Amendment 2 to the North Carolina Estuarine Striped Bass Fishery Management Plan (FMP) is currently under review…
Amendment 2 to the North Carolina Estuarine Striped Bass Fishery Management Plan (FMP) is currently under review, informed CCA NC in a recent press release. By law, each FMP must be reviewed at least once every five years.
The DMF prepares FMPs for adoption by the MFC for all commercially and recreationally significant species or fisheries that comprise state marine or estuarine resources. The goal of these plans is to ensure long-term viability of these fisheries. While the deadline for submitting comments on the striped bass plan has passed as of April 1, CCA NC would still like to educate the public on their view of the issues at stake.
In North Carolina, striped bass stocks are managed within four distinct areas: (1) Albemarle Sound Management Area (ASMA); (2) Roanoke River Management Area (RRMA); (3) Central Southern Management Area (CSMA); and (4) Atlantic Ocean. The MFC adopts rules and policies and implements management measures for the estuarine striped bass fishery in Coastal Fishing Waters in accordance with General Statute 113-182.1. The Estuarine Striped Bass FMP is jointly developed by the DMF and the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission (WRC). The ASMA and RRMA are also subject to compliance requirements of the ASMFC Interstate FMP for Atlantic Striped Bass.
The goal of Amendment 2 is to manage the estuarine striped bass fisheries to achieve self-sustaining populations that provide sustainable harvest based on science-based decision-making processes. If biological and/or environmental factors prevent a self-sustaining population, then alternate management strategies will be implemented that provide protection for and access to the resource.
The 2020 A-R striped bass stock assessment indicates the stock is overfished and overfishing is occurring. The current stock assessment is used to establish sustainable harvest in the A-R stock fisheries. This is done by providing the Total Allowable Landings (TAL) that can be removed annually from the stock. The TAL is currently allocated with a 50/50 split to the recreational and commercial fisheries. The Albemarle Sound Management Area (ASMA) commercial fishery receives 50% of the TAL, with the Roanoke River Management Area (RRMA) recreational and the ASMA recreational fisheries each receiving a 25% allocation of the TAL.
All commercial harvest on the A-R stock occurs in the ASMA. Under Amendment 1, the ASMA commercial striped bass fishery is a bycatch fishery, meaning striped bass harvest occurs while targeting other finfish species. Striped bass cannot be greater than 50% by weight of all other finfish species landed per trip.
Daily landing limits of 5-25 striped bass further deter fishermen from targeting striped bass and aim to ensure the striped bass quota is available when multispecies gill net fisheries are operating. Most striped bass harvest occurs with the American shad anchored gill net fishery in the spring, followed by the southern flounder anchored gill net fishery in the fall. Since 2015, as a commercial fishery for invasive blue catfish has developed, more striped bass landings have occurred in this strike gill net fishery.
Commercial landings in the ASMA have been limited by annual Total Allowable Landings (TAL) since 1991. The stock was declared recovered in 1997, and the TAL was gradually increased as stock abundance increased. The TAL reached its maximum level of 275,000 pounds in 2003 as the stock reached record levels of abundance.
Beginning in 2004, commercial landings no longer reached the annual TAL, even with increases in the number of harvest days and daily possession limits. From 2005 to 2009, landings steadily declined, averaging 150,000 pounds. The decline in landings during 2005-2009 was due to poor year classes produced from 2001 to 2004. An increase in landings in 2010 was due to the strong 2005 year class.
Since 2013, landings have declined in part because of a shortened American shad season. In 2021, the commercial TAL was reduced to 25,608 pounds to meet requirements of adaptive management measures in Amendment 1 to the Striped Bass FMP to end.
Supplement A, passed by the MFC in 2019, closed the Central Southern Management Area (CSMA) commercial striped bass fishery to protect important year classes of striped bass. From 1994 to 2018, commercial landings in the CSMA (Tar-Pamlico, Neuse, and Cape Fear rivers) were limited by a 25,000 pounds annual TAL. From 1994 to 2018, striped bass commercial landings in the CSMA averaged 26,132 pounds.
ASMA
Adaptive management to address the overfished status in 2021 reduced the ASMA recreational TAL to 12,804 pounds. Recreational landings peaked in 2001 at 118,506 pounds. Recreational landings in the ASMA primarily consist of age-3 to age-5 fish.
Beginning in fall 2005, harvest was allowed seven days a week in the ASMA. Additionally, in fall 2006, possession limits were increased from two to three fish. Despite the increases in bag limits and days, recreational harvest continued to decline. Several poor year classes produced since 2001 may have contributed to the decline in stock abundance and recreational harvest since 2006.
The recreational limit was decreased to two fish per person per day in January 2016. Recreational harvest from 1991 to 2019 averaged 42,466 pounds in the ASMA. Releases are usually greater than harvest and are dominated by fish less than the 18-inch minimum length limit. Undersized releases during the last 10 years have averaged 24,051 fish.
RRMA
Harvest from 1982 through 2019 averaged 54,103 pounds in the RRMA. Discards outnumber landings annually, especially in the RRMA where concentrations of fish on the spawning grounds can be dense. Annual releases from 2005 through 2019 in the RRMA averaged 80,821 fish. From 2003 to 2016, landings averaged 64,389 pounds, with a few noticeably low years.
Adaptive management measures implemented in 2021 reduced the RRMA recreational TAL to 12,804 pounds. Recreational landings in the RRMA are dominated by age-3 to age-5 fish, primarily due to a no possession rule of fish between 22- and 27-inches total length (TL) and general angling techniques. Few fish over age 9 are observed in the creel survey because most anglers do not use the large artificial lures or natural baits needed to effectively target striped bass over 28-inches TL.
CSMA
In 2016 and 2017, the number of trips and hours spent targeting striped bass in the CSMA increased substantially compared to other years. Within the CSMA, there is a significant catch-and-release fishery, averaging 47,309 releases from 2010 to 2019. Undersized discards peaked in 2017 but declined through 2019.
Threats and Alterations
Beyond the harvest of striped bass, other threats and alterations exist that impact the health of the stock, including water quality, degradation of habitat, the prevalence of the non-native blue catfish and flathead catfish, and manmade barriers that impede access to spawning grounds.
Appropriate river flow is critical before and after the spawning period and is the most important factor influencing year class strength. Striped bass require relatively high streamflow to encourage upstream migration prior to the peak of spawning, whereas low to moderate flows are necessary for spawning success and downstream transport of early life stages.
Recruitment failures in the ASMA since 2001 are thought to be due to extended spring flooding events. Appropriate flow regimes for successful striped bass reproduction in the Roanoke River have been a concern since Kerr Dam was constructed in 1953.
Stock Concerns
Annual recruitment is influenced by spawning stock biomass, egg and larval transport to nursery areas, predation, food availability, and optimum water quality conditions. The occurrence of recruitment failures since 2001, especially since 2017, is thought to be a function of spring flooding events in the upper Roanoke basin during critical periods of egg and larval transport.
Extended periods of flood or high flow releases during the critical spawning period (May through early June) negatively impact successful transport and delivery of eggs and fry down the Roanoke River and into the western Albemarle Sound nursery area. There is high year-to-year variability regarding flow releases and year-class strength. Consequently, all years with documented high flow rates (2017, 2018, 2020) had very low juvenile abundance index values, indicating poor spawning success (NCDMF 2020).
It should also be noted that the last year of data in the stock assessment was 2017, so poor recruitment from 2018-2021 impacts have not been modeled.
Those with questions, or those that wish to get more involved, should visit www.CCANC.org.
