Blue Fin Tuna, ????

[hubris 1]

I have to admit, Im a little confused. I took this pic from the canyon runner seminar photos. Hope they dont mind. What do they mean when they say they want to save the Bluefin? You arent going to stop foreign fleets from fishing for them, you arent going to stop countries from collecting them and farming them until they harvest them, Sooooo do they really think that all these other concerns are going to back down while average american guys with their boats go out and catch and sell them? I mean it seems everyone wants in on the money action with bluefin never seeing the impact they have on the species. Its never going to happen. Anglers want to take them, SELL THEM, and act like the other guys are destroying the fishery. What am I missing? I know they cant be saying STOP fishing for them......are they?

[wide open]

I dont know if recreational catch and relase will help the fishery of BFT, however your point about the main concern being the global commercial fleet is right on. the recreational limits currently imposed are descent at best...the northern anglers could be crushing the schoolie run badly if there werent strick laws.
with a good tuna bite it is really important that we know how to safely and successfully release these fish

[Big Jay]

I have to admit, Im a little confused. I took this pic from the canyon runner seminar photos. Hope they dont mind. What do they mean when they say they want to save the Bluefin? You arent going to stop foreign fleets from fishing for them, you arent going to stop countries from collecting them and farming them until they harvest them, Sooooo do they really think that all these other concerns are going to back down while average american guys with their boats go out and catch and sell them? I mean it seems everyone wants in on the money action with bluefin never seeing the impact they have on the species. Its never going to happen. Anglers want to take them, SELL THEM, and act like the other guys are destroying the fishery. What am I missing? I know they cant be saying STOP fishing for them......are they?

It's tagging research to see how different bodies of fish move. The American rec guys catching and selling has MINIMAL impact on the fishery. The real problem is the purse seiners off Spain/Portugal and in the Mediterranean. You're no dumb dumb. I know you've seen the footage. Schools of 1000's of mediums being penned up in one shot...done. That has a tremendous impact on the fishery. Even longliners taking 10-15 fish per set has minimal impact. It's when you have fleets pursing up schools of a 1000 in one shot that you have a problem.

I also had the privilege of speaking with Captain Len at the seminar regarding the Yellowfin. He mentioned that 2-3 weeks ago he had one of his tags returned. This tag was returned from an expedition 10 years ago. His yellowfin, caught off NJ, had the tag returned from the Gulf of Guinea in Africa.

If we can establish that our American Bluefin tuna DO in fact take a migratory path across the Atlantic then we may be able to force regulation of purse seiners taking them.

[John from Madison CT]

Does anyone have any idea how many Bluefin are thrown back dead by Longliners? After they meet their allotment, what happens to these valueable fish?

[lowlands]

Does anyone have any idea how many Bluefin are thrown back dead by Longliners? After they meet their allotment, what happens to these valueable fish?

Maybe they are transformed into Bigeye's when the head, fins, and liver are removed.

[Patudo]

One of the most interesting results of the tagging research that has been done on BFT is that a large number of BFT that were spawned in the Mediterranean make their way across the Atlantic to feed along the US East Coast. A good proportion of the fish found in the Carolinas have been shown to return to the east to breed.

It's thought most of those fish spawned in the Gulf of Mexico stay in the western Atlantic (fortunately) but if the Mediterranean breeding population gets even more badly decimated than it already is there, will be fewer BFT available to US fishermen.

[hubris 1]

One of the most interesting results of the tagging research that has been done on BFT is that a large number of BFT that were spawned in the Mediterranean make their way across the Atlantic to feed along the US East Coast. A good proportion of the fish found in the Carolinas have been shown to return to the east to breed.

It's thought most of those fish spawned in the Gulf of Mexico stay in the western Atlantic (fortunately) but if the Mediterranean breeding population gets even more badly decimated than it already is there, will be fewer BFT available to US fishermen.

I saw a program on tv where they pen them over there. Feed them for a year and then harvest them. They are the ones that sell for 100,000 dollars each to the asian crowd.

[ultangler]

A lot of what you're saying is accurate, but... the "average" guy does NOT sell his fish - that's a small minority.

[Fishfinder]

The hook and line commercial fisheries in the US has landed probably less that 300 metric tons per year over the last few year, with an annual quota of over 700 metric tons. The Europeans have exceeded their quota by over 100 % for the last 25 years, they admit that, yet they will not stop killing. Their net boats do not only take a few fish out of a school, they take the whole school!!. They don't just harvest bluefin over 73 inches, they harvest everyone they catch from 24 inches to whatever. The US hook and line fishermen both commercial and recreational will never hurt the populations of the bluefin tuna. Unfortunately, no matter what conservation restrictions that the US and Canada put in place, if we save a few tons of bluefins, they just swim over to the Med and get harvested there. If we could make the bluefins stop swimming to the Med we could save the populations here on the east coast and have a recovering fisheries. But that just won't ever happen!! So why make US fishermen and our economies suffer by cutting our quotas and giving them to other countries that don't give a damn ! The US seems to do all the scientific tagging, research and conservation, just to help the foregien countries harvest the tuna. I wish I had a solution to this unsolvable problem for the US fisheries for bluefin tuna! Unfortunately we will be the only ones getting screwed in this process, and our own NMFS, by going along with ICCAT is going to do it for us.

Capt. Joe Shute

[Patudo]

From what I understand of the research, not all of "your" fish enter the Mediterranean. The BFT that are fished in Carolina and other areas of the US eastern seaboard include both fish that spawn and were spawned in the Gulf of Mexico and fish that were spawned in the Med and return there for spawning. Protecting the western group of fish is important because although they are at some risk from the European nations (and the Japanese) when they travel into areas like the Flemish Cap and south of Iceland, none of the tagging has shown that they enter the Mediterranean, which is where there is the heaviest commercial pressure.

The eastern group of fish does enter the Mediterranean. It's this group that is in real danger of being wiped out. Since these fish are a part of US sports and commercial fisheries even though they were spawned in the east, I think the US should have a say in how this fishery is managed. It's because of the satellite tagging that the connection between the Carolina fishery and the Mediterranean was proven, so IMO this type of tagging is definitely of value. The real problem with the Med fishery is but there are so many countries involved in it including the likes of Libya and Algeria that getting all of them to agree that the fishery is in trouble is nearly impossible.

What I can gather from the research is that if the eastern/Mediterranean group of fish gets wiped out it will no longer contribute to your BFT fishery, but the western stock will still exist (so long as commercial pressure in the Gulf of Mexico is kept at low enough levels to allow them to continue reproducing) and should provide enough fish for sport and commercial fisheries to continue if it is correctly managed. The regulations imposed on US and Canadian fishermen are supposed to protect this group of fish. They have the effect that BFT spawned in the Mediterranean are protected while they are in the western Atlantic only to be caught en masse when they return but until you can tell a western fish from an eastern one at boatside, it's hard to think of a better solution. On our side of the Atlantic however, if the Mediterranean stock gets wiped out, those countries have no other stocks to rely on. The tagging results are pretty clear that Western/Gulf of Mexico spawned fish don't enter the Med.

This is the best article I can find that summarises the science. It's based on the tagging of 772 Atlantic bluefins tagged in the western Atlantic. What I thought really interesting was the fact that the tagging results showed that there were two groups of fish that spawned in the Gulf of Mexico and in the Med respectively but there was also a third group of fish that didn't seem to spawn in either place - luckily for them they seem to stay in the western Atlantic most of the time.
http://www.tunaresearch.org/reprints/bluefinature.pdf