To save the rockfish, Maryland must cut the commercial fishery
Bad things in human history often repeat themselves despite human knowledge of how to avoid them. The collapse of the once abundant shad, sturgeon, and oyster populations in Chesapeake Bay are hard lessons in poor fishery management.
Economic interests prevailed over the need for conservation to prevent overharvest. Unlike the rockfish collapse in the 1980s, actions taken were too late for these species to allow populations to recover.
The shad fishery was the largest by landings in the Chesapeake Bay at the turn of the 20th century. Our waters teamed with shad and their valuable roe was prized. Shad plankings were as common as crab feasts. Massive overharvest was allowed to overcome the need to conserve this species.
Bay states solemnly pledged in 2010 to act to bring back the shad so that there would be at least 2 million shad reaching the Conowingo dam for spawning by 2020. This was to be done by fishing closures, fish ladders, dam removals, and breeding programs.
That goal was abandoned when shad numbers were consistently below 3% of that goal. Despite Maryland closing the shad fishery 40 years ago leading to Virginia belatedly doing the same, the shad population is still collapsed and nowhere near recovery.
The two species of sturgeon in the bay are so depleted that they are very rare and federally listed as endangered. King Charles I in his charter granting Maryland to Lord Baltimore in 1632 specifically gave the right to “fish of all sorts including whales, sturgeons, and all other royal fish.”
Caviar from sturgeon eggs was considered a delicacy in Europe and this prehistoric fish, existing for more than 120 million years, was abundant when English settlers arrived in the bay region in the 1600s.
The science is clear but harsh: the species has been overfished since 2013 and overfishing is still occurring with far too few female spawners and very poor reproductive success in the fish’s nursery here in Bay rivers. Fishing mortality was found to be an alarming 55% above the target level to protect the species.
They served as a reliable source of food for the settlers and were an important fishery until the early 20th century with the Atlantic sturgeon the largest fish native to the bay growing to as much as 14 feet and weighing 811 pounds.
Oysters are — or were — the bay’s keystone species both for water quality and commercially. In 1900, the oyster packing industry was the third-largest in Baltimore.
Despite the expenditure of more than $300 million on their recovery, their population is at a pathetic 1% of its historic population. Bay states agreement to increase oysters by 10-fold has been abandoned. The wild harvest needs to be closed permanently and transitioned to aquaculture but DNR refuses to go against the wishes of commercial harvesters.
Now comes the rockfish whose collapse and fade into oblivion was saved by a Maryland moratorium (1985-1990) leading to federally imposed restrictions coastwide. Remarkably, this depleted species recovered by simply stopping their killing and allowing the stripers to breed unimpeded.
But now, overharvest and other factors have brought this important fish to the precipice of collapse again. Will we act to prevent it going the way of shad, sturgeons, and oysters?
The science is clear but harsh: the species has been overfished since 2013 and overfishing is still occurring with far too few female spawners and very poor reproductive success in the fish’s nursery here in Bay rivers. Fishing mortality was found to be an alarming 55% above the target level to protect the species.
These conclusions were reached by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, the interstate fishery management group. This is why the commission is forcing the states to reduce harvest by 18% while they develop a new fishery management plan. Waiting for years for the new plan and actions under it cannot be allowed to block further restrictions to stop overharvest and restore the population.
Other factors affect fish abundance. For striped bass, it is also poor water quality, toxic chemicals including farm pesticides, menhaden overharvest, dams, global warming, and perhaps introduced snakeheads and blue catfish. All of these need to be dealt with but, the only immediate action we can take now is to stop killing millions of rockfish each year.
Because Maryland is the most important state for rockfish populations, what we do in Maryland is of the utmost importance for the future of the species.
To Maryland’s credit, the DNR has cut recreational landings substantially over the last three years. Regulations reduced recreational landings in 2019 by 23% in the number of fish caught compared to 2018 and by 33% by weight. This is on top of previous cuts in the recent past. The recreational fishery consists of individual anglers and the charter boat fishery. In 2019, the recreational fishery took 64% of the 1.2 million rockfish harvested in Maryland and 70% by weight.
Unfortunately, DNR has failed to reduce commercial landings of rockfish recently. Further, bad news is that the recreational fishery is a hook and line fishery and many rockfish caught are released and die.
This discard of hooked fish is from catch and release fishing and from fish caught under the 19-inch minimum size limit. An estimated 9% of these released fish die.
In 2019, total coastwide rockfish removals by commercial and recreational fishing were 5.47 million fish, which was only a 5% decrease from 2018. The recreational sector accounted for 87% of these fish with 2.2 million kept and 28.8 million fish released alive. An estimated 2.59 million rockfish died from this hooking and release — more than the actual recreational harvest.
Applying this to Maryland, this would mean more than 900,000 additional dead rockfish in addition to the 777,770 that were kept by recreational anglers!
So, what should be done? Obviously, recreational fishing release mortality has to be substantially reduced.
The DNR one fish creel/ bag limit per individual angler and two for charter boat anglers if the captain electronically reports catch, still results in a huge mortality of released fish. DNR has tried to reduce this mortality with its regulations. I support these efforts but would suggest additional measures.
The fisheries commission mandated use of non-offset circle hooks when using live or natural bait is an effective tool to prevent deep-hooking mortality when using bait. However, many anglers are not using the required circle hooks. DNR needs to assure enforcement of this requirement and conduct an education/ outreach program including for tackle shops, anglers, and charter boat captains.
In addition to the DNR imposed July 16-31 recreational rockfish closure, further periodic closures are needed when water temperatures are high and water quality is poor making rockfish more vulnerable to hooking mortality.
These closures and circle hook requirements should apply to commercial hook and liners, too. There also needs to be better methodologies developed and employed to prevent discard mortality in both live/natural bait use and lure hook and lining.
The fisheries commission needs to reduce the commercial harvest quotas allocated to the states by at least 20%, especially in the Chesapeake, where at least 70% of rockfish breed. The Maryland allocation of 1,471,888 pounds has remained the same since 2015, except the quota was exceeded by a small amount in 2019 so that the 2020 quota was reduced by that overage.
The DNR has refused to reduce the commercial catch despite cracking down on the recreational fishery. Commercial rockfish harvest will be down for 2020 but this is not due to DNR actions. It is caused by a decline in the market for stripers due to COVID 19.
Commercial fishing for striped bass is now prohibited in Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Maryland’s commercial quota exceeds any other state’s quota by more than 40%. Yes, the fisheries commission cut quotas in the past and DNR acted, but we need to further cut commercial landings and now.
I am at a loss why the commission has not applied its mandated 18% reduction to this commercial quota, the surest way to reduce rockfish mortality.
I am urging a 20% reduction to assure a better chance of recovery while the fisheries commission develops a new FMP with no new restrictions perhaps until 2023 when it may be too late. The commercial harvest quotas in the Atlantic fishery (90,727 pounds) also should be cut by at least 20%. The fisheries commission wisely rejected attempts by Maryland and Virginia in 2017 to liberalize rockfish harvest because of “economic hardship.”
I agree with current DNR rockfish regulations except for the above-enhanced measures but I would suggest that the recreational 19-inch minimum size limits also should apply to commercial landings and the latter part of the rockfish harvest season for both commercial and recreational harvests should be shortened to further reduce mortality.
DNR also needs to name a director of fisheries with fishery management experience and a conservation ethic. It has been more than two years since the last director left.
The DNR should work more closely with recreational fishery leaders like the Maryland Coastal Conservation Association to foster trust and cooperation in assuring conservation goals are accepted and met.
While increased fishing restrictions to reduce killing rockfish are painful for both commercial and recreational fishers, the pain must be shared to prevent another collapse in our iconic state fish.