Coastal Conservation Association (CCA)

The One That Got Away…
By Richen Brame
CCA Atlantic States Fisheries Director

The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council (SAFMC) passed a Dolphin-Wahoo Fishery Management Plan several years ago that, by and large, CCA supported. It was debated and considered in the late 1990s by the SAFMC and was finally passed to the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) a couple of years ago.

It was a risk-averse plan designed to prevent a problem from ever occurring in the dolphin-wahoo fishery rather than reacting to one. In this case, the goal was to prevent the development of a dolphin commercial longline fishery.

At the time, there was concern that a lot of the longline boats targeting highly migratory species (HMS), like billfish, were being squeezed out of the pelagic fishery and would shift effort to the dolphin fishery. CCA’s original position was to simply outlaw dolphin longline gear. However, the Council determined that a very small percentage of commercial dolphin trips landed more than 3,000 pounds, but those trips accounted for a large percentage of the harvest. Most commercial dolphin catch, at least in North Carolina, came as bycatch in the king mackerel or snapper-grouper commercial fishery.

Thus, the Council instituted a trip limit of 3,000 pounds in North Carolina and South Carolina, and a 1,000 pound limit in Georgia and Florida, along with recreational bag limits and the complete prohibition on the recreational sale of dolphin.

In addition, the commercial dolphin total allowable catch (TAC) was to be no more than 13 percent of the recreational landings. Finally, a control date of 1989 was adopted to limit entry into the fishery. Again, these measures were supposed to prevent a longline fishery from developing, maintain the existing bycatch commercial fishery and keep the fishery a largely recreational fishery.

The plan was passed unanimously by the SAFMC, with the other councils concurring.

Needless to say, CCA was disappointed when Roy Crabtree, the NMFS Southeast Regional Administrator, sent notice in December 2003 that he had reviewed the plan and elected to:

· Disallow the trip limits, apparently reasoning that the longline fishery never developed and that the 13-percent cap on commercial harvest was in place. The SAFMC has a process to close the commercial fishery should the 13-percent cap be breached.

· Disallow the control date. The fishery will be an open entry fishery, as it has been.

These changes have been downplayed as minor, but NMFS essentially gutted the intent of the original Dolphin-Wahoo Fishery Management Plan, which was to be risk-averse and prevent a problem from occurring. Now, should commercial harvest exceed 13 percent of the recreational harvest, something will then have to be done. At present, nothing is in place to prevent such an occurrence from happening.

The excuse that landings have not come close to 13 percent of the recreational harvest in the recent past is largely a circular argument. Everyone expected the trip limits to be put into place (after all, they had passed the SAFMC unanimously), so there would be no reason for anyone to continue to develop a dolphin longline fishery or start a new one. Quite literally, the proposed rule had precisely the intended effect.

Now, since NMFS dragged its feet for several years reviewing the plan, it looked onto a changed landscape and determined that since there was no longline fishery (remember, because of the proposed restrictions), then there would be no need for trip limits to restrict the commercial harvest.

CCA will be exploring its options to try and restore this management plan to its original condition. The obvious request would be our original one – that the now non-existent longline gear be eliminated so that there is no chance of a high-volume commercial fishery from developing. We’ll keep you informed.