A menhaden pulled from the Chesapeake Bay in the area of Jordan Point Marina. (Charlie Paullin / Virginia Mercury)
Recreational fishers in Virginia are asking legislators to take action on managing menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay, as the only reduction fishing company catching the tiny nutrient fish continues to refute allegations it’s harming the species.
In a Sept. 3 letter , the Virginia Saltwater Sportfishing Association sent the request to all 100 members of the House of Delegates and 40 members of the Senate.
“The Chesapeake Bay is a national treasure and it can no longer support this level of industrial-scale fishing in its fragile waters,” wrote Steve Atkinson, chairman of the VSSA, after detailing ways management of menhaden has and hasn’t changed in recent years. “Our citizens ask for your support of sensible regulatory/legislative action to better manage this vital public resource.”
Oversight of the menhaden reduction fishery in Virginia has long been debated through regulation requests and ongoing court cases that sought to reduce the catch amounts for Reedville-based Omega Protein, the lone reduction fishery in the Bay that reduces menhaden into fishmeal and oil.
The VSSA and conservationists say Omega’s catches are hurting the striped-bass population, though the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, the regional fishing management authority, says the species is overfished but overfishing is not occurring. Overfished is a regulatory term meaning that the number of fish or weight of fish is below a sustainable reference point, while overfishing happens when catching or death rates are below a sustainable reference point.
Recent research is now linking lower populations of menhaden to starving osprey chicksin several areas of the Bay, not just the lower Mobjack Bay region that previous research examined. Over the summer, the USGS presented to the ASMFC separate research also looking at how catching menhaden, as well as pollution and weather events, could be starving the osprey species amid competition with other birds, including the double crested cormorant and brown pelicans.
In 2020, the Virginia legislature transferred regulatory oversight to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission, where the VSSA and conservations thought stricter rules on Omega would be easier to attain.
But a 2022 petition with 11,000 signatures calling for Omega to move its fishing to the Atlantic Ocean in order to study the impact of the company on the Bay led to the VMRC entering into a non-binding memorandum of understanding with the company, which agreed to not fish around holidays and weekends. Another request for stricter regulations on Omega was denied earlier this year.
Omega, which is limited to a 51,000 metric ton cap on catches in the Bay under ASMFC’s direction, has said that fishing in the Bay is critical when inclement weather makes fishing in the Atlantic Ocean unsafe. There also isn’t any science showing their operations — which employ over 250 people with annual wages totaling $29 million, $26 million of which stays in Northumberland and Lancaster counties — aren’t as impactful on birds in the Bay as “a range of issues” that the USGS presented are, contends the company that operates Omega’s fishing vessels, Ocean Harvesters..
“Ocean Harvesters believes that any organization can and should participate in the governing process, but the groups’ statements must be grounded in facts and the best available science; not erroneous rhetoric that is meant to misinform like that of VSSA,” said Ocean Harvesters in a statement, adding such rhetoric could “negatively impact the blue-collar, union, and minority workforce of Ocean Harvesters.”
The letter from the VSSA references a bill from this past session carried by Del. Lee Ware, R-Powatan, that would’ve funded the $2.6 million study both the recreational fishers and Omega have called for, but the measure was carried over to next year’s session. The recreational fishers, Omega, academic institutions and conservations crafted the framework of the study, to be conducted by the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences.
Attempts to reach Ware weren’t immediately successful.
Del. Betsy Carr, D-Richmond, who is a member of the study’s subcommittee that voted to carry over Ware’s bill and several other funding requests said in a statement, “I and many of my colleagues remain supportive of it and interested in (the menhaden study’s) crucial findings.”
“I look forward to continuing to work on this issue in the coming Session and am hopeful that we can secure the funding and resources,” Carr said.
Following the USGS presentation over the summer, the ASMFC approved a motion from Lynn Fegley, the Maryland Department of Natural Resources director of fishing and boat services, to form a workgroup to consider “precautionary options,” including seasonal closures, for regulations on Omega. Virginia’s representative on the board, Pat Geer, chief of fisheries management at VMRC, attempted to postpone the measure to gather the science first, but his motion failed.
“[Fegley’s] motion is leading down a path of the seasonal closure for a fishery based on public opinion,” said Pat Geer, VMRC Chief of Fisheries. “We need the science first. We need to have that information. It is very frustrating for us, and it’s embarrassing, that we can’t get the funding to do this, if it’s that important.”
The ASMFC workgroup is expected to present proposals in October. Any regulation changes to Omega need to happen between October and December, the time period negotiated as part of the oversight transfer to VMRC to allow the company to prepare for the season that begins in May.
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