There’s been plenty of talk this season about bunker—or the lack of them—in certain areas around Long Island. Depending on where you fish, the picture can certainly be different, and there have been schools around at different points this year. Still, I’ve heard enough conversations with fishermen, captains and people working within the fishing industry to know there is concern about the consistency of the adult bunker schools we’ve become accustomed to seeing.
Most of the conversation naturally revolves around the fishing. Fewer bunker can mean fewer opportunities to collect for bait for striped bass, fewer big surface feeds and more time searching for fish. But there’s another side of this issue that deserves just as much attention. Bunker are good for business, and when a major forage species becomes less available locally, the effects can extend well beyond the fishermen standing at the rail.
Think about what happens when acres of bunker settle outside one of our South Shore inlets and big striped bass find them. Within a day, word gets around. Boats are leaving the dock before sunrise, charter captains have customers lined up, ramps are busy and fishermen are stopping at tackle shops on the way to the water. They need circle hooks, leader material, snag hooks, plugs, ice and maybe a new rod or reel. Then comes fuel for the truck and boat, breakfast at the deli and everything else that goes along with a day on the water.
Multiply that by hundreds of fishermen over several weeks and suddenly those schools of oily baitfish have an economic footprint extending far beyond the ocean.
Charter captains are one group that can feel the difference directly. Their business depends on putting customers on fish, and concentrated schools of bunker can make striped bass considerably easier to locate. Find the bait, find the life around it and you’ve often found somewhere to begin the day. Without that concentration of forage, the bass don’t necessarily disappear, but finding them can become more difficult. More searching means additional fuel, additional engine hours and less time actually fishing. When you’re operating a boat for a living, those costs add up quickly.
Then there are our local tackle shops. Through years of putting together fishing reports, I’ve seen how closely business follows the bite. When the fishing gets hot, fishermen buy things. A good bunker-driven bass bite sells circle hooks, leaders, snag rigs, plugs, rods, reels and nets. Someone walks into the shop for one pack of hooks and inevitably remembers three other things he needs. More importantly, good reports give anglers a reason to fish in the first place.
The effect stretches even farther. Marinas sell fuel. Marine mechanics service boats accumulating more hours. Boat ramps see increased traffic. Convenience stores sell ice, food and drinks. Restaurants and delis see fishermen coming and going. Hotels can benefit when anglers travel to take advantage of an exceptional bite. Long Island’s recreational fishery supports an entire network of businesses, and all of them ultimately benefit when there are fish around and anglers are excited to chase them.
We should also be careful about what we say is causing the apparent inconsistency in local bunker numbers. According to the latest Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission assessment, Atlantic menhaden are not considered overfished and overfishing is not occurring on a coastwide basis. That’s important. At the same time, a coastwide assessment doesn’t necessarily tell a fisherman what is happening in his local bay or along his home stretch of coastline.
That distinction is where I believe more attention is needed. Long Island fishermen don’t fish a coastwide population. We fish the bunker that actually show up in Long Island Sound, the South Shore bays, around Montauk and along our ocean beaches. Environmental conditions, water temperature, currents, predators, migration patterns and harvest can all potentially influence where menhaden concentrate. Pointing at one factor without the science to support it doesn’t help anyone.
What would help is better regional information. If fishermen are consistently reporting changes in local bunker abundance, those observations deserve attention. We should know more about where different age classes of menhaden are concentrating, whether their distribution around Long Island is changing and what factors are driving those changes.
Menhaden management isn’t simply about maintaining enough fish to support a harvest. These fish are forage for striped bass, bluefish, tuna and many other predators, and their value continues after they swim past the dock.
A bunker swimming off Long Island might not have much obvious economic value to someone watching it flip on the surface. Put a school of hungry striped bass underneath it, however, and that same bunker can help fill charter boats, tackle shops, fuel docks and parking lots.
That’s why the bunker conversation matters. Protecting and understanding our forage base isn’t only about protecting fish. For an island with a deep connection to recreational fishing, it’s also about supporting the businesses and people whose livelihoods depend on anglers having a reason to get out on the water.
