NOAA 98-86

Contact: Scott Smullen
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
12/4/98

FEDS PROVIDE GUIDANCE TO NORTH PACIFIC COUNCIL TO BETTER PROTECT STELLER SEA LIONS IN NATION'S LARGEST FISHERY

After soliciting public input, the National Marine Fisheries Service has outlined a flexible framework for public resource managers to provide additional protection to endangered Alaskan Steller sea lions, the Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced today.

NOAA Fisheries issued the framework in a biological opinion prepared under the Endangered Species Act on the $670 million Alaskan pollock fisheries. The framework, developed using the best science available, provides the North Pacific Fishery Management Council with a set of conservation principles that will reduce the likelihood that pollock fishing may harm the endangered western population of Steller sea lions.

NOAA's fisheries managers will work with the Council at a meeting next week so that the Council can develop emergency rules to modify current fishing practices consistent with the framework to better protect these marine mammals. The Council consists of federal, state, fishing industry, and university science representatives.

"Working closely with the Council we can achieve the correct and delicate balance between wildlife conservation and commerce. We are looking for the Council to provide essential input into implementation of this framework," said Terry Garcia, assistant secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere. "Our goal is to recover Steller sea lions over time, and yet preserve the Alaska communities that rely on healthy and productive fishing to provide the largest number of jobs in the state. We must ensure the survival of both."

"There is mounting evidence that fishing for pollock, at various times of the year, and in some critical habitat areas, may reduce the availability of an important food resource for Steller sea lions," said Rollie Schmitten, director of NOAA Fisheries, the federal agency charged with protecting endangered marine species and implementing fishing regulations. "While we are not saying that fishing, by itself, caused the decline of Steller sea lions, our responsibility under the Endangered Species Act is to ensure that current fishing practices do not jeopardize the depleted sea lion population."

"This responsibility needs to be balanced with our responsibility to the fishing industry," Schmitten added. "The North Pacific Council has helped us strike this balance since the population of Stellers was first declared to be threatened in 1990; however, the job is not done."

NOAA Fisheries scientists have been investigating the relationship between the nation's largest fishery, Alaska groundfish, and the continued decline of the endangered Steller sea lions. While the pollock fisheries no longer directly take many Steller sea lions, the agency's most recent Steller sea lion stock assessment finds the population continues to decline from 110,000 in 1978 to less than 40,000 today. Counts of adults and juveniles declined by 72 percent between the late 1970s and 1990, dropped another 25 percent through 1996, and fell another 9 percent in the past two years. Similarly, pup counts dropped by 19 percent between 1994 and 1998. Steller sea lions were listed as threatened in 1990, and those found in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands and Gulf of Alaska were reclassified as endangered in 1997.

At the same time, the average amount of pollock harvested annually from waters of critical habitat where sea lions feed and breed has increased from less than 30 percent of the total harvest prior to 1986 (672 million pounds), to as much as 70 percent (1.79 billion pounds) in the 1990s. In addition, the race for the pollock catch has been concentrated in these areas to a short fishing season of about 75 days, down from nearly 300 days of fishing in 1990.

"This is a difficult area to scientifically evaluate and we will never have perfect information. However, we do know that the main prey of sea lions is pollock and there is clear evidence that they are not getting enough nutrition. We also know that, while the overall pollock stock is healthy and can support the fisheries, an increasing proportion of the catch is coming out of important sea lion feeding areas. Therefore, we need to take some cautious steps to minimize impacts of the pollock fisheries on sea lions," said Dr. James Balsiger, director of the agency's Alaska Fisheries Science Center.

Agency scientists say the fisheries are not overfished. Fishermen harvest only 18 percent of the available pollock from the stock each year. The problem is the increasing proportion harvested from sea lion critical habitat. In recent years, a large fraction of the annual pollock catch is harvested in critical habitat areas. Scientists question whether pollock are sufficiently available for sea lions in critical areas during times of the year important for sea lion survival. Fewer young Steller sea lions are surviving to become adults to reverse the population's decline.

The Fisheries Service has worked closely with the North Pacific Council since 1990 to develop measures to minimize the effects of Alaska's groundfish fisheries on Steller sea lions. They include establishing no-trawl zones around sea lion breeding areas, called rookeries. In federal waters, the Council also has prevented the commercial harvest of other Steller sea lion forage fish, including sand lance and capelin. Fishery officials have also recently proposed to reduce fishing pressure on the Atka mackerel found in Steller critical habitat areas.

However, these measures have not been able to halt the steady decline of Steller sea lions. Now, the council must meet the following framework principles as it considers measures to improve the fisheries' protection of sea lions:

1) Temporal Dispersion: Continue the pollock trawl prohibition in the Bering Sea (1 Nov. - 19 Jan.), extend prohibition to the Gulf of Alaska, and more evenly distribute the pollock harvest into at least four seasons throughout the year.
-- The objective is to avoid removing pollock at a time when Steller sea lions, particularly adult females and juveniles, need pollock the most. This action would more evenly distribute pollock catch and thereby reduce the probability of localized depletions that remove large amounts of catch in short periods of time (to avoid derby or pulse fishing).

2) Spatial Dispersion: Ensure that the rate of pollock removed from critical habitat is consistent with the amount and distribution of the overall pollock resource.
-- This action ensures that pollock is removed in critical habitat areas in proportion to its availability there. Fishing catch may be capped within critical habitat areas.

3) Pollock Trawl Exclusion Zones: Increase protection areas to include important locations where the endangered Steller sea lions rest, feed and breed.
-- This action would exclude pollock fishing based on sea lion seasonal use of major rookeries and haulouts. These exclusion areas, selected based on use by a significant number of sea lions, are needed to protect pollock stocks for nursing females and juveniles learning to forage. These exclusion areas should be at least 20 nautical miles in radius in the Bering Sea, and 10 nautical miles in radius in the Gulf of Alaska and Aleutian Islands.

Pollock is the largest component of the Alaska groundfish fishery, and is worth $673 million in processed product from more than 2.5 billion pounds of pollock landed in 1998.

Note to Reporters: Related fact sheet, charts and maps are available by calling NOAA Fisheries Public Affairs at (301) 713-2370. A copy of the biological opinion can be found on the NOAA Web site at http://www.nmfs.gov/prot_res/main/new.html