California Wetfish Producers Association Statement: West Coast Sardine Fishery Management Action
April 9, 2018 -- The following was released by the California Wetfish Producers Association:On Sunday, the Pacific Fishery Management Council approved the management measures for the West Coast sardine fishery that were recommended by the CPS management team. The decision provides for 7,000 Mt for all uses, allowing fishermen a reasonable set aside for incidental take.“We are very thankful to the Council for applying the best available common sense in making its decision, especially in light of the concerns expressed during the recent ATM methods review and the earlier problems voiced about last year’s sardine STAR panel review.“And we are especially grateful to NOAA Assistant Administrator Chris Oliver, who took the time to address the Council in support of sustainable fishing communities, as well as resources, saying in part, ‘We have to combine that scientific underpinning with practicality and common sense.’“This is especially topical given the ongoing forage fish discussion and its relationship to California’s historic wetfish industry, which has been the foundation of our fishing economy for more than a century. All too often, that importance is largely ignored or dismissed with pleas to ‘leave most of the fish in the water for other predators.’ Our precautionary catch rules already do that.“In sum, a big thank you to the Council for doing the right thing for sardine fishery management and for fishing families and communities up and down the West Coast.”Diane Pleschner-Steele, Executive DirectorCalifornia Wetfish Producers Association
About the California Wetfish Producers AssociationThe California Wetfish Producers Association is a nonprofit dedicated to research and to promote sustainable Wetfish resources. More info at www.californiawetfish.org.ContactDiane Pleschner-Steele805-693-5430diane@californiawetfish.orgRay Young916-505-4245ray@razorsharppr.comRead more about forage fish management here
Anchovy "collapse" a manufactured 'crisis'
 D.B. Pleschner:
Anchovy "collapse" a manufactured 'crisis'
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Saving Seafood has covered issues related to the various "forage fish" campaigns of the past several years, which have been organized by interest groups in the wake of the Lenfest Report, "Little Fish, Big Impact." In today's Santa Cruz Sentinal, Diane Pleschner, executive director of the California Wetfish Producers Association, addresses a recent campaign regarding anchovy fishing in the Monterey Bay area. In her essay, Ms. Pleschner argues that a controversial recent study is based on outdated samples, ignoring the latest observations. The Pacific Fishery Management Council votes on the issue later today.The California Wetfish Producers Association is a nonprofit dedicated to research and to promote sustainable wetfish resources.
SANTA CRUZ, California (November 15, 2015) -- If you follow news about the Monterey Bay, you've undoubtedly heard the recent outcry by environmentalists in the media claiming the anchovy population in California has collapsed and the fishery must be closed immediately.
The current controversy stems largely from a study funded by environmental interests that claims an apocalyptic decline of 99 percent of the anchovy population from 1951 to 2011.
However, fishermen have seen a surge in anchovies in recent years. Data collected at the near shore Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System stations and other recent surveys also document a big upswing in anchovy numbers. For example, a 2015 NOAA rockfish cruise report found that "catches of [Pacific sardine and northern anchovy] larvae and pelagic juveniles were the highest ever in the core [Monterey Bay to Point Reyes] and north and still relatively high in the south." Yet the recent study bases its conclusion on outdated historic anchovy egg and larval samples, not recent observation.
Outdated data didn't stop extremists from seizing on the study to manufacture an anti-fishing crisis for anchovy where none exists. They're now lobbying the Pacific Fishery Management Council for an emergency closure of the small anchovy fishery in Monterey Bay, saying the current anchovy catch limit of 25,000 metric tons is dangerously high.
In reality, anchovy management employs an extremely precautionary approach, capping the allowed harvest at 25 percent of the estimated population. Josh Lindsay, policy analyst for the National Marine Fisheries Service, which enforces the fishing cap, says, "We took the overfishing limit and told the fishing fleet that they could only catch 25,000 metric tons. That's a pretty large buffer built into our management."
Wetfish fishermen fish on a complex of species including sardine, mackerel and squid. Anchovy is a small - but important - part of the complex, a fill-in for Monterey fishermen when other species are not available. Environmental extremists ignore the fact the anchovy harvest has totaled less than half the allowed limit in the past two decades. The light effort is one reason why the fisheries service has not formally assessed the species since 1995, focusing limited research dollars on more active fisheries.
The big increase in anchovy abundance in nearshore waters in recent years has precipitated a record whale-watching spectacle in Monterey and along the Central Coast. Despite allegations to the contrary, whales and other marine life gorging on anchovies are oblivious to the fishery. In October 2013, for example, Monterrey Bay had record sightings of humpback whales, while fishing vessels caught more than 3,000 tons of anchovy.
Consider reports from fishermen:
When the Pacific Fishery Management Council convenes Nov. 15, to discuss anchovy, we hope sanity and best available common sense will prevail, in addition to "best available science." Council members need to incorporate evidence of recent anchovy (and sardine) recruitment into future management decisions.
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D.B. Pleschner: Sardines are not being overfished
In recent weeks, sardines have been a hot news topic again. Environmental groups like Oceana complain that the sardine population is collapsing just like it did in the mid-1940s. They blame “overfishing” as the reason and maintain that the fishery should be shut down completely.Today, in truth, Pacific sardines are perhaps the best-managed fishery in the world — the poster fish for effective ecosystem-based management. The current harvest control rule — established in 2000 and updated last year with more accurate science — sets a strict harvest guideline that considers ocean conditions and automatically reduces the catch limit as the biomass declines.If the temperature is cold — which hampers sardine recruitment — the harvest rate is low. And if the population size decreases, both the harvest rate and the allowable catch automatically decrease.Current management sets aside a 150,000 metric ton reserve off the top of the stock assessment and automatically closes the directed fishery when the biomass estimate falls below that level, which it did in the latest stock assessment, after four years of abnormally cold La Niña ocean conditions.In fact, the truth is much more complicated than environmentalists would lead you to believe. It’s inaccurate and disingenuous to compare today’s fishery management with the historic sardine fishery collapse that devastated Monterey’s Cannery Row.In the 1940s and ‘50s, the fishery harvest averaged more than 43 percent of the standing sardine stock. Plus, there was little regulatory oversight and no limit on the annual catch.Today, based on the latest stock assessment, the U.S. exploitation rate has averaged about 11 percent, ranging as low as 6 percent, since the return of federal management in 2000.Here’s where complications begin because scientists recognize two stocks on the West Coast: the northern or “cold” stock ranges from northern Baja California to Canada during warm-water oceanic cycles and retracts during cold-water cycles.A southern or “temperate” stock ranges from southern Baja to San Pedro, in Southern California. The federal Pacific Fishery Management Council manages only the northern stock.Doing the math, our current fishery harvest is less than one-quarter of the rate observed during the historical sardine collapse.In fact, the current sardine harvest rule is actually more precautionary than the original rule it replaced. It does this by producing an average long-term population size at 75 percent of the unfished size, leaving even more fish in the water, vs. 67 percent in the original rule. The original harvest rule reduced the minimum harvest rate to 5 percent during cold periods. The present has a minimum rate of 0 percent during cold periods.The so-called “sardine crash due to overfishing” mantra now peddled by Oceana isn’t anything of the sort. It’s simply natural fluctuations in biomass that follow the changing conditions of the ocean, reflected in part by sea temperature.In April, the council will discuss the most recent sardine assessment report and decide on future management measures. It is important to understand that the sardine stock assessment is a conservative estimate based on acoustic surveys that miss sardines in the upper 10 meters of the water column, above the down-looking acoustic transducer, and in shallow near-shore waters where survey vessels cannot go. It’s really a question of scale, fishermen say. While they acknowledge sardines’ downward trend, fishermen question the accuracy of the total number of sardines that the stock assessment estimates.California’s wetfish industry relies on a complex of coastal pelagic species including mackerels, anchovy and market squid as well as sardines. Sardines typically school with all these species, so a small allowance of sardine caught incidentally in these other fisheries will be necessary to keep wetfish boats fishing and processors’ doors open.Sardines are critically important to California’s historic wetfish industry as well as the Golden State. This industry produces on average 80 percent of total fishery landings, and close to 40 percent of dockside value. A total prohibition on sardine landings could curtail the wetfish industry and seriously harm California’s fishing economy.D.B. Pleschner is executive director of the California Wetfish Producers Association, a nonprofit dedicated to research and to promote sustainable wetfish resources.
Posted in http://www.montereyherald.com 04/04/15
California Wetfish Producers Association
California's fishing industry was built largely on ‘wetfish', so called because historically these fish were canned ‘wet from the sea', with minimal preprocessing. Sardines, mackerel, anchovy and market squid (now called coastal pelagic species) have contributed the lion's share of California's commercial seafood harvest since the turn of the 20th century.The enterprise of immigrant fishermen founded California's wetfish industry, building up the ports of Monterey and San Pedro, San Diego and San Francisco. Today's wetfish industry is a traditional industry with a contemporary outlook: streamlined and efficient, but still peopled by fourth and fifth-generation fishing families. Today the sons and daughters continue the enterprise begun by their fathers and grandfathers 100 years ago.Transformed from its storied beginning, California's wetfish industry remains an essential part of the state's fishing culture, as well as a key contributor to our fishing economy, producing more than 80 percent of the volume and 40 percent of dockside value of all commercial fishery landings statewide.Coastal pelagic species are also among the Golden State's most important seafood exports. In a state that imports more than 86 percent of its seafood, the wetfish complex contributes close to 80 percent of all seafood exports, helping to offset the seafood trade imbalance.This industry has invested in cooperative research since the beginning of the California Cooperative Fishery Investigations (CalCOFI) in the 1940s, when wetfish fishermen assessed their harvest to help fund the research partnership developed among the California Department of Fish and Game, Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Southwest Fisheries Science Center (SWFSC).Wetfish industry leadership established the nonprofit California Wetfish Producers Association (CWPA) in 2004, including fishermen and processors who produce most of the harvest statewide. CWPA's mission promotes education, communication, and cooperative research to ensure sustainable fisheries.Today CWPA's research program continues the CalCOFI tradition, collaborating with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and Southwest Fishery Science Center to expand knowledge of coastal pelagic species.Read the full story here.
New grant to “fill gap” in sardine stock assessment
New aerial surveys of sardines off Southern California will address fishermen’s concerns that sardine abundance estimates are effectively “missing California fish.”Collaborative Fisheries Research West has awarded a $16,000 grant to a California sardine industry group to help pay for two spotter-pilot surveys. The first survey is being flown this summer and the second will occur in the spring of 2014.The project’s leaders hope to use digitally enhanced photos of fish schools taken during the flights to develop a scientifically rigorous method for calculating sardine abundances. If this can be done, they will ask the Pacific Fishery Management Council, which manages the Pacific sardine fishery with NOAA Fisheries, to consider including California aerial survey data into its future stock assessments, from which harvesting limits are set.Read the full article here.
KUOW (NPR) Radio - Ray Hilborn on Overfishing: How Big Is The Problem?
Fish is a significant source of protein in the human diet; around 90 million tons are caught every year. Are some fisheries in danger of collapse? What species are being managed the right way? UW professor and fisheries expert Ray Hilborn talks to David Hyde about his new book "Overfishing: What Everyone Needs To Know."
Listen to the full interview here via KUOW NPR - 94.9 FM (Seattle).
Ray Hilborn is a professor of fisheries at the University of Washington. Reporter Ross Reynolds hosts this fast–paced news call–in program. Engaging, stimulating and informative – a forum where listeners have the chance to speak directly with experts on news–oriented topics. The Conversation covers the very current topics and issues of the day.
New NOAA Ship Strengthens Ties between Scripps Oceanography and Southwest Fisheries Science Center
Collaborations between La Jolla institutions began more than 70 years ago and flourish today with a mix of strategic relationships Scripps Institution of Oceanography/University of California, San Diego
NOAA anticipates bringing the Reuben Lasker to the West Coast in 2013 and beginning operations in 2014. The ship will support scientific assessments of fish stocks and other marine life on the U.S. West Coast.
"Reuben Lasker represents an important investment by the American people in our ability to monitor the health of our ocean ecosystems," said Bruce Appelgate, associate director of ship operations and marine technical support at Scripps. "This process of investment must continue in order to revitalize the United States research fleet, so that societally important issues can be properly understood."
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The new vessel honors the late Reuben Lasker, a pioneering fisheries biologist who served as director of SWFSC's coastal fisheries division and worked in a key position as an adjunct professor at Scripps. Lasker fostered fundamental collaborations that formed a scientific bridge between Scripps and SWFSC.
"Reuben Lasker was arguably the father of West Coast fisheries oceanography," said Dave Checkley, a Scripps professor of oceanography and director of the Cooperative Institute on Marine Ecosystems and Climate (CIMEC), a Scripps-led NOAA program established to study climate change and coastal ecosystems. "He brought his basic knowledge of insect biology to bear on plankton and fish, and combined this with oceanography to lead the Southwest Fisheries Science Center's program on small pelagic fish, particularly anchovy and sardine."
"He and his colleagues are renowned worldwide for their contributions to the biology of these fish and their ecology and fisheries oceanography. He, as much as anyone, fostered the close and productive collaboration between academia and fisheries."
Checkley, who noted that Reuben Lasker served on his Ph.D. committee, said the namesake vessel furthers the close collaborations between Scripps and NOAA in fisheries oceanography that was formalized in 1949, following the collapse of California's sardine fishery and the inception of the California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) program, a unique partnership of the California Department of Fish and Game, NOAA Fisheries Service, and Scripps. CalCOFI stands as one of the world's longest and most important marine monitoring programs and has provided valuable insights about various aspects of the waters off California and its inhabitants for more than 50 years.
"The Reuben Lasker will be one of NOAA's state-of-the-art fisheries vessels and will not only enable the continuation of CalCOFI but enhance it with its superior capabilities," said Checkley.
Read the full announcement via the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
Record Salmon Run Expected
"The Klamath River expects a record chinook salmon run this year, the most since 1978. Much like the abundant forage - such as sardines and squid - that live off California's coast, the high numbers of salmon reflect both strong precautionary fishery management practices and good ocean conditions.
- California Wetfish Producers Association (CWPA)
Epic forecast for fall run on Klamath River
Written by Adam Spencer, The Triplicate
The largest projected return of fall-run chinook salmon since 1978 is looming over the Klamath River.
Fishery managers project that roughly 380,000 adult chinook salmon will migrate up the Klamath this fall to spawn — three times the estimated run of 2011 adult chinook and 50 percent greater than the highest run on record (245,242 total fish in 1995).
Starting Wednesday, sport fishermen will be allowed to keep four adult chinooks per day, with a possession limit of eight adult chinooks.
The abundant forecast is a boon for sport anglers, tribal fishermen and the guides, hotels and restaurants that benefit from tourism dollars.
“I think it’s going to be the best season I’ve ever seen,” said fishing guide Gary Hix, who has already booked up much of his season on the Klamath.
“We haven’t had a four-fish quota since the quota era started,” said Wade Sinnen, senior environmental scientist with the California Department of Fish and Game.
Sinnen said it was a “tough sell” to convince the California Fish and Game Commission to adopt the four-fish limit, but the projections warrant it. “Even with a four-fish adult bag, it’s very unlikely we will obtain our quota,” he said. “This is a test year to evaluate the capacity of the sport fishery.”
It’s important to get as close as possible to the sport-fishing quota of 67,600 chinooks, because conditions are ripe for another event like the 2002 fish kill when tens of thousands of salmon died from diseases before spawning — partly due to more fish than usual.
An estimated 34,000 to 78,000 salmon died primarily from a gill-rotting disease known as “ich” (Ichthyopthirius multifilis).
“I was out there counting those dead fish; it was a smelly, disgusting mess — it was sad really,” Sinnen said. “People are nervous this year that the same thing could occur due to the record forecast of salmon and dry to average water conditions in the Klamath basin.”
To prevent a repeat fish kill, the Bureau of Reclamation started releasing additional water from the Lewiston Dam on the Trinity River to keep the flow of the lower Klamath River at 3,200 cubic feet per second throughout the peak of the fall run.
Mike Belchik, senior fisheries biologist for the Yurok Tribe, presented a case for higher flows for the fall-run chinook to the multi-agency Trinity River Fall Flows Workgroup, which was well received.
Maintaining a minimum flow of 2,800 cfs for an above-average run had already been established, but this run’s bigger than that.
Belchik emphasized to the group that excellent salmon fishing on the ocean provided reason to trust the predictions, and “in order to decrease the odds of fish kill happening we would like to increase the flow from 2,800 to 3,200,” he said.
Read the full article on Triplicate.com.