NOAA and NMFS made it official today with the release of FB08-029.
“The commercial fishery for deep water grouper in the Gulf of Mexico is closed, effective 12:01 a.m. (local time) May 10, 2008, through December 31, 2008. NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service has determined the 2008 commercial quota of 1,020,000 pounds of deep water grouper will be reached by this date. During the closure period, no person aboard a vessel for which a commercial permit for reef fish has been issued may fish for or retain misty grouper, snowy grouper, yellowedge grouper, Warsaw grouper, or speckled hind in federal waters of the Gulf of Mexico.”
They go on to say this:
“Closure of the commercial deep water grouper fishery in the Gulf of Mexico complies with regulations implemented under the Fishery Management Plan for Reef Fish Resources of the Gulf of Mexico and is necessary to protect the Gulf reef fish resource”
Which is interesting because, according to their own websites and information, there has NEVER been a stock assessment of the Deep Water Grouper in the Gulf of Mexico. Not Yellowedge, not Snowy, not Misty, not any of them. Nothing. They have absolutely zero real data to base this arbitrary closure on.
They simply took an average of three arbitrarily chosen years, chopped off what seemed to them to be a reasonable percentage and have stuck it to us with that quota ever since.
Full text of the bulletin can be read on the NMFS site here…