On Wednesday, Feb 4, The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) Shad & River Herring Management board will be making final decisions on Draft Amendment 2 to the Shad & River Herring Fisheries Management Plan.ACTION ALERT
Take Action to protect River Herring Today
Government biologists report that the severe decline in River Herring stocks is due to a combination of issues. Even though recreational fishers are under a moratorium and in other states the directed commercial fishery has been reduced or closed completely, there were only very minor gains in a few rare locations but overall the decline continues. The one issue thus far ignored in actual regulations has been the fact that since 2001 over 1 million pounds of River Herring have been recorded as by catch in the Atlantic (Sea) Herring fishery.
On Wednesday the ASMFC will have the opportunity to take significant action. You can help by taking a few minutes to send an e-mail right now!! Each state has three ASMFC seats. The three seats are filled by a state fisheries commissioner, a governor’s appointee and a legislative appointee. Lists of commissioners can be found at the following link:
http://www.asmfc.org/commissioners.htm
States we expect on our side: NY, PA, MD, NC, VA
States we are not sure of: DE, GA, SC, NH
Potential Problem States where we need a lot of pressure: ME, MA, NJ, CT, RI
Urge your commissioners to support recreational harvest option 5 that will institute a complete moratorium on recreational harvest. Urge them to also support commercial harvest option 4 which would close direct commercial fishing for River Herring except for sustainable fisheries.
Most importantly tell your commissioners that it is time for strict by catch regulations to be included in the River Herring plan. Ask them to vote for at least the following three options:
Option 3a will establish limits on river herring by catch in other commercial fisheries
Option 3b would require mandatory reporting of by catch and discards at a statistically confident level
Option 3c would mandate time/area closures for fisheries know to have high River Herring
