Jim Odlin noted that midwater trawlers had left Closed Area I, so the immediate problem had been solved.
“People are trying to make this a crisis, but boats have moved out of this area and the fishery is further south now,” he said.
Furthermore, he said, should a full analysis show that the 1% haddock bycatch criteria was exceeded, Odlin said he’d prefer having NMFS work with the single offending vessel “than prohibit the whole fishery.”
But New Hampshire council member David Goethel wasn’t sure that “punishing one boat” was the right approach.
“I’ve been agonizing over this because I really don’t know what to do,” he said. “21,000 pounds is a lot of fish, and that’s on an observed, documented trip. I think this does indicate we have an issue. One man’s bycatch is another man’s directed fishery.”
Goethel said he believed midwater trawl gear “can be fished cleanly.”
“The way to deal with this is to say, ‘We need 100% observer coverage in closed areas.’ It’s the only way we’re going to be able to prove or disprove this,” he said.
What to do
During this debate, the council worked on a two-part motion to:
Ask NMFS to “review recent midwater trawling observer data from Closed Area I to determine if council requirements for continued access have been met” and, if existing criteria were not met, then “access should be prohibited;” and
Initiate a framework action to “clarify the council’s intent regarding herring midwater trawl access to all groundfish closed areas,” including “clear criteria for continued access by individual vessels and for the midwater trawl fleet as a whole.”
Pressed for her interpretation of the existing criteria, Regional Administrator Kurkul said the language “could be clearer.”
“It’s not specific, so there are a lot of ways to look at it,” she said.
The council decided to split the motion and take action on each issue separately.
The first part of the motion – the request for NMFS analysis of observer data from Closed Area I – passed in a 14-to-2 vote with one abstention.
What about Amd. 4?
Then came the second part of the motion to develop a framework adjustment.
Frank Blount of Rhode Island, chair of the council’s herring committee, reminded the council that it voted last year to develop – as a priority – a new amendment to the federal herring plan specifically to address these very kinds of monitoring issues.
“It looks to me like we’re circumventing the amendment,” he said. “We’ve had this debate before and we said last year that we’d move forward with a herring amendment to do monitoring. The amendment was about herring boats in the closed areas.”
However, some council members said they wanted quicker action.
Connecticut council member Sally McGee said, “We need to address this problem in the vehicle that is moving most quickly. We should direct the committee to consider an alternative in the amendment or a framework to consider 100% observer coverage in all groundfish closed areas so the council could see some analysis of that.”
The council postponed its decision on the framework until the following morning, when it addressed the issue during the council’s debate over 2009 workload priorities.
That next morning, the council cast a more generic vote “to include criteria for midwater trawler access to groundfish closed areas in the list of 2009 herring management actions.”
One clarification
To be clear, the 1% haddock cap for closed areas is separate from the overall haddock bycatch limit set for the herring fishery through Framework Adjustment 43 to the groundfish plan.
Framework 43 put midwater trawlers and herring purse seiners into the “exempted fishery” category and eliminated their previous “exempted gear” status, which applies only to gear “incapable” of catching groundfish.
Under exempted fishery status, the herring fleet is now allowed to possess a small bycatch of regulated species without being in violation of the law.
For haddock, the annual, fleet-wide bycatch limit is “0.2 percent of the combined target total allowable catch for Gulf of Maine haddock and Georges Bank haddock (US landings only).”
Janice M. Plante
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