Snapper count should be final nail in NOAA’s inept management of red snapper.
This week, the public and Congress finally heard why nothing seemed to add up in federal management of Gulf red snapper. It turns out that NOAA just doesn’t count snapper very well.
All anglers need to be aware of some recent developments with the management of red snapper. On August 24, 2020 the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) published a temporary rule in the Federal Register: 2020 Red Snapper Private Angling Component Accountability Measure in Federal Waters Off Texas. Just two years after approving a plan to allow the Gulf states to develop their own recreational data collection systems to better manage red snapper and certifying those state programs, NOAA Fisheries intends to force the states to calibrate their data back to the flawed federal data system that caused significant turmoil in the first place.
Dagger Island is an island in Nueces County, Texas and part of Aransas Pass, Texas.
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The Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission moved to adopt changes in southern flounder regulations, making slight modifications to the proposed rule change.
The March meeting of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission previously scheduled for March 25-26 has been cancelled. All agenda items, including southern flounder proposals, have been postponed until the May meeting. The public comment period for the agenda items has been extended until the May meeting.
Southern Flounder are in trouble.
Gradually, over the last three decades, populations have been in decline and the abundance of flounder across their entire geographic range are at near-record lows. Fishery managers from Texas to North Carolina are grappling with difficult management decisions as previous actions taken by the states have only manufactured temporary results. Click here to read more…
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