The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission approved a new herring fishery amendment that continues to stringently restrict mid-water trawlers’ access to some of the most fertile inshore herring areas in the Gulf of Maine.
The amendment, which still needs to be approved by NOAA Fisheries, retains spawning and seasonal closures throughout the Gulf of Maine, but with an eye toward building more flexibility into when the spawning closures occur to afford the greatest protections for spawning herring.
The amendment calls for default closure dates to occur in late August or early October, depending on the area, if sampling has not showed spawning to be occurring before that. The spawning closure period will stay at four weeks.
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