Then I would ask the same question that precipitated my original post which is why do tens of millions of almost keepers EVERY year never come back as keepers the following season? And how can targeting the harvest of any stock's primary spawners AND not protecting the spawn from commercial onslaught during their offshore migration ever result in a healthy and sustainable fishery. Asking NOAA to assess the stock's health is commensurate with asking commercials to report their own dead discard percentages. The large breeders are being removed from the fishery by commercials and juveniles are being killed by the millions in that process. In 3-5 years, you'll see where this fishery is. In the late 70's, NOAA and NMFS we're saying the fluke fishery was not over fished and by 1981 the fishery collapsed which caused substantial reductions in quotas by almost 50%. As a result commercials were forced to start targeting other stocks including winter flounder which within a few years destroyed the winter flounder stock. It's never come back. We're in the process of reliving history and NOAA and NMFS will be the last to admit to it.
Still trying to figure out the functionality of the site so please bear with me. I posted my above reply to MakoMatt as I was running out the door yesterday and had the years wrong when the fluke stock actually collapsed in the 80's. Tried editing it but couldn't figure out how, maybe someone can provide me with some guidance.
BUT NOAA and NMFS said the fluke stock was not overfished in the early to mid 80's and was healthy. So people have the data from the assessment and for your perspective, between 1982 and 1988 commercial landings per the 66th SAW by number of fish were (and these are all in thousands) 19.768, 23.708, 32.098, 25.342, 20.554, 21.629 and 26.437 for an average of fish landed commercially for that seven year period of 24.219 million! Over those same years, 91% of age classes harvested were 2-yr old or less, 9% were 3-yr old fish and above. We weren't targeting the spawning stock and mega breeders, were leaving the spawning stock alone as a majority of the fish harvested were just reaching sexual maturity. A year later in 1989, the fishery was declared grossly overfished and commercial landings in 1989 plummeted to 11,514 and then again in 1999 to 5,159! The problems was the right size fish were being harvested, quotas were set insanely high causing the collapse.
I want to share statistics from 2017 (last year covered by the 66th SAW) to show just how bad this fishery has been managed since and still is today. In 2017, commercial landings declined to 2.454 million fish. The average age of fish harvested changed dramatically to 13% 2-yr and younger and 87% 3-yr and older, a complete reversal from the 90's into 2000 when the stock was completely rebuilt. Those statistics are based on fish landed, now add ACCURATE dead discards. Insane number of 1 - 2 year old age class fish are being killed by commercials in the process of harvesting more valuable older age class breeders which the regulation are directly responsible for. Today's fishery is not only not in good health it will never recover until the regulations are changed to protect the breeding population, protect the spawn and address the massive amounts of dead discards associated with the commercial fishery, the primary reason we never see last season's almost keepers come back the following year as keepers. The regulations went from harvesting younger age classes before they died of natural mortality at an estimated rate of 25% a year (which personally I believe to be overstated) and protecting the mega breeders to regulations incentivizing the harvest of older age classes, decimating the spawning stock and driving up commercial dead discard levels. NMFS introduced size minimums as a means to shift almost 90% of the biomass to the exclusive harvest of commercials, incentivized targeting the breeding population, allowed netting during the primary spawn which when I asked Kiley Dancy if they ever conducted a study to understand the impact of that decision on the spawn's efficacy her answer was incredibly no. Moving to size minimums sent commercial dead discard levels through the roof which will always happen when selective harvest is introduced into a fishery. For 10 years, the lead scientist for NEFSC Mark Terceiro said recruitment was down from historical levels and NMFS / NEFSC had no idea why. A 3-yr. old could figure it out. Every year size minimums increased recruitment as a percentage of SSB declined. Kill the breeders, kill the juvenile age classes in the process, kill recruitment, kill the stock. The stock since the turn of the century when size minimums and daily possession limits were mandated to the recreational sector has been de facto committed to the commercial fishery as it's year round and commercial catch values are being managed as opposed to the health of the stock itself. 1-2 year old age class fish are collateral damage in the harvest of older age classes by commercials with market values 2-4 times greater than juvenile. The fishery is dying and has been for the last two decades. If commercials are targeting the breeding population and juveniles are being killed by the millions in the process, how does this or any fishery survive. It won't and NMFS from experience will NEVER admit it because it's all about managing commercial catch values to their highest and managing the recreational sector based on trip effort or spending money. No one's managing the fishery itself.
