Coastal Conservation Association (CCA)

Capitol Ideas
Standing Tall for a Lowly Fish

By Richen Brame
CCA Atlantic States Fisheries Director
TIDE
May/June 2006

Menhaden, a small, oily fish often used by anglers for bait, has become a hot topic over the last year or so. It has received an extraordinary amount of media coverage for such a lowly fish and has generated exceptionally strong feelings on both sides of the debate over its future in the Chesapeake Bay.

The menhaden commercial reduction industry insists that irresponsible environmental and conservation groups have threatened to close down a vital Virginia industry with little or no information.

In a striking bit or irony, however, it is the menhaden reduction industry’s indefensible reaction to even the slightest regulation on its harvest that may now place the entire Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) management system process in jeopardy.

The debate over menhaden began because anglers were not seeing the number of adult menhaden that they had seen historically all along the coast. Not even close. There are signs that the number of menhaden in the Bay has declined as well, and the amount of menhaden in the diet of Chesapeake stripers has declined dramatically in recent years. Many bass are suffering from malnutrition.

A frightening 70 percent of the striped bass sampled in the Bay have mycobacteriosis, an often fatal disease typically observed in fish under stress. In addition, the estimated coastwide population of menhaden is at low levels currently, levels similar to when the population was overfished in the 1960s. This raises the very real possibility of localized depletion in the Chesapeake Bay, a vitally important nursery area for striped bass and many other species.

The fact that has presented managers with a dilemma in the past is that the status of the stock is determined on a coastwide basis – from Maine to Florida, and on that basis the current stock assessment says the stock is not overfished (ie, there is enough spawning stock) and overfishing is not occurring (ie the fishing rate is not depleting the spawning stock).

Yet as much as 60 percent of menhaden harvest occurs in a very small portion of the Atlantic coast, specifically the Virginia portion of Chesapeake Bay. The menhaden reduction industry is largely responsible for this catch. It catches thousands of tons of menhaden and reduces them to fish meal and oil every year. The Bay is prime habitat for such important species as striped bass, bluefish and weakfish, and many people are concerned that this concentrated harvest in such a small portion of the Bay may deplete the available forage for these fish.

After a long, protracted fight, the ASMFC last year decided to impose restrictions on the industrial harvest of menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay while scientific studies are conducted to determine its status. So what exactly are the management measures the commercial menhaden industry thinks are so objectionable?

1. The implementation of research and data gathering programs starting in 2006 to determine the population of menhaden in the Bay and thus determine if there are enough menhaden around to feed both the fish and the industrial commercial fishery;

2. In order to prevent any growth of the harvest in the Bay while research is ongoing, a cap on the industrial harvest of menhaden, based on the average of removals over the last five years, was set at 105,700 metric tons per year, effective July 1, 2006. The reduction industry has been unable to catch 105,700 metric tons in the Bay in three of the last four years.

These management measures are not punitive; they are thoughtful, reasoned measures designed to take a precautionary approach to management without being overly burdensome on anyone, and they go away in five years. The measures simply prevent the growth of the industrial harvest of menhaden in the Bay while research is conducted.

The cap is a compliance measure in Addendum II to the ASMFC’s menhaden fishery management plan, and as such requires the state of Virginia to implement the measure or run the risk of not being in compliance with the plan. If they do not implement the cap, there is the distinct possibility that the U.S. Secretary of Commerce could close down the entire menhaden fishery in the Bay until the cap is put into place. As of this writing, the Virginia Legislature has not implemented any cap, choosing instead to table the measure before it adjourned in January.

Unfortunately, as the situation stands now, the legislature will not be in session if the fishery is closed so it will not be in a position to remedy the situation in a timely manner.

CCA has always supported the ASMFC management process. Anglers have reaped countless benefits from the cooperative management of migratory populations of fish species all along the Atlantic Coast in state waters. It is the one of the very best examples of a state-federal fisheries management partnership. It is transparent and very open to public participation.

CCA fully supports the decision made by the ASMFC on menhaden. We believe it was made after careful consideration by some of the brightest fishery managers on the Atlantic Coast in the best interest of the menhaden resource. Thus, we believe the State of Virginia should be held accountable for its inaction implementing a cap. We believe the harvest cap, while not a reduction in the average annual harvest, will help prevent increases in removals form the Bay while research is ongoing.

If Virginia is allowed to ignore the management measures agreed upon by the ASMFC the entire ASMFC process will be seriously damaged. And that won’t be good for the fish or the fishermen.