Response to March 13 Letter to the Editor "Say NO to Proposed Recreational Grouper Fishing Restrictions"

From Julie Morris - Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council Member

Gag grouper anglers are passionate about fishing, venturing out into the Gulf to that familiar spot to catch big beautiful fish, and then heading home to share the fresh catch with family and friends.  It’s an incredible experience, one that I hope gag anglers will protect by compassionately accepting a few years of pain in order to gain a secure, sustainable future gag fishery. 

We learned in 2006, and reaffirmed in 2007 that we are harvesting too many gags, too fast.  We are undermining the ability of gags to build up to a healthy level, capable of long-term sustainable harvests.  Currently we allow a five-fish shallow water grouper bag limit with a February 15 through March 15 closed season - the height of the gag spawning season.  But these current management measures have not prevented overfishing.

Federal rules require fishery managers to stop this harmful practice and, just last year, Congress re-emphasized the importance of ending overfishing - mandating strict timelines for doing so.  As a result we’re considering lowering the shallow water grouper bag limit to three fish, and allowing only one or two of those to be gags.  Because of the inverse relationship between bag limit and season length, a three-gag limit results in a season of fewer than 200 days, while a two-gag limit yields 230 days, and one gag 276 days. 

Charter captains, bait shop owners, and motel and restaurant managers want the longest season possible, supporting an argument for lower bag limits.  But some anglers say they won’t pay to go offshore for only one or two gags, and a three-gag bag limit means a shorter season, so we have a management dilemma.  Faced with lower bag limits and shorter seasons, anglers argue several points, all of which merit discussion.

First, harvest has dropped due to rising fuel prices and recession, but we don’t know by how much, or when and if it will jump back up.  And while this drop in effort may reduce overfishing - good news for the fish - we can’t depend on these volatile factors to manage the fishery.  We have to come up with a sound plan that ends overfishing.

Second, anglers criticize the scientific basis of our management.  We don’t have perfect information to work with, but our data and assessment methods get better every year.  Anglers and scientists work side by side to find the best data and choose the best stock assessment models.  The results are reviewed twice, first by a committee of independent international fish experts, then by a panel of scientists familiar with Gulf fisheries.  Our recent gag assessment went through a third scientific review - all three reviews concluded that we are overfishing gags.

Third, anglers say that recreational harvest data is unreliable.  Despite problems with our recreational data, it has improved greatly over the past decade.  We use random-sample survey techniques to collect effort and landings data.  We combine this with headboat observer data and weekly phone calls to charter boat captains.  Efforts are underway to further enhance data reliability.

Fourth, recreational anglers tell us that recreational harvest has greater economic impact than commercial harvest, and often ask for deeper commercial reductions to benefit recreational anglers.  But federal fishery law directs us to achieve the greatest net benefit to the nation through a fair and equitable distribution of the fish resources across sectors.

Finally, anglers point out that the commercial gag harvest is wasteful, resulting in many dead discards - undersized fish that die after release.  This is an important consideration in both sectors.  The number of dead fish discarded by the recreational sector in 2004 alone was over 900,000 gags - close to 2.5 million pounds - while 50,000 pounds of dead gags were discarded by commercial fishers. 

In its efforts to address the overfishing of gag grouper, the Gulf Council is proposing management alternatives that will require short term pain for all – recreational and commercial anglers, grouper-sandwich lovers, and many business owners.  The Council is seeking public input and thoughtful, new management ideas. Together we must develop a plan that will create long term benefits for both gags and gag fishermen.

Sincerely,

Julie Morris
Council Member
Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council

This letter originally published on March 18, 2008.

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