Take The Cut: Massive Reductions for Menhaden Industry Necessary

What’s going on? The “most important fish in the sea” just exposed one of the biggest management failures in decades. A new assessment shows Atlantic menhaden natural mortality was inaccurately estimated for years, causing quotas set 300 million pounds too high. A significant, immediate reduction is necessary to align with science-driven management and right the course of a critical forage fish. The Atlantic fishery needs to “take the cut”, and the industrial reduction fleet needs to front a majority of that reduction. We can no longer accept half the coastwide catch being taken from the Chesapeake Bay. The Gulf fishery lacks a quota. It is shocking that an industrial operation of this scale has no upper limit in 2025. This can no longer be true, and buffer zones should not be repealed in any capacity. The fallout of upcoming meetings could reshape both the Atlantic and Gulf fisheries — and what happens next is up to us.

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Affectionately termed “the most important fish in the sea”, menhaden are a critical connection in marine food webs in both the Atlantic and Gulf. They have a different nickname depending on which dock you’re standing on, but regardless of what you call them, they’re often a topic of conversation due to the massive, industrial “reduction fleets” that harvest them. This industry’s overwhelming presence and activity often clutters management conversations for other species, but recently things have shifted, and the implications are profound. The Atlantic and Gulf angling communities have strong feelings about their menhaden fisheries. Now, new developments and looming conversations in the Atlantic have a good chance of impacting the Gulf community in a significant way. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission Menhaden Management Board will meet on October 28, 2025. The Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission will meet on November 6 and plan to present a Notice of Intent for the Gulf menhaden fishery. The topic we’re about to broach is complicated but undoubtedly connected. We encourage advocates to read the entirety of the blog before building their stances and joining the conversation. Things are not as simple as saying, “This is why we don’t have striped bass, redfish, etc.” The management of those species and what’s about to go down with menhaden is complex. We must unite around a more productive stance: “the science shows menhaden managers made massive mistakes, and this must be corrected.” The menhaden fishery must take the cut.” For the first time in years, we have an opportunity to drive meaningful change.

The Situation in the Atlantic:

Ecological Reference Points (ERPs) were adopted in 2020 for menhaden management in the Atlantic. This is an entirely new way of managing fish. Implementing ERPs is a shift from single-species management to looking at a complex ecosystem’s needs (EBFM or Ecosystem-Based Fisheries Management). The shift resulted in a minimal reduction in quota from 216,000 mt to 192,456 mt (a metric ton is 2204lbs), slightly over 10%. Our team wondered how such a shift in management resulted in such a minimal reduction at the time. In the following years, the Total Allowable Catch (TAC) increased to 233,550 mt. 

The following two figures paint the picture of the Atlantic fishery. Table 1 covers the history of the TAC. Figure 2 shows landings for the Atlantic bait and reduction fisheries since 2015. Note that since the increased TAC, landings have fallen 22.2% and 29.4% short of the TAC in 2023 and 2024, respectively. 

Here is where things get dicey. The Southeast Data, Assessment, and Review (SEDAR) ASMFC Atlantic Menhaden and Ecological Reference Points Assessment Process Report (non-peer review) recently came out. Here’s a summary in layman’s terms:

Picture a seesaw. On one side of the seesaw is natural mortality (menhaden dying due to predation, age, etc). On the other side is fishing mortality. If either of these dynamics is incorrectly assessed, the seesaw flies in one direction. We discovered that it did happen, and whoever was sitting on the natural mortality side of the seesaw was far lighter than scientists estimated.

In the original ERP process, there was a significant error in natural mortality. The SEDAR document states: “As part of the assessment process, the Atlantic Menhaden Stock Assessment Subcommittee (SAS) identified an error in the publication used to estimate the natural mortality rate used in the assessment. The SAS developed a revised estimate of M to use in the base run of the assessment, which was lower than the estimate used in the 2020 benchmark. This resulted in a lower estimate of biomass and fecundity and a higher estimate of fishing mortality over the time series compared to the previous assessment update. These estimates were no longer directly comparable to the ecological reference points (ERPs) from the 2020 ERP benchmark assessment used in management, so the proof-of-concept ERPs developed during the 2025 ERP benchmark assessment were used to evaluate stock status for this report. The final ERP values used in management going forward may be different based on the outcome of the peer review and the decisions of the Atlantic Menhaden Management Board, in which case, this assessment update will be revised to use the final reference points.“

The wrong value was used for natural mortality. The biomass level is smaller than assumed, and fishing mortality is higher than allowed. In the most blunt terms possible, there are fewer menhaden in the Atlantic than we thought, and we are killing way too many of them. This issue is compounded by another massive mistake. There was a large-scale tagging study on menhaden, and four flaws were discovered by the team listed below, one being the same inaccurate natural mortality estimate. You can click here to access the full paper. We will include the abstract. Please take note of the underlined portion:

“The critical data used in the assessment were from the National Marine Fisheries Service 1966-1971 large-scale mark-recovery study that placed a million ferromagnetic tags in adult menhaden released and recaptured over five areas from Massachusetts to Florida.  Liljestrand et al. (2019a) used this data in a “Bayesian multi-state mark recovery” model to generate the assessment’s natural mortality rate of an increase of 2.3 times the previous assessment.  We discovered the authors made four significant errors with the data: (1) tag numbers recovered from primary magnets underreported Coston’s by 13%; (2) 28% of tags found by secondary magnets in ground up fish were not included; (3) plant magnet tag recovery efficiency was over-stated; and (4) fishing effort was underreported by an annual average of 33.5%.  Correcting these errors and evaluating two accurate mark-recovery data sets with both indirect and direct modeling methods, including those used by Liljestrand et al., resulted in an annual natural mortality rate estimate of a rate 53% lower than used in SEDAR 69 and consistent with the pre-2019 literature.  Since natural mortality is such an influential rate parameter in Atlantic menhaden stock assessments, incorporating this new recommendation will likely have a substantial impact on stock status, harvest rates and the coastwide quota.“

The implications of these findings are profound. The TAC was set far to high for too many years. About 300,000,000 lbs too high to be exact! The TAC needs a serious reduction from 233,550 mt to 108,450 mt in order to have a 50% chance of not exceeding the target fishing mortality rate. Figure 3 below is from the ASMFC memo dated October 9th, titled “Stock Projections to Inform 2026-2028 Total Allowable Catch Levels”.

It should come as no surprise that folks on the Menhaden Management Board are already trying to figure out a way not to do this. In the same memo, you will also find the following chart. The most appalling part of the data presented in it is that it could result in zero reduction in landings because they haven’t been close to the TAC in several years. 2023 landings were 181,750 mt and 2024 preliminary data is 165,000 mt.

ASGA’s position is quite simple. Menhaden managers made a mistake to the scale of 300,000,000 lbs of menhaden a year. It is extremely hard for us to believe that the natural mortality rate could have been that wrong unless certain Technical Committee and/or Plan Development Team members were toggling those variables for a specific outcome. We welcome more information on how such esteemed minds accidentally made an error of such magnitude.

The bottom line is we need a 55% reduction in the TAC for Atlantic menhaden. The fishery isn’t anywhere near the TAC right now. There must be a huge reform in the 51,000 mt Chesapeake Bay cap. We can no longer accept half the coastwide TAC being taken in the Chesapeake. We fully understand the demands of the bait fishery. We recommend reallocating quota from the reduction industry to crabbers, lobstermen, and fishermen, so that these operations have all of the bait they need. This is a far better use of the resource than the reduction fleet, demolishing our oceans for cat food and fish meal. Marine advocates must flood ASMFC with emails demanding they do the right thing. Please note when and where significant action can take place. Managers can change the coastwide TAC at the meeting on October 28th. That being said, an addendum must be initiated to change the quota allocation. All this has to be done by the end of the year for these changes to take place in 2026. The science is clear. Reductions must be made, and they should come from the massive international operations that have pillaged our oceans for too long, based on poor data. The reduction fleet needs to take the cut.

The Situation in the Gulf: 

The importance of menhaden in their local marine ecosystems is not lost on anglers and advocates down south. Our community led a campaign for redfish regulations in Louisiana a few years ago. Towards the end of that campaign, other community members attempted to “come to the table” with menhaden operations to “negotiate” a new buffer zone. These conversations convoluted meaningful redfish management changes while not achieving reform of any significance on the menhaden front. The intention of these buffer zones is to reduce user conflicts and protect inshore habitats from the industrial operations. ASGA fully supports the core premise of buffer zones. The angling economy of Louisiana is critical. Its foundation is healthy red drum, sea trout, tarpon and sheepshead fisheries. These fisheries and their users deserve that level of respect in discussions about natural resources management. Our problem with the buffer zone discussions at that time was their role in “horse trading” for lesser redfish changes, without any positive impacts at scale. Remember that the menhaden industry has NO CATCH LIMITS in the Gulf! Sure, we can move them a 1/2 mile further from land, but their decimation of resources remains constant (if not growing). Our reluctance to celebrate that campaign has already come to fruition.

There is currently a new push to open some of the buffer zone areas in the Gulf, only a year after their implementation. The reduction industry wants these buffer zones pulled back, and their reasoning is that one of the companies has smaller vessels and traditionally fishes in some of the buffer zone areas. The closures have impacted their harvest. For clarification, this campaign to rescind zones did not come from the state agency, LDWF. This proposed action is coming from the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission. We have nothing but respect for the scientists of LDWF. Anglers and advocates are right to feel frustrated, but your frustrations should be aimed in the right direction. The Commission plans to initiate a Notice of Intent to alter the buffer zone areas. The crucial point here is that while it is important where the fish are caught, the amount of fish caught will always be even more critical. 

Is this bad? Sure, it is. Our community will submit comments in opposition to reducing these zones in any capacity. Purse seines should not be fished that close to shore. That being said, pushing the reduction fleet off the coast by 3000 feet is not a “one-stop shop” for saving Gulf fisheries. The conversations are far more nuanced. No one wants to talk about the offshore shrimp industry in Louisiana. They kill at least 5 times the number of adult redfish out in open water than the reduction fishery does each year, which is detailed in the redfish stock assessment. A clean and simple buffer zone to reduce user conflicts is justifiable. Still, if members of the Gulf community want to see massive positive change in their waters, we need to address the real issue: a fishery with no limits. 

Connecting Both Coasts:

Right now, the Gulf is lacking a TAC/Quota for menhaden. This is the Achilles heel for our fishermen. We have grave concerns that if the Atlantic TAC is (rightfully) reduced, there is nothing that will stop Omega from shifting effort to the Gulf. While all of these implications may not yet be clear, that shift in effort could be significant. These two critical management meetings are taking place about a week apart. The TAC must be cut in the Atlantic, and now the buffer zones are under attack in the Gulf. We also don’t believe in coincidences. Coincidence is an endearing term for a lack of transparency into backdoor discussions.

ASGA fully supports anglers and advocates fighting to maintain buffer zones. We wholeheartedly support the enforcement of those zones. Based on the circumstances in the Atlantic, a quota must be set for the Gulf to establish true limits for the fishery. We need limits that won’t allow the reduction fishery effort to shift to the Gulf and expand by hundreds of millions of pounds. If effort doesn’t shift south, then the industry should have no problem supporting that stance. If they oppose a quota, well, they are showing their hand.

THE ACTION ALERT IS NOW LIVE! SIGN THE OFFICIAL ASGA LETTER BEFORE THE DEADLINE ON SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25th, 2025 – CLICK HERE TO ACCESS.

Resources & Links:

ASMFC 2025 Atlantic Menhaden Stock Assessment Update 

ASMFC Memorandum on Stock Projections to Inform 2026-2028 Total Allowable Catch Levels