The March 5th meeting of the New Jersey Marine Fisheries Council was postponed due to weather, and is rescheduled for April 9 at the Stafford Township Municipal Building on 260 East Bay Avenue in Manahawkin. On the council agenda is the New Jersey Striped Bass Bonus Program (SBBP) and possible changes for the 2015 season.
New Jersey banned the commercial harvest of striped bass over two decades ago. Soon after, the state opted to protect the commercial allocation of striped bass for its own use, choosing to allow saltwater anglers a “bonus fish” in addition to the current daily limits required by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC).
At the time, many felt that if New Jersey failed to utilize its allotted quota of striped bass for commercial harvest, the ASMFC would’ve returned the unused commercial quota back into the coastwide commercial pool, resulting essentially in a net-zero conservation effort.
As reported in The Fisherman in a 2013 article however, that’s not what exactly how it worked with other ‘gamefish’ states.
THE GAMEFISH STATES
Besides New Jersey, the Atlantic Coastal states of South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Maine have all designated striped bass as a recreational only species. However, the only state other than New Jersey which utilizes unused commercial striper quota for a recreational only bonus is Connecticut, which in previous years transferred their 23,750-pound commercial bass quota to a bonus program equating to 4,025 bonus slot fish between 22 and 28 inches in length for anglers.
In terms of the two New England states with gamefish status for stripers – Maine and New Hampshire – ASMFC executive director Bob Beale said that the unused commercial striped bass quota has essentially become that swimming reserve that’s not harvested.
“The States of New Hampshire and Maine are different in that they have an allocated commercial quota that remains un-harvested resulting in a conservation benefit of roughly 6,000 pounds annually,” Beale said. Calling that portion of striped bass quota in New Hampshire and Maine untouched, Beale said “the unused quota cannot be harvested or accessed by another state with a commercial fishery.”
“South Carolina is outside of the management unit so its striped bass fisheries are not managed by ASMFC as they are thought to be ‘resident’ stocks,” said Beale, adding “Pennsylvania does not have a commercial quota allocation.”
New Jersey’s SBBP was implemented in the early 1990’s and has allowed recreational anglers to apply for and utilize an SBBP permit to retain an extra striped bass, very much like Connecticut. The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) calls the SBBP, “an integral part of New Jersey’s striped bass management,” explaining that it’s not only popular with saltwater anglers but that it also “provides valuable data for assessing stock status and fishing trends.”
HOW IT WORKS?
Prior to 2015, New Jersey’s allotment of commercial striped bass harvest under the Striped Bass Interstate Fisheries Management Plan was 321,750 pounds. With the 25 percent cutback in harvest for 2015, that will leave New Jersey with 241,313 pounds of unused commercial striped bass quota. Given the law prohibits the sale of striped bass, this quota is transferred to the recreational fishing sector via SBBP, which permits a limited harvest to be managed separately from the ordinary recreational harvest limits allowed by the ASMFC.
The program has gone through several modifications over the years, including the suspension of the SBBP for the party/charter for-hire sector as of June 8th, 2012. Today, only private anglers can take advantage of the opportunity to harvest a ‘bonus’ or third fish, and only if the angler possesses a state issued ‘bonus’ permit which is non-transferable and valid only during the calendar year.
For a $2 application fee ($1.01 goes to a third-party vendor which handles the permit process, the other 99 cents to the state), individuals can immediately print one bonus permit; only one permit can be used per day. Once the individual bonus permit is issued, all information must be completed immediately after harvest and prior to transportation of any additional bonus striped bass. Harvest information must then be reported online at www.wildlifelicense.com, and another $2 fee will be charged to receive a replacement permit.
One valuable asset of the SBBP has been the data acquired through volunteer fishing logs kept by tag holders and submitted back to the NJDEP. Participants receive a log sheet with their Bonus Permit and are encouraged to report all striped bass fishing activity for the calendar year; anglers are also encouraged to use a logbook found online in place of the paper logbooks.
The paper log is in table form and features areas for date of trip, area fished, the amount of time spent fishing, the length of any striped bass caught and/or released, and whether the striped bass was caught by shore, private boat, or onboard a charter or head boat. As far as the bonus fish harvest, SBBP participants are also asked to enter the permit number onto the log in the additional information section.
IS IT WORKING?
For more than a decade, the NJDEP’s Division of Fish and Wildlife was able to collect important biological information from the SBBP through physical check-in; but that has changed significantly since 2006 when the state stopped running actual ‘check stations’ for bonus fish.
“It still helps us characterize New Jersey landings and discards, but we don’t get age information from the bonus program anymore,” said Brandon Muffley, NJDEP’s Bureau Chief of Marine Fisheries told The Fisherman in 2013. He said that since 2006, his staff has had to supplement striped bass aging analysis and data collection by going to various tournaments and party boats for research.
“We’ve had to find another way to get that data, the bonus program is not as data rich as it used to be,” Muffley said. “We still get logbook information, and we have found other ways to gather the biological samples, but the harvest is so small right now.”
“The value is still there in terms of the data,” Muffley added.
Muffley said the maximum amount of harvest ever tabulated through the SBBP was about 30% of the overall quota of 321,750 pounds of unused commercial quota, the rest being that virtual ‘swimming reserve’ of un-harvested striped bass. “The reported harvest has gone down,” Muffley said, while adding “it could be the third fish at 28 inches versus the old slot, or could be the online system, I don’t know.”
THE HONOR SYSTEM
New Jersey deer hunters can relate to the online harvest collection changes. In 2012, the NJDEP announced it was eliminating deer check stations in favor of a new reporting mechanism called the Automated Harvest Report System in which those who successfully bag a deer must call in or report their harvest online. NJDEP called the new reporting system more efficient than previous local check points and easier for the public, however, NJDEP biologist Dan Roberts told the New Jersey Herald in 2012 that one reason for the change was due to staff reductions in the state agency.
The number of reported deer harvested during the six-day firearm season has dropped since the 2012 change, but that’s a trend that has been occurring most seasons going back to 2005/2006. In terms of the SBBP however, active participation has most certainly dropped off since the striper bonus program went online in 2007.
“For the years 2000 through 2006 we received an average of 2,230 logs per year. After 2007, we averaged 212 logs per year, with less in recent years,” said Maryellen Gordon at the NJDEP’s Bureau of Marine Fisheries. Gordon’s statistics show that there were 13,690 SBBP participants in 2012 versus 13,842 in 2011, while there were 325 fish checked in by private anglers in 2012 versus 517 the year before.
As for 2014, preliminary numbers for SBBP participation showed angler numbers up to 15,516, with just 225 bonus catches actually reported.
In terms of total poundage, when the for-hire sector was allowed to utilize permits in 2011, the combined harvest of all participants in the SBBP was 16,332 pounds, while those reporting fish in 2012 registered just 6,285 pounds of striped bass. Additionally, the for-hire sector reporting of daily catch logs was also more robust than in recent years after the suspension in 2012.
When the New Jersey Marine Fisheries Council meets on Thursday, March 5, one option that may be considered for the striped bass bonus program moving forward will be similar to what’s in effect up in Connecticut regarding the smaller, ‘slot’ fish below 28 inches. A special advisory panel for striped bass has taken that into consideration, and it’s possible the full council could vote on a new SBBP limit starting in 2015 that allows harvest of striped bass between 24 and 28 inches.
According to NJDEP, if the Council votes in favor of the 24- to 28-inch slot option, New Jersey’s ‘commercial quota’ hit would be reduced from 241,313 pounds to just 215,912 pounds; it’s the age-old question of ‘pounds’ versus ‘numbers’ for monitoring the recreational sector.
Other possibilities of course are that councilors could decide to keep the SBBP of a 28-inch minimum size, or perhaps even ask NJDEP to suspend the program. Only time and the April 9th meeting will tell.
