News & Events: Groundfish

NOAA Fisheries announces a proposed rule to implement measures to minimize incidental take of Endangered Species Act-listed salmon by vessels in the Pacific coast groundfish fishery. The proposed rule will publish tomorrow, October 20, 2020 in the Federal Register. The pre-publication version of the proposed rule is available for public inspection. When the proposed rule publishes, it will […]

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) published the proposed rule for the 2021-2022 biennial specifications and management measures, including Amendment 29 on October 2, 2020. The accompanying Environmental Assessment is provided here. This rule, if approved, would establish the harvest specifications and management measures for the next two years. These specifications and management measures were […]

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Groundfish Management Team (GMT) will hold an online meeting to discuss items on the Pacific Council’s November 2020 meeting agenda. 

The Pacific Fishery Management Council (Pacific Council) and the NMFS Northwest Science Center will hold an online workshop to review data and analyses proposed to inform new assessments for Dover sole, copper rockfish, quillback rockfish, and squarespot scheduled to be conducted next year, which is open to the public. 

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Scientific and Statistical Committee Groundfish Subcommittee (SSC Groundfish Subcommittee) will hold an online meeting, which is open to the public. 

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Scientific and Statistical Committee Groundfish Subcommittee (SSC Groundfish Subcommittee) will hold an online meeting, which is open to the public.  The meeting will be held Friday, October 23, 2020, starting at 2 p.m. (Pacific Daylight Time) and ending at 4 p.m., or until business for the day is complete.

Purpose of the meeting

The purpose of the SSC Groundfish Subcommittee meeting is to review proposed length-based assessment methods.  This is a follow-up review of stock synthesis with catch and length (SS-CL) and SS-CL with indices (SS-CL-Index) methods proposed by the NMFS Northwest Fisheries Science Center that occurred on May 12-14, 2020.  The SSC recommended this review at the November 2020 Pacific Council meeting to review several short-term tasks, detailed in section 6 of the May 12-14 Methods Review Panel report.

To attend the online meeting

Details will be posted to this webpage as they become available.

Technical information

Primary fixed-gear sablefish fishery extended under emergency rule Under an emergency action, NMFS is extending the primary (tier) limited entry fixed-gear sablefish fishery from October 31 to December 31, 2020 in response to requests from the Groundfish Advisory Subpanel, fishing industry, and members of the public. A portion of this sablefish sector also participates in […]

NOAA Fisheries will be applying $5.9 million (allocated by the Office of Management and Budget) to reduce the outstanding principal to the Pacific Coast trawl groundfish buyback loan as of January 14, 2020. This action comes after tireless effort on the part of West Coast groundfish fishery representatives, particularly Heather Mann of the Midwater Trawlers […]

The Groundfish Subcommittee of the Pacific Fishery Management Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC) will hold an online meeting to plan a later methodology review of elasmobranch harvest control rules and management reference points.  

NOAA Fisheries is working with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to establish a new retention schedule for the raw imagery and other data collected by Electronic Monitoring systems. This NOAA Fisheries website provides background information, the proposed rule, the link to the NARA website, and the instructions on how to comment. Public comments are due […]