Three anglers were standing in neck-deep water off a beach on the Florida panhandle, being circled by a 12-foot shark—the kind of shark that makes its living attacking swordfish, tuna, and other sharks. It was the next-to-last moment in a beach-fishing adventure none of them will forget, and it ended safely for all of them, including the shark.

On November 12, Travis Lucas and friends Joshua Smith and Ben Brandner caught and released a very large shortfin mako shark from the beach. It’s exceedingly rare to catch a mako from shore; they prefer deep water and the larger prey that live there. This was the first confirmed shore-caught mako at Cape San Blas, about an hour east of Panama City. The shark was released per the rules; harvesting Atlantic mako sharks has been prohibited since 2022 due to overfishing.

Lucas, Smith, and Brandner never expected to catch a mako, let alone one that’s about as big as they get. “We usually just target big species, like bull sharks,” Lucas recalled. A week earlier, they had caught a 12-foot dusky shark and a 13-foot great hammerhead.

The Hometown Sharkers Score Big

The group, “Hometown Sharkers” on their social media, specialize in overnight beach outings.
Lucas was set up with an Okuma Makaira 130 reel spooled with 200-pound Reaction Tackle braid, a 300-pound mono top shot, and a homemade 800-pound leader on a 7-foot Rainshadow rod. The 24/0 circle hook was baited with a chunk of a blacktip shark caught earlier in the day.

Lucas had dropped the bait from a kayak about 1,000 yards offshore at sunset and paddled back to camp. During the evening, “we ended up catching a smaller bull shark on another rod,” he said. After that, it was a calm, cool night on a quiet beach—until it wasn’t.

“We had actually dozed off,” Lucas said. “I woke up to the 130 screaming.” He got into his harness and immediately knew the fish was heavy, perhaps a tiger shark. “It started pulling pretty significant drag pretty effortlessly,” he said.

Ten minutes in, the fish “woke up” and began leaping in the moonlight, “pretty much back-to-back for three or four minutes in one position, and then again in the next,” Lucas said. Eventually, the acrobatics ended. The fish ran toward shore a couple of times, which made life easier for Lucas, and the fight was over in 35 minutes.

As the fish neared the beach, the anglers still didn’t know what they had caught. Maybe a hammerhead, they thought. When it reached the wash, they thought it may have been a great white. When they finally got a light on it, “there was a lot of screaming,” Lucas recalled.

Team Release

“Releasing that fish was one of the most memorable situations I’ve had,” he said. “We realized it was a mako. Josh runs out with the tail rope. I come out with bolt cutters and the hook remover. We get out there, assess the situation, get it unhooked, get the leader off of it. It was about 49 degrees, it was cold.”

Lucas’s wife, Flower, and the other guys’ girlfriends watched and held flashlights from the beach. The group began moving the mako to deeper water to ease its release. “So it’s pitch black outside. We get out past the sandbar, so we know she can swim off. She swims out 10 or 15 feet and comes back at us. She made three full circles around us before thrashing at the surface and then swimming off. It was definitely nerve-wracking.”

The group saw for themselves why makos are sometimes confused with, blue sharks. “They are in every sense of the word ‘blue sharks’,” Lucas said. “When the light hits them they’ll go from deep purple to blue, and it’s a color you’d never expect to see from an animal. It almost seems like it’s a holographic. They’re pretty wild looking. It’s definitely a once in a lifetime fish.”

The post Massive Mako Caught on Florida Beach appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

I watched a National Geographic documentary recently on the African savanna, highlighting the typical predator-prey encounters that the landscape is famous for. A wildebeest was at a watering hole and, predictably, its day was ruined by a pack of gnarly hyenas. I always felt sorry for the big beasts as they tried to fend off attacks from every quadrant. Sometimes the beasts get away, but many at least suffer wounds that eventually finish them off.

Which reminds me of the current state of Florida waterways, besieged by repeated thrashings from a pack of hyenas, in the form of ancient and inadequate sewer infrastructure, failing septic systems close to the water, heavy residential and corporate agriculture fertilizer runoff, stormwater runoff, freshwater herbicides and more. That’s a formidable, destructive pack of attackers.

And it’s all happening at once. The causes and consequences have been relatively ignored for years, and if these attacks do not stir panic in the hearts of Floridians who fish, boat, love the water, or care about their health — maybe they’re not paying attention.

The Real Culprit

Lack of political will and urgency — plus inadequate funding — is at the heart of the failures. It’s too easy to chalk it up to too many new residents coming in or too many tourists. The reality is Florida’s office-holders at every level, and the agencies they oversee, are stuck in a time warp. They seem to think you can still use 1950s technology and approaches that worked for a 1950s population, and somehow protect the resource that is suffering much greater pressure today.

Not to mention that development permitting is way too easy in the Sunshine State. If you fish in Florida, you’ve likely seen the bumper sticker that reads “Leaving Florida? Take a developer with you.” That attitude likely sprung from the over-development of the woods, freshwater springs, lakes and salt waters that long-time Floridians consider “True Florida.” And True Florida is rapidly disappearing.

Sewer, Septic and Stormwater Pollution

The Everglades water crisis — and efforts to restore the natural system — is the center of attention (even internationally) for good reason. But that’s just one part of the massive Florida water problem — local point-source pollution throughout Florida is worsening rapidly.

Florida’s sewage infrastructure is ancient (as old as 80 years) and simply inadequate in places, where development is off the chain and natural habitat loss is shocking. Aside from age, performance of sewers is inhibited by Florida’s heavy rain, and of course, tropical storms. The regular rainfall and common deluges basically guarantee major spills. Sewage lift stations without generators shut down. Untreated sewage backs up and overflows, usually through simple manhole covers. It all ends up in our favorite waterways where we swim, fish and boat. Many expect rising sea level to exacerbate this problem.

Heavy and repeated nutrient (nitrogen and phosphorus) loading from septic leeching and large-scale sewage system spills fuel the harmful algal blooms (HABs) that cloud both fresh and coastal salt waters, shutting out sunlight that is vital to seagrass health. And all of Florida’s marine fish and other organisms depend on seagrass, and to a lesser extent, oysters and other shellfish. Not to mention sky-rocketing fecal bacteria levels that make people ill, and often prompt no-contact health warnings on the water.

Perfect examples of nutrient hotspots on the Atlantic coast include the upper St. John’s River, the entire 156-mile-long Indian River Lagoon, the St. Lucie estuary, Lake Worth Lagoon, and Broward and Dade county’s heavily urbanized waterways. On the Gulf coast, the west central region accounted for over half of all spills from 2009 to 2020. Southwest Florida accounted for over 15 percent. In contrast, the Space Coast on the Atlantic side accounted for 25 percent of all sewage spills. Not surprisingly, the heaviest population density regions fared the worst.

Sewage spills get the most media attention, and are more shocking to see than the continuous polluting inflows of stormwater. Florida’s copious annual rainfall used to seep into the ground surface and into Florida’s “honeycomb” aquifer. Now, rooftops, streets, parking lots and other impervious, developed surfaces prevent much of this. There is instead a quick shunting of this rainfall, and the pollutants it picks up, directly into lakes, rivers and coastal bays, in most cases, without any degree of treatment.

Everglades Restoration Sputters Along

Long before Florida saw today’s rampant development and sprawl, early settlers envisioned making a “worthless swamp” a money-making landscape. They blindly drained the wetlands of South Florida which was ruinous for the natural water flow that once trickled over land and in the porous ground year-round from today’s Orlando region to Florida Bay in Everglades National Park. Three major roadblocks interrupted the natural flow of the River of Grass:

• 1) Herbert Hoover Dike (which today is essentially a hardened dam)
• 2 and 3) Alligator Alley and Tamiami Trail cross-state highways that intersect the southern Everglades

The highways greatly impede the wet season bounty of fresh water which naturally spilled over the southern rim of the Lake Okeechobee. In time, the lands were drained by canals to accommodate corporate agricultural operations, mainly sugar growing and some row crops which needed drier fields in summer and fall, and ample irrigation during winter drought.

In the 1950s, the agriculture industry grew with dairy farms, cattle ranches and citrus groves. Unfiltered and unmonitored, nutrient runoff from these farms caused eutrophication of Lake Okeechobee. Increased phosphorus levels fed cyanobacterial blooms, also known as blue-green algae, on Lake Okeechobee. The harmful blooms and sediments flowed unimpeded to outlet valves such as the St. Lucie River to the Atlantic and the Caloosahatchee River to the Gulf. Florida basically destroyed three estuaries, and the dependent coastal economies, to support an agriculture industry that belongs elsewhere. (Note: Florida sugar is subsidized.)

The big hope in 2000 was the signing of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) by the Clinton administration, a complex suite of 65 water projects designed to right the Everglades ship, to basically restore the natural hydrology of the vast wetland. It was to take 20 years, with costs shared by the federal government and the State of Florida.

CERP is in year 24 with less than 10 percent of the work completed. A vast reservoir and stormwater treatment area (STA) is finally under construction south of Lake Okeechobee. It will supposedly take 20 percent of the polluted water from Lake Okeechobee that currently trashes the coastal rivers. Its size was shrunk by over 70 percent during land-acquisition negotiations — the state of Florida failed to find enough willing landowners to sell for the project footprint. The water-holding area might be completed and operational by 2035 if there’s enough money allocated in each budget year.

Take Real Action

Too many Floridians are not especially enamored with the outdoors, and too many seasonal visitors seem to accept the declining natural resources because, well, at least it’s not snowing outside. All anglers and outdoorsmen should engage with those who are paid by state and federal taxes to fix this mess.

Too few realize they can speak their displeasure directly to Florida’s branch of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the state’s handful of water management districts (St. Johns, Southwest and South Florida), the governor, senators and representatives, county commissioners, mayors — all of them. You can even take part with public comment on those monthly water district meetings. Hate to say it, but anglers are too often missing from the discourse. Same goes for the recreational fishing tackle companies, boat-makers and tourism businesses who stand to lose their shirts if this continues.

Responsibility Starts at Home

In the case of point-source pollution, you can change a few things you might be doing at home. Do you fertilize your yard and landscape? Consider stopping altogether, or at the least, choose low-nutrient products. Slow release, too. And never apply fertilizer, herbicides and fungicides during the wet season. It all ends up in the storm drains and public waterways. Floridians are increasingly eliminating turf grass, replacing it with native ground covers and plants. It’s a great move to make.

Don’t blow turf grass clippings onto streets where they end up washing into storm with the next heavy rain. They decompose and add phosphorus to lakes and streams, plus cause algal blooms in summer.

If you live where there’s sewage infrastructure, and you still have a septic tank, consider hooking up to sewer. There are cost help programs in some municipalities and communities. Conversion to sewage is finally gaining traction. Be part of the solution. At the least, keep your septic system in good working order.

Speaking of flushing, please never dispose of outdated or extra pharmaceuticals that your doctor prescribed. Researchers are finding massive amounts of human drugs in our fish and other wildlife. Some of the compounds do enter the waterways through human urine, but flushing old pills can and should be stopped.

About the Author: Mike Conner is a lifelong Florida fisherman, specializing in fly and light tackle angling. He has worked as a guide in South Florida, as a staff editor at magazines such as Florida Sportsman and Shallow Water Angler, and as executive director of the Indian Riverkeeper.

The post How Florida’s Water Woes Affect Anglers appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Recreational anglers are applauding progress by the Gulf States Marine Fisheries Commission (GSMFC) to improve the quality and timeliness of recreational fishery dependent data gathered by the Gulf states. With the ongoing turmoil in federal recreational data collection efforts, anglers are optimistic that the states will be in position to break from the federal data system, as other regions have done, and assume management of red snapper and other species in the Gulf of Mexico in the near future.

David Donaldson, executive director of the commission, recently reported to the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council that more than $6.6 million in Inflation Reduction Act funding is being applied to:

• Improve state and commission data management systems;
• Develop better methods of quality control;
• Establish GSMFC as centralized warehouse for state fishery dependent data;
• Evaluate ways to validate state-based recreational fishing effort estimates;
• Evaluate ways to improve recreational discard data

Progress at the commission can’t come too soon as it is becoming apparent that the federal management system is struggling to function due to uncertainty in the federal recreational data. Continued cooperation by the Commission and the Gulf states is critical to provide a viable alternative to the current federal system, which is anchored in decades of questionable data, uncertain conversions and outdated management models. It has become almost impossible for fishery management councils to make timely decisions.

In just the last few months, the following developments have highlighted deep-rooted problems in the federal management system bringing trust in that system to the lowest level possible:

Fishing Effort Survey Errors

Last August, NOAA Fisheries announced that errors in its recreational data program — the Marine Recreational Information Program-Fishing Effort Survey (MRIP-FES) — is causing the over-estimation of recreational harvest by up to 40 percent for some species. This error was believed to be caused by the order of questions in the survey; moving them around yielded more accurate results.  Despite that rather small change that led to exceptionally spurious findings, managers will be forced to use the flawed data for management for several years as the system is analyzed. The recreational data program will once again go back to the drawing board — now looking at the third major change since the last reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Act. This certainly does not instill in recreational anglers any trust in NOAA management.

Red Snapper Numbers Remain Unclear

In January 2024, it was announced that SEDAR 74 — the current Gulf of Mexico Red Snapper Stock Assessment — was unable to produce a viable stock assessment for the most studied species in the Gulf reef fish complex. The stock assessment model contains more than a jaw-dropping 2,900 parameters, each with its own level of uncertainty and bias. Even a casual observer would not expect robust management advice to be produced by such a convoluted process. A new assessment is not expected for at least two years. Moreover, due to the model’s instability, reviewers recommended not including findings from the Great Red Snapper Count (GRSC), a $12 million independent stock assessment of the Gulf red snapper population funded by Congress and conducted by 12 leading marine science institutes and more than 100 of the top scientists around the Gulf and beyond. The GRSC was finalized in 2021 and found a red snapper population at least three times larger than NOAA’s estimates. As it stands, that $12 million effort has been largely ignored by NOAA Fisheries.

Conflicting Gag Grouper Numbers

NOAA Fisheries recently released its initial recreational harvest numbers for Gulf of Mexico gag grouper, which were seven times higher than results generated by the State of Florida Reef Fish Survey (SRFS). The findings included 106,000 pounds of gag grouper harvested from shore based on a single intercept on a bridge. Taken as presented, those findings would indicate the recreational sector is more than four times over its annual catch limit and would necessitate severe management actions, including possible bottom closures. NOAA officials have laid out a plan to go back and determine where these incredible numbers came from and how to deal with them.

What’s the Next Step?

These are just a few of many findings and outcomes of what continually appears to be a flawed system of exceptional reactive vs proactive resource management. These events are part of a crisis management pattern that has undermined the effectiveness of NOAA Fisheries as a viable management entity. Constantly unwinding errors from the past and eliminating unexplainable outliers leaves no room for forward-thinking — only reacting. The fishery management councils and staff are doing the best they can, but the federal agency has painted itself into a corner and the system is staggering under its own weight. Trust is so low that there are reports of private marinas beginning to block NMFS access to their docks. This crisis of confidence in MRIP needs to be addressed by turning the data collection over to the states.

Comparing West Coast to Southeast States

The Gulf Coast states are following a path taken by the West Coast states, which opted out of the federal data system in 2002. This follows a long-held management paradigm that fisheries management is most successfully accomplished at the most local level reasonable. For example, Oregon, Washington and California reached an agreement in which NOAA takes the funding it was using to collect recreational data and gives it to the states, and those states collect their own data and supply it to NOAA Fisheries for management purposes. No calibration, no trying to tie it back to NOAA’s inexplicable MRIP numbers — a clean cut. The West Coast states broke with NOAA due to frustration with the same problems that are plaguing the Southeast. States in the South Atlantic are also currently exploring options after ongoing data debacles in the red snapper, reef fish and Spanish mackerel fisheries, among others.

Recreational data problems in the federal system aren’t going away — they’re getting worse. Fortunately, there is a path forward in the Gulf, and we believe it is time to embrace a cohesive state-based management program that utilizes timely, current data and produces information managers can use today. We must get down to the business of properly managing our fisheries rather than wasting time explaining the mistakes of the past.

About the Author: Ted Venker is the Vice President and Conservation Director of the Coastal Conservation Association.

The post Give Power to the States appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

The sport and the science of sport fishing lost a hero, an advocate for science as a tool for better fisheries management in the Gulf of Mexico, and (in the best sense) a true fish nerd — Bob Shipp, who died on Jan 25.

I make the latter claim because I’m also a total fish nerd, which helps explain my friendship with Dr. Bob for more than 15 years. Besides often comparing notes with Shipp about fishes and their world, as editor-in-chief of Sport Fishing magazine, I edited a ton of content submitted by Shipp all of those years.

The scientist — who earned his PhD in biology and served for years as chair and professor of the Marine Science Department of the University of South Alabama in Mobile — was my go-to guy among a panel of Fish Facts experts who wrote for that ever-popular department in Sport Fishing. No kid in a candy store was ever more enthused than Shipp whenever I challenged him with a reader’s what-the-heck-is-this? fish photo and question.

Of course, he always knew the answer, and always promptly submitted a response in his down-home style — informative yet folksy and never pedantic. Such was his style in general, in a lab, on the docks, and on the water. I had the pleasure to fish the Gulf of Mexico a time or two with Bob, and it was evident that he rejoiced in walking the walk.

Bob wrote the authoritative Dr. Bob Shipp’s Guide to Fishes of the Gulf of Mexico, a real bible for all things piscatorial concerning the Gulf. For every species, his information included but transcended the scientific to include interesting tidbits and often amusing anecdotes by the guy who had “been there” for many species.

Shipp also authored an article in the March 2016 issue of Sport Fishing titled “The Great Gulf Red Snapper Train Wreck.” He did a remarkable job of explaining that wreckage and how we got there, during the height of federal regulations that nearly caused a revolt among Gulf anglers. His research was instrumental in disproving the theory (among some large environmental NGOs particularly) that the thousands of oil rigs in the Gulf were bad for the Gulf’s ecology, only aggregating fish such as red snapper where they could be easily overfished. His data showed that to be the nonsense it was, as he proved that juvenile red snapper flock to the thriving coral habitat covering rigs to grow and spawn. That data showed what anglers knew — that “threatened” red snapper in the Gulf were abundant and increasingly so, which he directly attributed to the astounding amount of habitat these rigs provided in an otherwise mostly barren Gulf.

In nearly every issue of Sport Fishing for many years, Shipp answered at least one inquiry submitted along with a photo in the magazine’s popular department, Fish Facts. Check out some interesting photos and IDs here. I often recognized even obscure species from the photo, but I always learned from the man’s answers.

To have known and worked with Bob Shipp was certainly a privilege.

The post Bob Shipp Remembered appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Update: Art Weston can add to his already impressive list of records with a massive 283-pound alligator gar he caught while fishing in Sam Rayburn Lake, Texas on September 2, 2023. The giant gar overtakes his previous best of 251 pounds, and if approved will potentially set both the IGFA All-Tackle and IGFA Men’s 6-pound Line Class World Records for the species. Weston was once again fishing with Capt. Kirk Kirkland aboard the Garship Enterprise when the big gar hit, and gave him an incredible 2-hour and 45-minute battle before getting the fish to the scale. Like most of Weston’s records, this gar was weighed on a certified scale and released. The IGFA states this record is currently pending and under review.

(Original article continues below.)

Even for an expert in catching world-record fish, this one was special: a freshwater specimen nearly 8 feet long from a river in Texas.

Art Weston has made a specialty of setting International Game Fish Association records. In fact, the massive alligator gar was one of six potential IGFA record fish Weston caught on a recent trip to the Trinity River, including a 142-pound alligator gar on 50-pound test, and a 191-pounder on 130-pound line.

He caught the big fish – 7.5 feet long and 251 pounds – on 80-pound braid. “It was easier to catch than the 102-pound fish on 2-pound line, I can tell you that,” which he did Oct. 1, 2022, he said.

A Gar Fishing Record Setter

Weston, who lives in Union, Kentucky, and manages the artificial intelligence department for a bank, already has a long list of IGFA records, including six that are pending. If they and his most recent submissions are all certified, his total will be 46. And counting.

“I think probably record fish are caught every day, but people don’t know that they’re records, or know the rules for submitting them,” he told Sport Fishing magazine.

Weston is obviously a serious angler, and fishes where the big fish are, including Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, Bolivia and Brazil. He also knows the requirements for certifying a catch and has the gear and equipment to satisfy them. For example, while big alligator gar are caught on the Trinity River all the time, most of them are caught on baited treble hooks — and that’s against the IGFA rules. Weston fishes for them with J hooks.

Along with knowing the IGFA rules inside out, he’s made a hobby of assessing things like line breaking strength, hook strength, the effects of abrasion. “I actually have a digital force gauge in my house,” he said. “I make hundreds and hundreds of leaders every year. All of that I did to have an advantage in record hunting.”

Weston even shares his know-how on his YouTube channel, Analytic Angling.

A Surprise Bite from a Record Gar

The big gar took a piece of carp on the Trinity on April 16. Weston was fishing from shore with Capt. Kirk Kirkland, who’s landed thousands of the big fish as a commercial fisherman and a guide. The fish never set off the rod’s alarm; Weston had only picked up the rod to re-cast when he discovered he had hooked up.

You don’t fight a fish like that standing on the bank. Weston and Capt. Kirk boarded the Garfish Enterprise, Kirkland’s custom-built, flat-bottomed Weldbilt, and pursued the big gal on the river. The fight was a relatively brief 25 minutes. Kirkland saw the fish first. “He just yelled out, ‘That’s the one, that’s the one you want,’” Weston recalled. “I’m like, ‘Is it big?” and he’s like, ‘it’s huge.’”

They both thought they might have caught an actual alligator, which are common in the area. “It pulled the boat in circles,” Weston said. The gar surfaced, Kirkland got a lasso around it (permitted by IGFA), and they towed it to shore, hauled it up to the game tripod on the bank, weighed and measured it, and released it back to the river.

“It had a lot of fight left in it,” Weston said. “It just happened to surface and Kirk was fast enough to get the lasso around it. We were very fortunate to land it fast. It wasn’t out of the water for more than five minutes, and they’re air breathers. It was released alive and well with no issues.”

The current IGFA 80-pound-test record for alligator gar is 132 pounds, set by Jennifer Schall in the same river in 2021. The all-tackle IGFA record for alligator gar is 279 pounds, set way back in 1951.

Careful Selection Leads to More Records

Not all of Weston’s records are enormous fish. He picks his battles, seeking species that aren’t well represented on the IGFA lists. For example, the IGFA recently determined that Alabama bass were misclassified and wiped out all the records. The fish in question is now called spotted bass. On the April trip, Weston caught one on 2-pound line, one on 4-pound, and one for its length, and expects them all to be IGFA records, at least for a while. “I don’t mind being the first one,” he said.

Another example: two of his teenage kids caught IGFA records a mile from their house. A nearby pond had been stocked with hybrid striped bass, which are also known as wipers, but which the IGFA calls whiterock bass. No one had submitted a catch for the species. Emery and Elyse Weston each caught two and entered the record books.

All of which goes to show there are opportunities for recognition. “You actually have a better chance than most people think, depending on what you’re trying to catch,” Weston said.

The post Massive Gar Smashes Record appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Draft Amendment 15 (PDF here) to the 2006 Consolidated Atlantic Highly Migratory Species Fishery Management Plan is a dense, technical document with a short fuse that is seeking an alarming objective. This federal management action is proposing to modify or eliminate four areas that currently restrict or prohibit commercial longline fishing due to the indiscriminate nature of the gear and the excessive mortality it causes to non-target and juvenile species, as well as overfished target species.

The closed areas, known as Mid-Atlantic shark, Charleston Bump, East Florida Coast, and DeSoto Canyon, have been in place for decades. Not unexpectedly, the removal of hundreds of thousands of longline hooks has resulted in tangible recoveries of iconic sportfish populations in some areas. In one area, the East Florida Coast Pelagic Longline Closed Area, an unexpected benefit has been the establishment of the nation’s best sailfish fishery. The direct economic benefit to recreational fishing-related businesses in Florida from this catch-and-release fishery has been nothing short of remarkable. Even though this particular zone was created to be a conservation area for juvenile swordfish — and was never intended to be exposed again to commercial plunder — it has been the object of repeated attempts to reintroduce longlining.

The Push to Reintroduce Longlining

It’s an unfortunate reality that as an area recovers back to health, pressure mounts to reinstate the very commercial gear that drove the area into an overfished condition in the first place. Previous attempts to allow longlines back into closed areas have included ham-handed charades by longline operators pretending to be marine science entities and using the federal exempted fishing permit process to propose “research” with longlines.

In one case, the permit would have granted a single longline company exclusive access to drop longlines in a closed area for three years and sell all the legal fish it caught under the permit. In essence, it was pursuing an Exclusive Longlining Permit and it almost worked. In that instance, it took months of work and the combined effort of the marine conservation community to successfully oppose the permit and safeguard the East Florida Coast Pelagic Longline Closed Area.

Amendment 15 is a slightly different animal. NOAA Fisheries contends that closed areas do not provide critical fishery-dependent data, which includes data that are collected during normal fishing operations. The agency says this lack of fishery-dependent data complicates efforts to assess the effectiveness of the conservation zones and the model they have created to evaluate the zones requires the use of longlines. In other words, they can’t know how well the zones are working to protect targeted species from longlines unless longlines are reintroduced to see what protected species they kill.

To be fair, NOAA is asking the right questions:

• Are the conservation zones working?
• Are they in the right places?
• Are they achieving the management goals?
• Do the zones need to be modified or moved to be more effective?
• Are changes in ocean conditions altering migration patterns and distribution of marine species?

Those are valid scientific inquiries that should be made about any closed area.

Longline Fishing Has Little Support from Public

But while evaluating the effectiveness of the areas is one thing, the verdict on longlines came back a long time ago. It’s a dirty, indiscriminate gear. The thousands of baited hooks attached to miles of longline don’t know the difference between a swordfish and a sea turtle, or between an adult tuna and a juvenile billfish. Few things caught with it are viable to be released alive. When the gear was removed, an incredible, economically vibrant sailfish fishery appeared off the East Coast of Florida. If it is allowed back, it is only a matter of time before it overwhelms the resources that are subjected to it and valuable, sustainable recreational fisheries will disappear, too.

There is more focus than ever on the health of the oceans, and it is often difficult to reconcile this country’s rhetoric on marine conservation with NOAA’s continuing infatuation with indiscriminate commercial gear such as longlines and trawls. The goals of Amendment 15 may be valid, but the proposed means to attain them with longlines are flawed.

NOAA Fisheries will not get the support of the recreational angling community and the public at large for research efforts like this — no matter how practical — if the goal is to justify reintroducing dirty gear. Amendment 15 should take advantage of less destructive commercial gear like buoy gear and bandit rigs while evaluating the effectiveness of those conservation zones. Maintaining or improving that effectiveness should be the paramount goal, not finding a way to allow longlines back in to wreak havoc.

Proposals like Amendment 15 (submit your own comments here) are frustrating to the marine conservation community because they showcase over and over the agency’s never-ending embrace of the most indiscriminate, destructive gear in the ocean. There are better ways to research these conservation zones than using this horrendous gear. Amendment 15 may very well be a necessary evaluation of conservation zones, but NOAA’s insistence on reintroducing longlines — even in a supposed research capacity — makes this proposal as suspect as an Exclusive Longlining Permit.

About the Author: Ted Venker is the Vice President and Conservation Director of the Coastal Conservation Association.

The post Are Longlines Headed Back to Protected Waters? appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

“In a state where I can go to jail for not taking enough meat off the ribs of a moose I hunt, or I can receive a ticket for taking a king salmon out of the water if I catch one while trout fishing, Alaska’s ‘Big Trawl’ has been documented chucking dead bycatch over the side of their boats. This action by commercial trawlers is completely legal under current regulations.” — Cody McLaughlin

Alaskan Bycatch By The Numbers

What is bycatch? For the uninitiated, it’s when a fisherman catches a fish species they didn’t intend to or, in the case of factory fishing vessels, can’t sell and have to discard. According to NOAA’s website, “Bycatch is a complex, global issue that threatens the sustainability and resiliency of our fishing communities, economies, and ocean ecosystems.”

The group of commercial trawlers in Alaska, what I call “Big Trawl,” produce millions of pounds of bycatch each season. We’re talking wasted and dead iconic gamefish such as halibut and salmon, species that have enormous economic value to local communities and recreational anglers.

FACT: Since 1991, 1,774,800 king salmon have been documented as trawl bycatch in Alaska. To break it down further, 1,117,800 of those fish came from the Bering Sea/Aleutian Islands (BSAI) and 657,000 of them came from the Gulf of Alaska (GOA). This data was compiled from weekly bycatch reports.

It is important to note that those numbers are just observed bycatch — and only 15 percent of bycatch is observed on these vessels. Estimates of complete trawl bycatch are likely 10 times higher than current documented numbers. That’s because trawl regulators don’t factor in unobserved bycatch — all the fish, crab, plants, coral and marine life mowed down by the net that doesn’t make it to the surface to be tallied. Currently, regulators slot in “0” for unobserved bycatch.

In addition to king salmon’s observed bycatch, Big Trawl in Alaska has reported wasting 141 million pounds of bycatch per year over the last 10 years. The numbers don’t lie — commercial fishing operators throw away millions of pounds of fish every season. And its harmful effects are staggering. On the other hand, recreational anglers continue to see their seasons shortened in efforts to save salmon and halibut populations. The difference in how commercial and recreational sectors are managed is maddening.

A Quick Halibut Fishing Comparison

For context, charter boats in Southcentral Alaska can’t keep halibut on certain Tuesdays or Wednesdays from June to August to help save the resource. And there’s been minimal howling from the small-business sportfishing operators. The entire Southcentral sport charter halibut quota for 2023 is 1.89 million pounds.

Meanwhile, Big Trawl has already dumped 3.14 million pounds of halibut as bycatch year-to-date in 2023. As of late June, they’ve shoveled over the sides of their vessels nearly double the quota for the entire sportfishing fleet. Plus, trawlers are still allowed to fish in designated halibut nursery areas of the Bering Sea, places where everyone else is banned from halibut fishing in order to protect young fish.

A Weak Response By Regulators Angers Fishermen

Salmon numbers are down at an alarming rate. Where do regulators fall on the issue? In a move many see as too little and too late, federal fisheries managers created a Federal Research Task Force to find the cause of the decline.

Sport fishermen have taken it on the chin through all this. We’re entering the second summer with the legendary Kenai River closed to king salmon fishing. This fabled river fishery is synonymous with the king salmon species. The current IGFA all-tackle record chinook is 97 pounds, 4 ounces, caught on this river in May 1985 by angler Les Anderson. In 2009, a potential replacement world record was caught and released on the same river.

Other world-class fisheries in Alaska also saw increased regulations. The Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers are both closed to subsistence fishermen who depend on the resource for food security. King salmon retention in lower Cook Inlet was reduced from 2 to 1 on March 2, before the run even started. The fishery was later closed in all Cook Inlet salt waters. On top of all of this, at least one misguided environmental group is asking that chinook salmon receive endangered status over crashing stocks, after succeeding in stopping trolling efforts in Southeast Alaska because endangered orcas. (A U.S. appeals court eventually halted the lower court ruling, allowing the trolling season to start on July 1.) 

Citizen anglers are finally taking a stand. The STOP Alaskan Trawler Bycatch Facebook page just reached the 25,000 member milestone in recent weeks and receives support from conservation groups in the state. You can also directly support organizations such as the Alaska Outdoor Council, fighting these issues on the ground. In addition, Salmon State has started a helpful “stop bycatch” take-action tool for concerned anglers.

Cheap Protein for China at the Expense of Iconic Fish

What’s the driving force behind commercial trawlers? How can cheap pollock take precedence over salmon or halibut? (Salmon costs consumers a whopping $20 to $40 per pound in the grocery store!) In a word? China. The Amendment 80 bottom trawl fleet is the top halibut bycatch offender. All participants in that fleet are registered in Seattle, with more than 80 percent of their catch going directly to China for cheap protein. They also ship $45 per ounce pollock roe caviar over for China’s growing population of billionaires. The rest, essentially, goes to McDonald’s as Filet-O-Fish sandwiches. McDonald’s claims its fish are 99 percent sustainably caught, and the pollock fishery might be doing fine, but the bycatch fisheries are cratering.

So what’s the recourse? In short, anglers and conservationists concerned about this issue need to let policyholders know where they stand. The North Pacific Fisheries Management Council (NPFMC) has the power to stop this. Congress needs to consider acting, and it will take more than just Alaska’s representatives to get this done. That means contacting your state’s federal representatives to let them know the waste and destruction of Alaskan salmon and halibut fisheries is unacceptable.

Lastly, the governors of Alaska and Washington (where the trawl fleets are regulated) have influence here, especially over the makeup of the NPFMC and the future direction of commercial fishing. Both states are sportfishing destinations. The sportfish wasted by commercial trawlers negatively impacts the economies of these states. Visiting anglers will not bring their tourism dollars if there are no salmon.

As I have said on more than one podcast this month, this issue deserves every angler’s attention. Commercial trawlers catch or waste the majority of king salmon while recreational anglers continue to get pushed out of fishing opportunities. If you’re looking to catch a wild king salmon, you should hop on a plane to Alaska in the next five years before these historically mighty runs of fish disappear.

About the Author: Cody McLaughlin is a noted conservationist covering public policy issues related to hunting, fishing and the environment. He currently serves on the board of the Alaska Outdoor Council and is a former board member and lead spokesman of the New Jersey Outdoor Alliance, representing the state’s 1.2 million sportsmen. McLaughlin recently launched Trout Stream Studios as an executive producer for podcasts and livestreams in the hunting and veterans’ affairs spaces.

The post Bycatch Is Killing Legendary Alaskan Fishing appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

In his satirical novel Catch-22, Joseph Heller perfectly summed up the average angler’s experience in federal fisheries management when he wrote that “just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.” In the case of Snapper Grouper Amendment 46, anglers are certainly justified feeling more than a little paranoid.

On its surface, the effort to address deficiencies in recreational data through the creation of a permit requirement for private recreational vessels makes some sense. Better defining who is fishing offshore can lead to better data on harvest and, just as importantly, on bycatch. No paranoia yet.

One of the most significant limiting factors in the South Atlantic red snapper fishery is the tremendous bycatch mortality that NOAA Fisheries attributes to recreational anglers, even though federal information on recreational discards is probably the poorest-quality dataset in all of federal fisheries management. Which is really saying something.

NOAA calculates that the red snapper anglers catch and discard dead while fishing for other things when the snapper season is closed is enough to consume just about the entire recreational quota, resulting in the recent 2-day open season. Not only that, there is nothing on the horizon to make those seasons any longer – this may be as good as it is going to get, according to NOAA, despite perhaps the largest population of red snapper since management began.

Last year, NOAA Fisheries threatened to implement massive bottom fishing closures to get at the alleged red snapper bycatch problem, but the South Atlantic Council, anglers, state agencies, boating and tackle manufacturers, elected officials, charter operators — basically everyone other than NOAA — utterly rejected that proposal as wild over-reach in the face of a booming red snapper population.

In the midst of this debacle, Amendment 46 outlined a federal permit for offshore anglers to get a better handle on exactly who is fishing offshore and use that information to determine better harvest and bycatch data. On its surface, this proposal makes sense, but it also rings the paranoia alarm bell for two reasons.

For starters, anglers lobbied for a saltwater license and established the Federal Saltwater Registry in the 2006 reauthorization of the Magnuson Stevens Act specifically to improve recreational data and to date that effort has been largely wasted. Coastal states had the option of establishing their own license systems or using the federal registry to determine angler populations. Almost every state established its own saltwater licensing system, so this information already exists although it is not clear how or if NOAA uses it. Tweaking what is already available to identify those who fish offshore should be a relatively simple exercise, so why is an entirely new federal permit necessary?

Second, NOAA Fisheries officials have made several alarming statements in recent years about their desire for “effort rationalization” in the recreational sector. The current leadership of NOAA seems to be of the opinion that, even though they say they have no idea how many anglers are fishing offshore, they are certain it is far too many and therefore that effort needs to be limited by the federal government.

One way to limit recreational effort is to create an offshore permit and forbid those who aren’t fortunate enough to get one from fishing. Make no mistake — there is an incipient groundswell of support inside the agency and across several environmental groups for limiting recreational access as a management tool. Locking you out of your fishery is on the table.

That threat became a bit more tangible after Amendment 46 evolved to include language that the permit would only be used to disseminate fishery information and education materials, and any reference to data collection was removed. The rationale given for removing data collection from the permit was to expedite the process, but without a data component the permit becomes virtually meaningless. Several Council members objected to the change, which created the potential for the amendment to become an unjustified mandate with a wide-open door for its purpose.

NOAA Fisheries has an abysmal record of recreational management and expressing a desire to limit the number of anglers on the water is not a way to engender trust with the recreational community. One way anglers could support the original goal of an offshore permit is to task the states with adapting their own systems — which already exist — to determine the offshore angling universe. Putting the states in charge and ensuring that any such permit is used only for data collection and educational purposes has a much higher likelihood of cooperation and success.

Anglers in the South Atlantic are desperate to find a solution to the chronic crisis of federal fisheries management, yet they are rightly suspicious of NOAA’s intent behind a federal offshore permit. Better data is clearly part of the solution, but it’s a good idea to first make sure they really aren’t out to get us.

About the Author: Ted Venker is the Vice President and Conservation Director of the Coastal Conservation Association.

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Anglers looking forward to catching and keeping gag grouper in June will have to wait a couple months — at least for offshore bottom-bouncers fishing in the Gulf of Mexico. The 2023 gag grouper season in federal waters was scheduled to open June 1; now it will open on Sept. 1.

The gag grouper season is still expected to close on November 10, unless NOAA Fisheries projects the recreational Annual Catch Limit (ACL) is reached prior to that date, in which case the season might end sooner. As it stands, the gag grouper season is shortened from 162 days to a bit more than two months. Minimum size limit remains 24 inches total length. Bag limit stays at 2 per person, within the 4 grouper aggregate.

“That leaves us 70 days to fish, and we’ll fish all those days,” said Capt. Clay Shidler, of Hang’Em High Sport Fishing in Crystal River, Florida. “Thankfully, we’ll still have the red snapper season which will bring anglers out.”

NOAA Fisheries implemented the temporary rule to help reduce overfishing of gags as part of the Gulf’s Reef Fishery Management Plan. The recommendations originated from the Gulf Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee, based on results from a recent gag grouper stock assessment, leading the Gulf Council to ask NOAA Fisheries to implement the temporary changes.

“We want to protect those big male gag groupers,” said Shidler. “We’ve worked with state and federal researchers conducting gag grouper assessments.” He points out that gag grouper are protogynous hermaphrodites. Gags all start as females. None switch to males until growing to at least 32 to 36 inches. Most gags over 45 inches are males.

“We have 11 charter boats and all of them catch gag grouper, even the bay boats, in waters from 5 to 30 feet,” said Shidler. “October to December is the best time of the year for shallow water grouper. It’s what we’re known for in this part of Florida. We would have taken a 1-fish bag limit, or even a 24- to 36-inch slot limit, rather than the shortened season.”

Anglers who can keep just one gag grouper are still going to hit the water or book a charter, Shidler said. Shidler and his boats are seeing strong numbers of smaller, legal-size female gags in the areas they fish — but 10 to 30 feet off Florida’s Nature Coast is still federal waters.

The 2021 Gag Grouper Stock Assessment

Gulf gag grouper are overfished, according to 2021’s stock assessment. That means there are too few gags in the Gulf for the population to sustain itself, especially when compared to historic levels.

The Southeast Fisheries Science Center calculated a drastic reduction in take is necessary to ensure that gag stocks can rebuild in a span of 22 years, explained a NOAA Fisheries statement. Their calculations found catch limits in 2023 had to drop to 661,901 pounds in order to meet the timeframe for rebuilding, as specified by the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council.

To complete the gag grouper stock assessment, data was gathered from the Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP) Fishing Effort Survey (FES), which replaced the MRIP Coastal Household Telephone Survey (CHTS). MRIP-FES uses mail-based surveys to estimate effort, and uses angler license and registration information to identify and contact anglers. 

Crunching the Gag Grouper Numbers

Here are the current catch limits for Gulf gag grouper, estimated using MRIP-CHTS. All numbers are in pounds gutted weight.

• Stock Annual Catch Limit: 3,120,000
• Commercial Annual Catch Limit: 1,217,000
• Recreational Annual Catch Limit: 1,903,000
• Commercial Annual Catch Target/Quota: 939,000
• Recreational Annual Catch Target: 1,708,000

Below are the new catch limits for Gulf gag grouper, calculated using MRIP-FES estimates. MRIP-FES estimates of effort and catch are substantially higher than MRIP-CHTS estimates.

• Stock Annual Catch Limit: 661,901
• Commercial Annual Catch Limit: 258,000
• Recreational Annual Catch Limit: 403,759
• Commercial Annual Catch Target/Quota: 199,000
• Recreational Annual Catch Target: 362,374

Reef Fish Amendment 56 Update

The temporary gag grouper rule is effective for 180 days until October 30, but NOAA Fisheries is expected to extend the rule for up to 186 days. That’s long enough for Reef Fish Amendment 56, the Gulf Council’s complete plan to rebuild gag grouper, to go into effect by the mandated date of January 26, 2024. On June 8, the Gulf Council took final action on Reef Fish Amendment 56. The Council:

• Revised the criteria used to determine whether gag is overfished and/or experiencing overfishing, based on results of the most recent stock assessment (SEDAR 72), by setting the maximum sustainable yield proxy at the fishing mortality associated with 40% spawning potential ratio.
• Revised the sector allocation to account for the change in recreational harvest monitoring data, resulting in a 65% recreational and 35% commercial split, using average landings from 1986-2005 as estimated by Florida’s State Reef Fish Survey for private vessels, MRIP for shore mode and for-hire vessels, and the Southeast Region Headboat Survey for headboats.
• Established a rebuilding timeline of 18 years and set corresponding annual catch limits at 75% of the fishing mortality associated with a 40% spawning potential ratio.
• Set the recreational annual catch target 20% below the recreational annual catch limit; and, set the commercial annual catch target 5% below the commercial annual catch limit and set the commercial quota equal to the annual catch target.
• Opened the gag recreational fishing season on September 1 and close it when the recreational ACT is projected to be met; this is expected to result in a season duration of about two months.

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Three anglers headed offshore on Friday, April 28, to fish the Perdido Rig, a deepwater spar in 8,000 feet of water, almost 180 miles east of South Padre Island, Texas. The experienced crew left Island Moorings Marina in Port Aransas, Texas, at 10 a.m. But weather forecasts were not favorable, with many offshore boats staying home. When the 31-foot catamaran didn’t return that night as expected, family members reported the boaters missing.

“This case highlights the importance of diligently checking the weather forecast and filing an accurate float plan with family members, including intended arrival times,” said Senior Chief Petty Officer Josuah Chears-Stevens, command duty officer, Sector Corpus Christi.

Coast Guard Sector Corpus Christi watchstanders received a notification at 10 p.m. of three overdue boaters. Watchstanders work the radios at Coast Guard stations and monitor calls for assistance. They also maintain communications with Coast Guard boats underway in the Gulf.

First, the Coast Guard contacted Perdido Rig personnel, who reported they saw the catamaran near the rig at 3 p.m. on Friday. That’s when watchstanders directed the launch of an HC-144 Ocean Sentry airplane from Coast Guard Air Station Corpus Christi. During the search, the Ocean Sentry crew heard the boaters hail them on the radio, VHF-FM channel 16.

“The boaters then activated both the DSC distress alert function on their radio and their Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB),” said a Coast Guard news statement.

Using location data from the alerts, the Coast Guard aircrew located the boaters’ position. The twin-engine turboprop aircraft found the vessel taking on water about 30 miles northeast of South Padre Island on Saturday. A 33-foot Special Purpose Craft–Law Enforcement (SPC-LE) boat, launched out of South Padre Island, also raced to the distressed boaters.

“The crew observed the three boaters bailing water out of the catamaran,” said the Coast Guard. “On-scene weather conditions were 10-foot seas with winds of 34 mph.”

The Coast Guard’s SPC-LE crew rendezvoused with the catamaran and escorted the men safely to Sea Ranch Marina on South Padre Island. No injuries or ailments were reported. 

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