April 27, 2012 – NOAA has never undertaken a stock assessment for sturgeon, regional council members were told Tuesday. The agency declared it endangered when acting on a petition by the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The New England Fishery Management Council, not to mention fishermen out of Gloucester and across the region, have a new obstacle to face when they begin the new fishing year next Tuesday. And this one's spawned from a NOAA decision that may truly mark a new low, even for an agency with virtually no credibility left.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has declared the Atlantic sturgeon as an endangered species, and that bodes badly for fishermen across the region.
It's not that New England fishermen are illegally hauling in a lot of sturgeon. But the declaration also means that fishermen cannot haul up sturgeon in their bycatch — the fish that nets accidentally snag when fishermen are targeting other species. And that may mean dire new limits on the catches for other species in the sturgeon's habitat, which ranges up and down the Atlantic coast.
Read the full story at the Gloucester Times.