Regulators cut Chesapeake Bay menhaden harvest, tying bay cap to coastwide catch

The interstate board that oversees the Atlantic menhaden fishery voted Wednesday to reduce how much of the small, oily fish can be harvested from the Chesapeake Bay and along the East Coast. Virginia’s Northern Neck will feel the decision most.

After two days of meetings, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Menhaden Board tied the bay’s harvest cap directly to the coastwide total allowable catch (TAC). From now on, no more than 21.8% of all menhaden landed on the East Coast may come from the bay.

The board also cut the coastwide TAC by about 17%, phased in over the next two seasons. Virginia holds 75% of that total because it is the last East Coast state that allows reduction fishing, in which menhaden are processed into fishmeal and fish oil instead of being sold as bait.

Together, the changes will lower the bay cap from its current 51,000 metric tons (about 112 million pounds) to 33,847 metric tons by 2028. A separate measure keeps the cap from rising above 51,000 metric tons even if the coastwide TAC is raised later. The commission will review the bay cap every three years.

Virginia’s representatives on the board voted against the bay changes.

Ocean Harvesters uses purse seines, large walls of netting, to catch menhaden for Omega Protein’s reduction plant in Reedville. The two companies say there is no scientific basis for the cuts and warn they could devastate their business and cost jobs on the rural Northern Neck.

Recreational anglers and environmental groups argue that the industrial harvest removes fish that osprey, striped bass and other species depend on for food. Bait fishermen in Maryland also report sharply lower menhaden catches.

The debate largely comes down to data. Industry officials point to commission stock assessments showing menhaden are not overfished coastwide. Environmental groups say coastwide figures can hide a localized decline in the bay.

Before the meeting, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation noted that Ocean Harvesters caught less than 70% of its bay limit in 2025 and called that a sign the fish are getting scarce. Industry groups blamed the shortfall on an unusually high number of severe-weather days that kept boats at the dock.

Virginia’s board members raised concerns about the economic impact on the Northern Neck and urged the commission to wait until at least 2028. That is when preliminary results are expected from a recently funded Virginia Institute of Marine Science study of menhaden in the bay. They argued that acting first undercuts that publicly funded research. Other board members said existing data, along with extensive public testimony about the bay’s role as a nursery for menhaden and other species, justified acting now.

The commission, which manages fisheries for 15 states from Maine to Florida, approved a draft addendum in August with options that included cutting the bay cap by as much as 50% and spreading the harvest more evenly across the season. It received more than 48,000 written comments, and more than 860 people attended public hearings on the proposal.

Two decades of limits in the bay

Menhaden reduction was once a coastwide industry, but many factories north of the Chesapeake closed after the stock contracted in the 1960s. Today Omega’s Reedville plant is the last one on the East Coast.

The commission first capped the bay’s reduction harvest in 2006 as a precaution against localized depletion. The cap was set at 109,020 metric tons, the average catch from 2001 to 2005. In 2012 it was cut by 20%, to 87,216 metric tons. In 2017 the commission lowered it to 51,000 metric tons, citing the bay’s importance as a nursery for many species.

That 2017 cut set off a standoff. Virginia was the only state where the legislature, not fishery regulators, managed menhaden, and the General Assembly never adopted the lower cap. In 2019, Omega’s bay harvest went over the commission’s limit by about 30%, or roughly 15,000 metric tons. The commission found Virginia out of compliance, and the U.S. Commerce Department upheld that finding, threatening to shut down Virginia’s menhaden fishery if the state did not comply by June 2020.

In response, the General Assembly handed menhaden management to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission in 2020, the same agency that oversees the state’s other saltwater fisheries. The VMRC adopted the 51,000-metric-ton cap that year. Also in 2020, the Atlantic commission began setting coastwide catch limits using “ecological reference points,” which account for menhaden’s role as food for other fish and wildlife.

With this week’s vote, the cap that started near 109,000 metric tons two decades ago is on track to be less than a third of that size by 2028.

About the Author

Wayne Creed

Administrator

View All Posts