Photo by John McMurray When fisheries close abruptly, the questions come a-lobbin’. Most of my fellow fishermen get rather anxious, questioning whether our fishery managers are accurate in their assessments of the harvest. Although I will claim a bias, since I worked for both state and federal fisheries agencies, I certainly subscribed to the statistical […]
Youth fishing camp participants caught on quickly. By day three, they were casting from shore like pros. “Catching fish is a blast… I caught eight fish today and four yesterday,” said Aiden Plante, a 10-year-old who attended the Rhode Island Saltwater Anglers Association’s (RISAA) Youth Fishing Camp last month. Aiden was one of fifty children […]
Some may be cheering the Secretary of Commerce’s decision to overrule ASMFC on summer flounder, but in the end, Jersey may have really screwed us If you are a regular reader, you likely know the controversy surrounding summer flounder (aka fluke). And I’m guessing you’re probably up to speed on the striped bass situation, too […]
Everglades photo via Wikipedia For many years, it was my job to figure out what anglers cared about and represent their concerns to various decision makers. We used internet polls, face to face meetings, and questionnaires to see what really mattered to recreational anglers in Maryland. In 2012, the main areas of concern for Chesapeake […]
Author Charles Witke will testify at a House Natural Resources Committee hearing on the Magnuson-Stevens Act on July 19th. In this post, he explains why the recent Commerce Department decision undermines ASFMC and the future of cooperative interstate fisheries management. Late in the afternoon of July 11, 2017, the United States Department of Commerce (Commerce) […]
Photo by John McMurray. Members of the Network are speaking out against the recent decision by the Commerce Department to allow New Jersey’s noncompliance with the 2017 regulations for summer flounder set by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC). This marks the first time that the Commerce Department has overruled the decision of the […]
Keeping Progress in Fisheries Management Top photo: Bob Rees with a May, 2017 Willamette River spring Chinook Yet another lawsuit to shut down hatchery production in the Willamette Basin has been slapped down on the state of Oregon and the US Army Corps of Engineers by Willamette Riverkeeper and the Conservation Angler. The reason? Stray […]
We should all care about the red snapper decision in the Gulf of Mexico, as it eliminates public input and circumvents regional council authority granted by the Magnuson-Stevens Act. Photo courtesy of NOAA. Who cares about red snapper in the Gulf of Mexico? If you come from a coastal state like me (Rhode Island) you […]
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