Battle won, but war rages on in fluke debate

While the efforts of the Save The Summer Flounder Fishery Fund have gone a long way towards restoring some semblance of sanity to fluke regulations, there is a great deal of work left to be done, Capt. Tony Bogan told anglers gathered at the Taylor Pavilion in Belmar Sept. 22.

The organizers of the nonprofit group held the meeting to update anglers and industry members of the progress the organization has made since its inception just ten months ago, when a closure of the 2009 fluke fishery was a looming possibility. Thanks to the efforts of organizers and the generosity of the fishing community, Bogan said, the fund was able to hire Dr. Mark Maunder, who offered his own evidence of a healthy fishery to regional managers, who in turn increased the summer flounder quota for 2009 by 2.68 million pounds, from 15.77 million pounds this year.

Under the proposed 2009 quota, recreational anglers from Maine to the Carolinas would be able to take home 18.45-million pounds of summer flounder next season, subject to federal approval of the regional councils’ findings. Additionally, fluke stocks must be rebuilt to 132 million pounds by 2013, down from an original number of 197 million pounds.

Though better scientific data has been obtained through Dr. Maunder’s efforts, Bogan warns that the bone of contention driving tight fluking regulations remains – the necessity to rebuild fluke stocks to an arbitrary number in an arbitrary time period.

FAULTY LAWS

Though scientific data recognizes that fluke stocks have doubled since 1993 and are possibly at their highest levels in recorded history, anglers could still face a fishing ban in before the 2013 deadline since the fluke biomass — the total weight of the fluke spawning stock off the East Coast — may fall short of the 132 million pounds the law requires.

“The problem with summer flounder is not a problem with the fish, but a problem with the lack of flexibility [in federal fisheries management law] and a lack of good science,” Bogan said at the meeting. “There’s a deadline, and the deadline is not based in anything except, ‘this is a nice round number.’ There was no biology behind ten years. It was ten years because it was a nice, round number. You should be able to do anything in a decade, right?”

To that end, the fund’s organizers, with help from the Recreational Fishing Alliance, convinced Rep. Frank Pallone [D-6] to introduce the Flexibility in Rebuilding American Fisheries Act, which would provide for limited flexibility in the rebuilding mandates set in the federal Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Management Act if certain conditions are met, including extending the rigid 10-year stock rebuilding periods if a particular species of fish is “on a positive rebuilding trend.”

Other provisions in the Pallone bill would provide for a deviation from the 10-year plan if a specific biomass rebuilding target exceeds the highest abundance of the stock of fish in 25 years and there is evidence that the stock is on a positive rebuilding trend. The legislation will also add additional criteria to the Magnuson law to take into account commercial, residential and industrial development when determining fishing regulations, as well as agricultural activity in coastal areas and its impact on the marine environment. The bill also calls for the assessment of the relationship between predator and prey and other environmental and ecological changes to the marine conditions in the stock assessment.

The bill has gained 19 co-sponsors in Congress, and RFA founder Jim Donofrio told those in attendance at the meeting that there is interest in the Senate as well. Though the current Congress has adjourned for its session, Pallone said in a recent statement that he will push for the bill to be placed on the agenda for the next Congress. Donofrio urged anglers to contact Senator Frank Lautenberg and voice support for laws that will provide for flexibility in fisheries management.

MAD SCIENCE

Through Dr. Maunder’s work and closer examinations of the methodology used to calculate the effects of fishing and regulations on stocks, serious question have been raised. According to Bogan, government figures on fluke stocks do not make any mention of the sex of fish caught in trawl surveys or any other dockside studies. Recent research into this area of “fluke science” is cause for concern. “Almost 100 percent of every fluke that’s 18-inches is female,” Bogan said. “When you hit 19-inches, 100 percent are female.”

With an 18-inch size limit imposed on recreational anglers this season, female fluke were the only sex targeted by recreational anglers, a fact that has caused concern among many in the scientific community. Similarly, the latest research has uncovered the fact that male fluke – whether due to predation or age – simply do not live as long as their female counterparts, though mortality rates used in government figures do not even mention a difference between genders.

Other topics which beg further study include how many newborn fluke are recruited into the spawning stock each year and the natural age fluke can live to. “They don’t know the answers to these questions,” Bogan said. “We have two choices: wait for the government to get the answers to these questions, which they haven’t done yet, or pay for it ourselves. That’s what we’re here to do.”

Obtaining accurate scientific data and analyzing that data represents the ongoing mission of the Save the Summer Flounder Fishery Fund, Bogan said. Science, however, does not come cheap, and the fund will continue fundraising efforts this off season.

For the group’s organizers, the victory scored at this summer’s meeting of the Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Management Council represents just one battle of a multi-front war. For the Bogan family – fishing legends in the central part of the state – as well as recreational anglers from Sandy Hook to Cape May, the end result is what counts, especially given the abundance of fluke in local waters.

“I’ve got family that’s been fishing in New Jersey since 1931, in the same location, and there’s no one in my family that remembers seeing as many fluke as we see at this point in time,” said Bogan. “Overall, there’s fluke out the ying-yang.”

NJ Fishing Reports