I don’t recall seeing this article posted here but I do recall some good conversations over this issue.


Halibut in steady decline throughout Pacific, says commission | National Fisherman


Halibut in steady decline throughout Pacific, says commission

By Laine Welch December 5, 2019

Lower catches for Pacific halibut are in the forecast for the foreseeable future.

That was the message from the International Pacific Halibut Commission at its November meeting in Seattle. The commission oversees halibut stock research and sets catch limits for nine fishing regions ranging from northern California to British Columbia to the Bering Sea.

There are fewer of the prized flatfish (down 4 percent), they weigh less (down 5 percent) and no big pulses appear to be coming into the stock, according to the grim summary of the 2019 halibut fishery. The assessment included the results of summer-long surveys at nearly 1,370 fishing stations, including 89 added to the Central Gulf of Alaska, the biggest halibut fishing hole.

The numbers of spawning halibut also appeared to continue their decline over the past year, said the commission’s lead scientist Ian Stewart.

The commission calculates the amount of removals of halibut over 26 inches for commercial, recreational, sports charter, subsistence and bycatch in other fisheries, called a total constant exploitation yield. For 2019, the coastwide TCEY was 38.61 million pounds. The decline was projected, Stewart said.

“This has been predicted for several years. This is projected to continue for all 2020 [Total Constant Exploitation Yields] greater than approximately 18.4 million pounds,” Stewart said. “It’s essentially the breakeven point over the next three years. So, we’re looking at a period of relatively low productivity for the Pacific halibut stock over the next three years.”

Stewart added that more female fish are showing up in the stock and lower halibut yields will be necessary to “reduce higher fishing intensity.”

“The primary driver behind that has been the addition of new information about the sex ratio of the commercial fishery catch that has indicated that we’ve probably been fishing this stock harder than we thought, historically,” he said.

Fishing the stock harder includes the halibut taken as bycatch in other fisheries.

“The nondirected discards, meaning bycatch, was up from a little over 6 million pounds to a little over 6.4 million pounds,” Stewart said.

In the Bering Sea, for example, there is a fixed cap totaling 7.73 million pounds of halibut allowed to be taken as bycatch for trawlers, longliners and pot boats targeting other fish, with most going to trawlers. The cap stays the same, regardless of changes in the halibut stock.

This year, after four years of analysis and deliberation, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council began moving toward a new “abundance based” management plan that would tie bycatch levels to the health of the halibut stock as determined by annual surveys. (Prior to that, the issue had not been discussed for 20 years.)
Meanwhile, bycatch allowances, combined with new rules in setting halibut catch limits, could mean Bering Sea communities get squeezed out of the upcoming fishery.

“Last year the IPHC agreed to two allocation decisions that this year may hamstring efforts to provide enough halibut for Area 4CDE (the central Bering Sea) to even go fishing,” said Peggy Parker, director of the Halibut Association of North America.

“The first decision was to provide a fixed minimum of 1.65 million pounds to Area 2A (Washington, Oregon and California). The second was a formula for the Canadian allocation that was designed to mitigate their current and future losses from the trawl bycatch in the Bering Sea. That bycatch increased this year, which threw last year’s projections off and will likely result in lower catches to that area next year,” Parker added. “Having fixed minimum allocations to Area 2A and 2B (B.C.) will increase the difficulty in providing enough halibut to merit a fishery, in the eyes of quota holders, next year. It is a zero-sum game in the midst of a declining stock where Alaska becomes the only place with wiggle room.”

It’s déjà vu for Jeff Kauffman of St. Paul, Alaska, where emergency measures were implemented in 2015 to enable a halibut fishery to open in the region and fishermen’s catch limits were slashed to a half million pounds.

“There has been a de facto reallocation from the directed fisheries to the bycatch fisheries,” he said at the time. “Conservation of the stock is riding solely on the backs of the halibut fishermen.”
The North Pacific council was expected to set halibut bycatch limits for 2020 during its Dec. 2-10 meeting in Anchorage. The commission will reveal the catch limits for the halibut fishery during its annual meeting Feb. 3-7, also in Anchorage.

The Pacific halibut fishery ended on Nov. 14 amid little fanfare. Most dock prices ticked up during the eight-month fishery, hovering in the $5- to $6-per pound range, likely a result of bad weather hampering landings of competing halibut from Canada.

“Their hurricanes and everything may have disrupted some of the fisheries there and allowed some of the product from Alaska to make it into those higher end East Coast markets. So we got a little better price,” said Doug Bowen of Alaska Boats and Permits in Homer.
Better dock prices have not boosted the market for halibut quota shares, which are down by a third or more from sky-high levels two years ago and appear to have stabilized. Shares in Southeast, for example, that topped $70 per pound are now in the $55 range or less. In the Central Gulf, halibut IFQs are at around $45 a pound.

“For the last 15 years or so the resource has been in general decline. There have been some minor increases over the years, but mostly the trend has been downward,” Bowen said. “I think folks are kind of tired of buying something that gets cut the next year and is worth less. They’re buying an asset that’s declining in value. Many times over the last few years folks have thought that this must be the bottom and it would be a great time to buy — get in and ride it back up, and that hasn’t happened.”

So t hey just discovered that that they overfished for at least 40 years? Which we knew. How precious! Obviously the sport fishing must be further restricted!

The bigger halibut are breeding females. Sportfishing targets those bigger fish.
It's easy for the commercial lobbbyists to point this out as a problem.

Add in the bycatch and the numbers drop even more for the commercial guys. IMHO, the real problem behind the push for the commercial guys is the commodities market and the drive for higher share prices.

Follow the money...

Also, IMHO, NO food or energy products should be traded on any market unless a person has the ability to store that product. This is the way it used to be, but the corporate elites pushed until they got another "investment" to make money off of, and thus, the "futures" market was born and actual food producers got left out of the profit picture. Some producers have absolutely no say in what their products will bring at market, they are at the mercy of the investors. Weather, disease, input costs, etc, be damned. It's the producer that take the hit.

Follow the money...

Ed

It’s a complex issue.

VERY! And a lot on the line for both sides financially, as well as the state.

One of the biggest mistakes was going to IFQ's. You know the saying, "The Squeaky Wheel Gets The Grease"? Well the squeaky wheel got it, just not how those pushing it had envisioned it would be.

Trawling should be banned in all North American waters for every fishery. Actually I will say that they should be banned worldwide!

Big fish are breeders, but you need little fish to grow into big fish!

As for the commercial side of Halibut fishing as in Longlining they should go back to a modified Derby days. I know, I know, I know it cost the boats more money. Well something has to give and if it means costing a little more than that's what it needs to be.

As for Sport fishing Guides and Lodges need to be capped. Grandfather all lodges and guides as of Today. No more new lodges or guides. You must buy out an existing guide or lodge. Figure out a workable quota for the existing Guides and Lodges. They have to be able to provided their clients with fish!

I am sure anyone on either side of this can shoot holes in my opinion. But at least it is a start in the right direction.

Salmon is gonna get interesting too

Turn halibut management over to Board Of Fish and they'll straighten it out.

As I said it’s complex. Guides are capped via the charter halibut permits. They are quickly becoming a very valuable and scarce permit. Once all the non transferables are retired they will become very valuable.

I own a charter halibut permit, and halibut Ifq, as well as a State limited entry permit. I also sport and subsistence fish. I have a few conflicts of interest.

See how it all shakes out. Still plenty of halibut in the ocean. They move around a lot. There is a lot getting lost to whales and killer whales too while the longliners pull their gear. Sea lions eat them too, which seems to be a newer thing.

It’s amazing the crap the greenies dream up. Protect the killers by shutting down king fishing. Close crab fishing to protect the whales. Up here the killers eat the whales. A lot of them.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

For charters in SE, we were 18% under allocation last year. So, not much will change in that area.

We book our halibut charter out of Homer with Capt Dave on the Current Lady.------ Central Charters

SC is in trouble. Pretty sure the one a day any size is at risk.

Never, ever, has recruitment been an issue with halibut, so there are plenty of spawners.

As the halibut grow they run into problems on many fronts, but there were no spawn failures to point fingers at. Commercial lobbyists fail to note the huge bycatch issue where the small fish are killed and wasted in huge numbers.

I do not see any connection between the commodities market and the fish numbers coming over the rail, only a question on the route the money takes.

Sadly, you are completely correct on following the money. They do that instead of following the Alaska Constitution,

Not if that little thing called the State Constitution is considered...

A casual observer just might think they already did...

I think the IFQs are exactly what the planners were trying to make then into. They dropped the various rules preventing accumulation of quota so fast they proved they had no intention of following the rules from the get go.

I disagree completely on the notion fishing guides are a problem. They provide access to people from everywhere to a public resource allocated by law to users first, not rapists and pillagers selling the resource. After the people get their fish the longliners should get theirs.

I believe a set aside of at least 50:1 for every killed and wasted halibut by the draggers would clean up the industry overnight. The bycatch exceeds the subsistence, personal use, sport, and charter catch combined by a multiplier of about three... Hard to accept the sports guys as the problem.

Just in case, my last sentence above was sarcasm.

I agree with Art

This is a part of my comment. "They proved they had no intention of following the rules from the get go."

And where did I say Sport Fishing, Guides, and Lodges are a problem? You may want to read it again! My comment on guides and lodges is about capping it. Specifically in Southeast there are plenty of guides and lodges. Those small communities don't need another lodge being built. Numbers hurt the guys that live in AK, and fish AK year in and year out. Not those that are just looking to make a quick buck!

For conversation, there is 540 charter halibut permits in SE, and 380 are transferable. On the flip side there is over 1k power troll permits just for reference.

In 15 years once the non transferable permits are retired 380 will be a fairly small fleet given the size is se ak.

You may want to write it again.

So, you don't think they are a part of the problem, you just think that we shouldn't have any more?

Should we assume that your other comments (trawling, creation of the IFQs being a mistake, eliminating trawling) were also offhand comments not relating to the topic of discussion?

I generally agree with Art on this too.

My thoughts are to make the draggers retain the bycatch in salable order until they return it to the docks and then donated to worthy charities. Dumping bycatch seems to be a direct violation of wanton waste laws (yes, I understand the intent of current regs.). More bycatch in holds, less salable fish to send to market.

Probably a few regs/laws to maneuver to make it happen, if even plausible. Point being, dumping bycatch costs the fleet little. Make a dent in their pocketbook and they will find a way to comply.

I agree with your comments but the critical point on retaining all halibut bycatch is to count it. It is obvious only a small segment is reported and seeing the real numbers would shock everyone... probably even the draggers.

Thanks for the numbers, I was trying to find them earlier.

The State Constitution sets out a heirarchy of use for fish and game. At the tail of the line is Commercial fishing. That is 180 degrees from today's reality. I would like to use the Constitution as the baseline for fisheries management.

As others noted you think the current numbers of operators is enough. I strongly disagree. I would like to see all limits on charter boats eliminated and let the markets determine how many there should be. And let the commercial folks have the left-overs as the State Constitution clearly spells out.

Additionally, a large area around every town should be set aside as Commercial-free for long-lining. They are headed out for tonnage, let them take that tonnage well away from town.

...b...B...BINGO!

The State Constitution sets out a heirarchy of use for fish and game. At the tail of the line is Commercial fishing. That is 180 degrees from today's reality. I would like to use the Constitution as the baseline for fisheries management.



What article/section is it?

If I had to hazard a guess, I'd guess that halibut aren't the only valuable and political hot button fish being hammered by trawling.

Most of the longlining happens locally before the sport guys put their boats in. The sport guys really have no idea the quality of halibut that exists. It's no secret that to get the bigger halibut, you need to set in rocks which is a whole different set of issues.

The private sport fishermen would be shocked to see what a pile of halibut looks like 1k pounds net weight.

Does Oncorhynchus tshawytscha mean anything to you?

There are lots of bycatch issues with longlining for halibut. I see no reason for all the local non-pelagics to end up as some longliner's home pack. Not to mention lingcod...

Will have to look it up myself...

O'tshawytsha - are you well versed in industrial safety laws in the state of WA?

Not even a little bit...

O'tshawytsha = OSHA / WISHA

It was a bad attempt at a joke...

Yes, but was a very good attempt at a bad joke

Sure glad I never reached for a joke that weak...😉