Read Part I of this two-part series. Top Photo: Black Sea Bass caught off Fire Island Each year, before the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council (Council) and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s (ASMFC’s) Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass Management Board (Management Board) meet in December to set the recreational specification for the next […]
Category Archives: ASMFC
Mid-Atlantic “Harvest Control Rule” Makes an Awkward Debut, Part I: A Hasty Beginning
Read Part II of this two-part series. Top Photo: Summer Flounder When the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council (Council) and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s (ASMFC’s) Interstate Fishery Management Program Policy Board (Policy Board) met in joint session on June 7, 2022, they approved the so-called “Percent Change Approach” to a “Harvest Control Rule” (Control […]
Rebuilding Striped Bass
Photo by Kyle Schaefer In April 2019, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s (ASMFC) Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board (Management Board) accepted a benchmark stock assessment that found the striped bass stock to be both overfished and subject to overfishing. The Management Board acted quickly to reduce fishing mortality and end overfishing, but was much […]
NMFS Seeks Angler Input on Recreational Fishing Policy
Photo by John McMurray Most anglers probably don’t realize that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has a policy that addresses recreational fisheries management (Recreational Policy). Most anglers have probably never even considered the issue. Yet it’s an issue that deserves some thought for, as the introduction to the Recreational Policy notes, “The purpose of […]
Thoughts on Climate Change Planning, Resilience & Forage Fish
Managers Take Up Next Phase of East Coast Climate Change Scenario Planning This article was originally published in Wild Oceans’ The Horizon newsletter and is reprinted with permission. View the latest issue and past issues of The Horizon. Top photo: Atlantic menhaden. After the East Coast Climate Scenario Creation Workshop (held June 21-23), I left […]
The Bluefish Conundrum
It’s difficult to describe what fishing for bluefish was like in Long Island Sound forty or fifty years ago. Back in the ‘70s and ‘80s, and for a while after that, bluefish defined the summer fishery along the Connecticut shore. Every morning, in at least one local harbor, untold hundreds of bluefish, many of them […]
Council Staff, Scientists Caution Against Mid-Atlantic “Harvest Control Rule”
Top photo by John McMurray For more than two years, the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council (Council) and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Interstate Fishery Management Program Policy Board (Policy Board) have been working on something they call a “Harvest Control Rule” (Control Rule), which could make very significant changes to the way that the […]
Newest Amendment to ASMFC’s Striped Bass Management Plan Emphasizes Conservation
On Wednesday, March 4, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board (Management Board) completed its work on Amendment 7 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass (Amendment 7). Amendment 7 maintains the conservation measures adopted in earlier amendments, while embracing additional improvements to striped bass management that promote […]