Outdoors: Need for sea bass closure questioned

Sea bass are a popular sport fish off the mid-Atlantic coast, of course, so it wasn't without irony that a few days earlier I'd read that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued an emergency 180-day closure of recreational fishing for black sea bass in all federal waters from north of Cape Hatteras, N.C., to Maine. In announcing the closure, NOAA claimed "landings data and scientific analyses show recreational fishermen have reached their quota and could exceed their 1.14 million pound harvest limit by as much as 84 to 225 percent if the recreational fishery is not closed." Further down the page NOAA stated an independent team of federal and university scientists determined that the black sea bass stock has been rebuilt, but states still allow for overly generous bag limits. Talk about mixed messages.

The closure doesn't affect state waters, but many in the charterboat industry, as well as sport fishermen, felt they'd been sucker punched again by the feds. These are the same folks that levied the constrictive 2009 flounder regulations on Marylanders, based on data that supposedly showed Maryland sport anglers are too good at catching flatfish. Recreational fishermen were incredulous at that finding.

A little background: NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service gleans estimated recreational catch numbers from its Marine Recreational Fisheries Statistics Survey, conducted via field and phone surveys. Management decisions, such as the sea bass closure, are based in part on MRFSS data; sport fishermen for years have mistrusted the accuracy of the data. Enter the new companion data collection system - called Marine Recreation Informational Program, or MRIP. Federal fisheries managers are hopeful the new system will provide a more comprehensive picture of the number of trips being taken, and fish caught, by recreational anglers.

Before we get awash in governmental alphabet soup, here's a quick personal anecdote about MRFSS: I hold a state fishing guide license, which requires me to turn in catch reports. Therefore I'm not counted as a "sport" angler. Yet for better part of the decade, MRFSS interviewers continue to call my home despite repeated pleas for them to take me off the rolls. The drill is the same: they ignore me and charge into asking survey questions. Who knows how these "interviews" have been reflected in their filings.

The federal sea bass closure has left many angry and perplexed. Clint Waters, a leader in the Maryland Saltwater Sportfishermen's Association, often organizes club trips off the coast for tog and sea bass during the winter. He estimates his local chapter takes as many as 10 trips a season. It's fun for them and puts some money in the skippers' pockets, but they won't go at all this year. While he personally feels the creel limit of 25 sea bass is too high, he's says shutting down the fishery "was a bad decision. It is really going to hurt the headboat captains."

Party boat operators, such as Ocean City based Captain Monty Hawkins of the Morning Star, are already feeling the pain, and much more acutely. But he has another bone to pick.

"These constant battles over MRFSS data that no one believes are so distracting real restoration of sea bass hasn't even begun, (and) can't begin until the natural coral habitats have been reestablished," he told me via e-mail. "NMFS claims of sea bass rebuilding fall flat; they have yet to find the fishes' essential habitat - our mid-Atlantic coral reefs. Habitat and habitat fidelity must be factored into management. No restoration can occur solely through catch restriction."

The Recreational Fishing Alliance, based in New Jersey, is leading a coalition of sport fishermen and party boat captains to "fight back against this unprecedented and unwarranted shutdown" by suing the federal government to force it to rescind the closure. It's not clear on what legal and/or technical grounds they'll make their case, but they've tapped into a cord of understandable frustration.

In a press release announcing the lawsuit, the group raises an interesting point when it asks, "Where does it end if we allow the federal government to continue to use a broken system to deny recreational anglers access to healthy fisheries?" Taking on the federal government (you know, the people that make the rules and print the money?) is a lot easier said than done. Just ask the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, which recently backed off from its threatened legal action against the EPA despite being well-funded and having on their side decades of documented federal failures to enforce clean water laws. (Though they won't share details, apparently CBF knows something we don't since they've accepted this latest federal pledge, one of many that promise progress.)

While RFA's suit may well be justified to try and shake up the federal morass that passes for recreational fishing data collection, attempting to match the feds' deep pockets and legendary delay tactics is another story entirely.

Fins & Feather Report

A two-day Nor'easter was cheered by the duck hunters awaiting the October 17th opening of the waterfowl season, but cursed by fishermen. When you could get out the rockfish and bluefish were most obliging. The fish are thick from above the Magothy River to Breezy Point. Some South River fishermen are live lining juvenile menhaden to catch keeper rock to 26 inches, while those plying the bay's main stem - hotspots include Podickery Point, Dumping Grounds, and Bay Bridge pilings - are trolling small (2-4 ounces) bucktails with pork rind trailers. Try jigging Stingsilvers or tandem feather jigs over suspended and breaking schools of stripers and blues. In the tributaries, rockfish to 30-plus inches have moved into the shallows to intercept the ever growing bunker schools headed to...