Send a message to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission today in support of stronger conservation for menhaden, an important forage fish.
The Situation
Menhaden, a key food source for many popular sportfish – especially striped bass – are the most important fish in the sea according to noted historian and author H. Bruce Franklin. Unfortunately, menhaden stocks have declined 88 percent over the last 25 years and are at their lowest abundance in recorded history.
Commercial harvest continues
Despite growing concerns over the condition of the menhaden population, managers have allowed commercial harvest to continue at high levels, resulting in overfishing which seriously threatens some of the East Coast's most prized recreational fisheries, including striped bass. In an effort to increase menhaden abundance and its availability as a forage species, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is in the process of establishing new population targets and fishing limits for the species.
Disease is taking its toll
The declining status of menhaden has taken on more significance with the increasing prevalence of Mycobacteriosis infections among striped bass in the Chesapeake Bay. There is growing evidence that a lack of suitable forage, notably menhaden, has stressed these important sportfish and made them particularly vulnerable to this fatal disease. Stronger conservation measures are required for the appropriate management of the menhaden fishery and will help bolster its population.
Read the full petition at Keep America Fishing.
Analysis: The article misrepresents the health of the menhaden fishery; it claims that menhaden are overfished, which has no basis in the data collected on the fishery. The last Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) assessment determined that the fishery was not overfished, and that in the last ten years of the stock assessment overfishing, fishing above the mortality threshold, only occured once in 2008 on a marginal level. This has not affected menhaden fecunity levels, which are currently at their target.
The article also makes the claim that a lack of menhaden are responsible for an increase in mycobacteriosis in bass, an assertion that is controversial and not as universally supported as the article implies. Environmental factors, such as the "thermal niche/oxygen squeeze" theory, are much more likely candidates for the source of the bass' illness. Because large amounts of run-off in the Bay have created areas with low levels of oxygen, called hypoxia, in cold waters that bass traditionally inhabit, bass spend more time in warmer, shallower waters. However, the bass are not ideally suited for these waters, and the temperature is too high for them to feed properly. This makes them susceptible to a variety of health problems, including mycobacteriosis.