More on Groundfish Meetings

[OceanBlue]

please make every effort to attend. YOU are the ones who will make a difference here.

Tips for testifying - Keep it constructive and respectful. Do NOT make disparraging comments about non-sport fishers. If you present a problem, suggest a solution. Try not to reiterate what others have said. "What s/he said" works great.


Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife
Contact: Anne Pressentin Young (503) 872-5264 x5356
Internet: www.dfw.state.or.us Fax: (503) 872-5700


For Immediate Release Tuesday, July 22, 2003
Public meetings to be held July 29-31 on 2004 groundfish management options


NEWPORT – The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife will host three public meetings next week to discuss and gain input on groundfish management options for the 2004 fishing season.

Comments received at the July 29, 30 and 31 meetings will be used by the Pacific Fishery Management Council in September when setting 2004 regulations.

At each meeting, ODFW staff will provide an overview of the 2003 groundfish management results and harvest, review the decision-making process, discuss proposed 2004 harvest level ranges for both commercial and sport fisheries and present possible management strategies for commercial and sport fisheries.

Several species of groundfish have been declared overfished by the federal government. Harvest of other species has increased and little is known about their long-term sustainability.

Potential management options for 2004 include the following:
-Sport:
Option 1: Maintain the status quo, including the 10 rockfish, cabezon, greenling daily bag limit; daily bag limit of two lingcod longer than 24 inches; and prohibition on retention of canary and yelloweye rockfish during the all-depth halibut season.
Option 2: Maintain the status quo (option 1) and close bottom fishing in waters 50 fathoms deep in July. The closure would occur during the coho salmon season and would reduce harvest of canary, yelloweye and widow rockfish and lingcod.
Option 3: Maintain the status quo and close offshore bottom fishing 2-4 months in waters deeper than 30, 40, or 50 fathoms. This option would further reduce catch on canary, yelloweye and widow rockfish and lingcod.
Option 4: Maintain the status quo and close offshore bottom fishing possibly all year in waters deeper than 30, 40, or 50 fathoms. This option further reduces catch on canary, yelloweye, widow rockfish and lingcod.

-Both Commercial and Sport:
Proposals include:
· Separate the harvest guidelines for black rockfish, other nearshore rockfish, cabezon and greenling.
· Maintain 2003 harvest level nearshore rockfish guidelines for 2004 and allow harvest of greenling and cabezon at levels equal to or 10-20 percent above the 2003 guidelines.
· Require minimum length of 10-12 inches for sport-caught greenling. Commercially-caught greenling currently must be 12 inches.
· Require minimum length of 16 inches for sport-caught cabezon. Commercially-caught cabezon must be 16 inches.
· Increase minimum length from 24 inches to 26 inches for sport and commercially caught lingcod.
· Prohibit retention of canary and yelloweye rockfish

-Commercial:
Option 1: Consider federal Exempted Fishing Permit (EFP) impacts after all 2004 fishery management options are reviewed and 2004 fishery management options have been addressed.
Option 2: Brief PFMC on options to pursue Pacific whiting individual quotas in September.
Option 3: Allow for the use of selective flatfish trawl gear coast-wide and allow increased bottom trawl trip limits and access to areas that would otherwise be closed.
Option 4: Consider trawl depth-specific rockfish conservation area (RCA) management options. Define shoreward boundary of RCA as 50, 60, 75 or 100 fathoms. Define offshore boundary as 100, 150, 180, 200 or 250 fathoms.
Option 5: Specify winter petrale fishing areas for January-February and November and December.
Option 6: Define non-trawl Rockfish Conservation Area as 30 fathoms to 125 fathoms.
Option 7: Require commercial halibut boats to fish outside the 100-fathom line
Option 8: Allow trawl vessels to use fixed-gear under existing trawl limits.
Option 9: Use video monitoring aboard shoreside whiting vessels.
Option 10: Consider elimination or retention of “B” trawl fleet.
Option 11: Consider zero retention of cabezon for nearshore fixed gear and open access.
Option 12: Apply the Washington arrowtooth EFP to create a fleet-wide trawl opportunity, with observers, bycatch caps and full retention of rockfish.

All three meetings will occur 6:30 – 9 p.m. They will be held:
· Tuesday, July 29, at City Hall in Port Orford;
· Wednesday, July 30, at Englund Marine Supply in Newport; and
· Thursday, July 31, at Duncan Law Seafood Lab, 2001 Marine Drive, Astoria.

For additional information on commercial fishing options contact Mark Saelens, ODFW in Newport, (541) 867-4741. For additional information on sport fishing options contact Don Bodenmiller, ODFW in Newport, (541) 867-4741.

[Pilar]

Why is the notice so short?

[OceanBlue]

Not sure, John. Could have sworn I posted a few weeks back. Can't find it now, though.

Nevermind - here it is: http://www.ifish.net/cgi-local/ultim...;f=21;t=002177

[ 07-23-2003, 10:47 AM: Message edited by: OceanBlue ]

[Straydog]

Ocean Blue and other Salty's.

I would be curious to know your take on the options presented. Maybe you have posted them and I have missed them but you folks do this alot more than I and are around a lot of others that do so, too.

I am interested to know what Sportfishers are thinking about this.

Depoe Bay Dan,

What's your take and the other folks around Dopey Bay thinking about this?

[Born to be Wild]

Well Straydog, I’ve been out of touch with a lot of the Dopoe Bay fisherman especially the charters. I’ve been trying to avoid the café science if you know what I mean.

By the way, I was the only person from Depoe Bay at the all important ODFW Salmon Industry meeting back in February! Charters, commercials and privates from Brookings to Astoria but not one single charter from Depoe Bay could find time to go (the whole 12 miles). These guys are... incredible.

I’ve known this was coming down for about a month and posted on ifish as suggested by Don Bodenmiller. Didn’t know what the options were at that time but had a good idea on some of them. This is the first I have seen of the proposed options. I would presume if it is anything like the other meetings I have participated in that these options can change or be modified.

Option 1: Maintain the status quo, including the 10 rockfish, cabezon, greenling daily bag limit; daily bag limit of two lingcod longer than 24 inches; and prohibition on retention of canary and yelloweye rockfish during the all-depth halibut season.

This is the option I like best and feel it is adequate. Yelloweye and canary rockfish were for the most part over fished by the commercial fleet (Terry Thompson and the gang - draggers). Hopefully the sport fishermen don’t have to pay more than they already have for the actions of the greedy lack-of-conscious commercial trawl fleet.

Option 2: Maintain the status quo (option 1) and close bottom fishing in waters 50 fathoms deep in July. The closure would occur during the coho salmon season and would reduce harvest of canary, yelloweye and widow rockfish and lingcod.

This would be acceptable for me and would not harm the sports fishermen and could hardly see what difference it would make on populations of the over fished rockfish. Depoe bay and Newport are primarily fishing bottom fish inside 50 fathoms. Garibaldi and Charleston often fish deeper and possibly Bandon and Winchester Bay (where there is little pressure).

Most of them should be chasing Chinook and coho anyway that time of the year and if Garibaldi and Charleston sell bottom fish trips instead I guess they can pick on the near shore blacks.

Option 3: Maintain the status quo and close offshore bottom fishing 2-4 months in waters deeper than 30, 40, or 50 fathoms. This option would further reduce catch on canary, yelloweye and widow rockfish and lingcod.

This wouldn’t make a difference that I see to the central coast but would effect the north and south coast. Again force them to put more pressure on the inner reefs and the blacks, blues, cabezon, greenlings and china rock fish that live there.

I and one charter office that I am aware of would like to see the ocean closed all together for 2-4 months. Say maybe November through February. The advantages are; leave the blacks and other sabastes species to spawn in December and January and the ling’s to spawn in February. Then open it up and let ‘em have at it! This would also eliminate a lot of dangerous bar crossings by the charters. (They usually don’t push this issue with whale watchers).

The majority of charters would be up in arms of course. I do know of two charters in Garibaldi that close up for the winter and make for snow birds down in Mexico now that I think about it.

Of course if this included rock fishermen, we would miss some opportunities during the closure. Something to think about however.

Option 4: Maintain the status quo and close offshore bottom fishing possibly all year in waters deeper than 30, 40, or 50 fathoms. This option further reduces catch on canary, yelloweye, widow rockfish and lingcod.

This option would kill Garibaldi and Charleston. These guys have bills to pay so they would fish the inner reefs and fish the blacks into oblivion. They don’t have enough shallow water reefs to withstand the pressure like we do here in Depoe Bay and Newport.

Not that the charters aren’t doing damage to our fish populations here.
If you had any idea what the Depoe Bay charters are doing to the population sizes to our rockfish on the local reefs off the spit and Lincoln City you would understand. Go fish Pacific City and you will see the difference. Of course now days the charters are selling long distance trips to PC.

If it sounds like I am picking on the charters, I am. They are the ones doing the damage to the inshore rockfish populations.

Hopefully our OCN’s (wild coho) will continue to rebound so they (charters) can spend more time chasing them (hatchery and possibly wild coho) instead of these slow growing rock fish. I am confident that they will continue to rebound. Now they need to retrain there customers to fish silvers again instead of rockfish.

-Both Commercial and Sport:
Proposals include:
• Separate the harvest guidelines for black rockfish, other nearshore rockfish, cabezon and greenling.

Doesn’t matter to me. Just have to re-educate the public. Actually a lot of them never got educated!

• Maintain 2003 harvest level nearshore rockfish guidelines for 2004 and allow harvest of greenling and cabezon at levels equal to or 10-20 percent above the 2003 guidelines.

That’s good news.

• Require minimum length of 10-12 inches for sport-caught greenling. Commercially-caught greenling currently must be 12 inches.

I don’t think that is a bad idea. A lot of greenling is wasted for ling bait and off the rocks I see greenling kept sometimes that are too small to filet! I mean we might be talking 5 and 6 inchers! Maybe even 4”!

• Require minimum length of 16 inches for sport-caught cabezon. Commercially-caught cabezon must be 16 inches.

Increase the minimum an inch. No problem with that one. Re-educate the public again.

• Increase minimum length from 24 inches to 26 inches for sport and commercially caught lingcod.

Bad move! What’s the purpose? I wished they would have kept it at 22”. A 22" ling has some decent filets on them. They just increased the bag limit on them this year because they are showing signs of improvement. Why throw back a 24-25” ling? That affects the sport boats and the rock/jetty fishermen. Bad move! [img]graemlins/berry.gif[/img]

• Prohibit retention of canary and yelloweye rockfish

I would hate to see it come down to this. Most of you realize that a caught canary or yelloweye is a dead canary or a dead yelloweye! I had to turn back a dead 6 pound canary at the tug last year because we all had one each. Enough to make you sick. Thanks again Terry Thompson and gang. You didn’t get my vote for state senate!

This would be the worst option of all discussed because of the waste. :depressed:

Dano

Day 11

[ 07-25-2003, 02:23 PM: Message edited by: DepoeBayDan ]

[Sea Jypzee]

As a Depoe Bay sport fisher, I'd have to largely agree with Dan's assessment. I agree, the draggers are the ones who've largely depleted the canary and yellow-eye stocks.

While there are a nice supply of close in reefs here locally to fish, it's still nice to be able to go out to the deeper water to target the larger ling-cod. By restricting to 30-50 fathoms, it would knock that option out.

This would also knock out going to the rock pile for bottom fishing.

There needs to be some way to better control the commercial fleet, as they're the ones doing the bulk of the damage. They damage the environment the fish live in, plus wipping out the fish themselves.

[Born to be Wild]

There needs to be some way to better control the commercial fleet, as they're the ones doing the bulk of the damage. They damage the environment the fish live in, plus wipping out the fish themselves.

<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helv">Good point Nancy. They also damaged their habitat besides depleting the stocks.

I believe they are under control now but the problem is that 60-80 year old yelloweye don't grow back over night. Mature canaries get up there in age also.

Not to mention that a lot of the habitat has been destroyed. When the goverment buys back their boats they ought to take 'em out there and sink 'em to bring back some structure. :grin:

This is going to be a long rebuilding process unlike that of rebuilding our wild coho stocks.

Dano

[Mr. BrownTrout]

While working in the seafood industry I witnessed alot of over fishing by the draggers. To top if off they would brag about it. One time a dragger came into Astoria Seafoods, bragging about how he had about a 75,000 tow of blackcod. Well anyone knows that that was quite over their limit, well he did not keep all the fish as he couldn't. He kept was he was allowed to keep and the rest went overboard, do you think those fish survived????? NO
I can name so many other times. Its sickening. If these big boat owners go broke....too bad as I won't feel sorry for them. Of course I am refering to the ones that would consistantly catch over their limits. Yes there were some good guys out there that are honest. And yes when a repeat offender would come in, I would be on the phone to OSP Game troopers. Once again this is only my opinions and observations. [img]graemlins/applause.gif[/img]

[Straydog]

Thanks for the insights folks! Good info here.

My fear is that if we don't do something, and I don't yet pretend to know what, we will end up like California with large reserves off limits to any and all fishing.......... :depressed:

[OceanBlue]

Black Magic? RFA Janice? Some insight please?

My personal feeling is that we want to be as conservative as possible to avoid a catastrophe in the future.

If sport fishers are willing to give up bottom fish from, say, Nov. 1 - end of Feb. and maybe even July - September, we can certainly ask for more aggressive restrictions on the commercial fleet. Keep in mind, these guys have already taken a massive hit, but we want to protect our nearshore fish and habitat.

I'm not sure what the issue with lingcod is. They just increased the bag limit. I'm not sure what the thinking is on increasing the min. size for retention.

I understand the reasoning behind not allowing canary or yelloweye to be retained, but it is a double-edged sword. If the fish is dead, "releasing" it isn't going to help the population. But, the idea is that if fishers can't keep them, they won't fish areas where these fish live. WRONG. They live where lings and other rockfish live. We catch 'em when fishing salmon or halibut in the summertime.

The meetings are the place to discuss these issues and get more information from ODFW about what they're thinking. I hope that we will have good representation there.

[Pilar]

Still reading .....

[black magic]

OK! OK!
I'll tell what I know about this issue (canary)

First of all this actually has nothing to do with canary and everything to do with bocaccio.

California has been virtually shut down for recreational groundfish offshore due to low allowed bocaccio bycatch, (zero in N.california and 5 metric tons south.). This is the current constraining species for california rec fishing. Since California could not fish due to bocaccio there was no need for them to have an allocation of canary bycatch, so Oregon got most of it. Sort of a sanctioned canary heist.

Unfortunately or fortunately a new assessment of bocaccio has been completed and the results show a sizeable increase in bocaccio populations in California. Now the constraining species for California rec fishing is canary not bocaccio. California wants their canary allocation back and that is what they are going to get. The question that remains is only about how much.

My best guess is that Oregon's rec. allocation for canary bycatch will fall somewhere between 4 and 7 metric tons. The current level is 9.3.

Therefore Oregon fish managers must come up with a plan to reduce canary bycatch so that it is reasonably assured that the total take of canary will fall within the range that is being proposed by the Council.

The fishery management process is extremely complicated. I call it a 'vast political ecosystem' where every decision affects many others. I would caution you not to look at it in black and white, as very little of it falls into that category.

Hope this helps a little

[OceanBlue]

Thanks John... unfortunately, it just opens up more questions. :shocked: But that's what the meetings are for, huh? Which are you attending?

Thanks!

Jen

P.S. I think I'm going to add "fish politics - ain't they fun" to my sig line.

[black magic]

Jen,
I will attend Astoria as my first option. If I have schedule conflicts then it will be Newport, but most likely Astoria.

Also I know that Don Bodenmiller is working on assumed canary savings with the different options and if any of those options cannot do the job they will not be used.

[OceanBlue]

Does Don have a particular recommendation based on the options presented? Patty?

[black magic]

Jen,
I don't think there is a favored option due to the fact that the final number for canary bycatch for Oregon rec. fishing will not be known until after PFMC meeting in Seattle in Sept.

The options that are listed do not really look like "options" to me. They look more like increasing levels of restrictions to achive the required bycatch number. The last being what would be required if the final number is low. An option would be something such as which periods of the year would you prefer to be restricted to acheive a given level of the range?

If none of this makes sense, please say so and I will try offering a different explanation

[Born to be Wild]

First of all this actually has nothing to do with canary and everything to do with bocaccio.

<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helv">Black magic,

I understand what you are saying but have to question or disagree with your assessment that this has everything to do with bocaccio and not canary rockfish. If the canary rockfish hadn’t been over fished by the commercial trawl fleet Oregon wouldn’t have anything to be concerned about, correct?

I don’t believe bocaccio is a factor or direct factor in Oregon. What you are saying is California wants its share of canaries back now that they can harvest more bocaccio if I read you right.

Unfortunately the west coast canary stocks are considered one stock and split between the three states.

Acoording to Don bodenmiller when I talked with him on the phone about a month ago I was told that the canaries were the driving force and when I asked about yelloweye I was told that they could become a factor also.

Regardless of what California does with its bocaccio fishery and canary bi-catch if the canary stocks were healthy Oregon wouldn’t have the threat we are facing now. We are going to take a hit because of the canary and possibly yelloweye populations.

This almost and could have taken place last year but didn’t because of California having to forfeit there share of allotted canaries due to their bocaccio problems and I would suspect that was do to the commercial trawl fleet also.

You seem very knowledgeable on the groundfish picture and appreciate your response but I don’t agree with your statement that this has nothing to do with the canaries.

Dan

[Born to be Wild]

I understand the reasoning behind not allowing canary or yelloweye to be retained, but it is a double-edged sword. If the fish is dead, "releasing" it isn't going to help the population. But, the idea is that if fishers can't keep them, they won't fish areas where these fish live. WRONG. They live where lings and other rockfish live. We catch 'em when fishing salmon or halibut in the summertime.

<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helv">Ocean Blue,

I think that is the point of the 30, 40, or 50 fathom closures. They would be closed to all bottom fishing then so you couldn't catch them purposely or incidently.

I'm surprised you catch them salmon trolling or mooching maybe but I believe salmon fishing would remain open in those waters. Do you catch canaries in any numbers while salmon fishing?

You wouldn't be able to fish for lings in those closed waters and halibut fishing would most likely be closed to fishing in areas like the rock pile where canaries and yelloweye are present.

As far as the "inside 30 fathoms" spring/summer halibut fishery is concerned, I'm not to clear on that and that is borderline canary depth.

Dan

[ 07-25-2003, 02:37 PM: Message edited by: DepoeBayDan ]

[OceanBlue]

I wouldn't say we catch them in any great numbers when salmon fishing, but ocassionally without the use of downrigger, you'll drop your gear to the bottom and start reeling back up and get a bite. Most times it is a ling, but sometimes a rockfish will surprise you.

[RFA Janice]

Originally posted by OceanBlue:
I wouldn't say we catch them in any great numbers when salmon fishing, but ocassionally without the use of downrigger, you'll drop your gear to the bottom and start reeling back up and get a bite. Most times it is a ling, but sometimes a rockfish will surprise you.

<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helv">

[RFA Janice]

Black Magic and Depoe Dan have it about right. We need to reduce our canary impact because now California will need some canary to go with their increased bottom fishing, now that bocaccio aren't such a problem for them. So the question is, how much do we get restricted to provide them with a season? Theree are less than 10 meteric tons for the two states, and this year we are slated to take around 9.3 in Oregon. In order to give California around 4.5 tons, we have to be restricted somehow. Which is the best way? Fathom closures or season closures? Bear in mind that we may be able to deliver the decrease in our take only by agreeing to fathom closures. :depressed:

It isn't clear that we would be allowed to have our halibut seasons, but I think that is the actual intent. Need to check that out at our meetings, and make sure that some of the canary are saved for (dead, overboard) bycatch caused by sportsmen during halibut days.

Also need to attend to effects of sport and commercial take on greenling and cabezon--there are important effects of those regulations on the sport harvest.

As soon as there is a stock status study of china cod, (which will find thoses fish overfished or close to it), we will begin to have very bothersome nearshore restrictions on rock fishing. Also, black rockfish are showing the effects of intense fishing pressure, and are not all that healthy right now either. So I support the increase on the size of lings. If we would just give a little right now, we would have much bigger lings to fish for when we are restricted to just a little fishing for them becuase of the effects on other fisheries. Just my take on the future.

[OceanBlue]

Janice/Black Magic - what am I missing here? Did we suddenly find out that rockfish are migratory? Why on earth would we have to share quota with California or anyone else? :whazzup:

[black magic]

Jen,

Of course canary rockfish are not migratory, you knew that. This is the very reason that they had to be relocated from California about two years ago.

You see the real story is that Don Bodenmiller had to lease a fleet ballistic missile submarine from the Navy at Bangor in WA. He took a fast track course in submarine driving from the Navy. He then took Mark Saelens and Patty Burke as crew and went to California to get the Canary that California was giving to Oregon. They really only needed a few metric tons so they figured that all of the fish would easily fit into the missile tubes. They could also be kept alive due to the fact that the tubes could be kept flooded and they could maintain the proper depth/pressure to keep them very healthy. They only had to go as far south as Ft. Bragg where they turned around and started collecting canaries as they cruised north. The full allocation was onboard by Cape Mendocino. Are these guys good or what.

When they crossed into Oregon the outer and inner doors of the missile tubes were cracked open slightly and adjusted for the proper amount of opening to evenly distribute the fish along the entire coast. This was working fine except when they arrived just off Tillamook Bay they found one tube with a canary jam at the door. They decided to just open that one all of the way and let them all out right there. This is why some of the T Bay fishermen are reporting 'lots of canary' in that area.

I am sure that you have already guessed what the real problem is, yep you got it. California doesn't have enough money to pay for the submarine to take half of them back. They expect Don to take them back at our expense and we're real mad about that and that is really what the meeting is all about.

By the way Jen. If you ask Don about this I am sure he will deny any knowledge of what I have told you here so maybe you shouldn't tell anyone else either.

How did I do?

[OceanBlue]

[img]graemlins/applause.gif[/img]

Well, John, your story was an incredible one. I bought every bit of it... that is until I realized that Patty has only been with us for about 18 months, not 2 years. [img]graemlins/eek13.gif[/img]

Anyway, thanks for the parody. Politics hardly ever make sense and they have absolutely no place in fish management.

See, folks... this is why you need to be at these meetings. Raise common sense from the dead. Let ODFW hear your frustration over this silliness so they can carry that back to the PFMC.

Until we get heard there, at least let the ODFW understand that we don't want to lose our stocks and that we need to be real conservative with the groundfish. Ask for season closures, increased restrictions on the commercials, increased size minimums. We need to be willing to give in order to get.