December 1, 2012 — A showdown over bony, oily fish called menhaden is set for later this month in Baltimore.
Regulators will decide whether to cap the harvest of menhaden and divvy up the catch by state and by types of fishing.
It’s all aimed at ensuring the survivability of the menhaden population, because the fish are a valuable species at the bottom of the marine food chain.
But those pushing for a cap are facing stiff opposition from commercial fishermen — including a major corporate fishing company — who don’t want to see their livelihoods further limited.
While one of the options on the table is to change nothing, it’s likely that members of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission will make substantial changes to the menhaden harvest.
“This is really the first time that we will be directly managing the menhaden catch on a coastwide basis, so in a lot of respects, we’re starting from square one,” said Bill Goldsborough, a fisheries scientist with the nonprofit Chesapeake Bay Foundation. He’s one of Maryland’s three representatives on the panel.
First, a primer on menhaden.
Menhaden are small, bony fish that gobble up plankton. In turn, they’re gobbled up by rockfish, bluefish, ospreys and other larger animals further up the food chain.
One author dubbed menhaden “the most important fish in the sea” for their ecological value.
Menhaden are inedible to humans, but they can be lucrative to catch.
Omega Protein, a Houston-based company with a 300-employee operation in Virginia, uses giant nets drawn between boats to scoop up schools of menhaden. The fish are processed for use in food for pigs, cattle and fish farms, as well as for omega-3 fish oil products for humans.
Omega’s work, called the reduction fishery, accounts for about 80 percent of the total East Coast menhaden harvest.
The company’s type of netting, purse-seining, is banned in Maryland and several other states. It’s allowed in Virginia and in federal waters.
The remaining 20 percent of the menhaden harvest involves mostly independent fishermen who catch menhaden in various kinds of nets and traps and sell the fish for bait that’s used by crabbers, lobster harvesters and recreational anglers.
Read the full story at the Capital Gazette