Freshwater Fishing News

NOAA Fisheries and the National Fish Habitat Board have announced the release of a report entitled: “Through a Fish’s Eye: The Status of Fish Habitats in the United States 2010.”

The report follows a nationwide assessment of human effects on fish habitat in the rivers and estuaries of the United States, developed by the public/private partnership of the National Fish Habitat Action Plan.

The report summarizes threats to rivers, estuaries, and other aquatic habitats, as well as identifying major sources of these threats, including pollution; urban development; agriculture; barriers to migration; and climate change. Some of the successful, ongoing efforts to address these threats to habitat are also featured within its pages.

This report also provides information concerning the challenges and opportunities facing fish and those engaged in fish habitat protection and restoration efforts. It also illustrates the need for strategic use of limited resources though partnerships—such as the Fish Habitat Partnerships established under the National Fish Habitat Action Plan—to identify the most effective use of funds and help the nation as a whole make progress in fish habitat conservation.

Through a Fish’s Eye can be accessed at:

http://www.habitat.noaa.gov/pdf/fishhabitatreport.pdf

During 2011 and 2012, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will be conducting the 12th National Survey of Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife-Associated Recreation.

American hunters, anglers and other wildlife enthusiasts will be asked to participate in interviews. The survey, which has been conducted every five years since 1955, will involve 53,000 households.

The survey is funded by the Multistate Conservation Grant Program authorized by the Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration Programs Improvement Act of 2000. The survey provides the only comprehensive statistical database available on participation and expenditures for hunting, fishing and wildlife-watching in all 50 states.

The information is collected by the U.S. Census Bureau, primarily through telephone interviews to be conducted April to June and September to October in 2011, and January to March in 2012.

Respondents will be asked about their participation and expenditures in several categories of wildlife-associated recreation. The results will be available in a national report and in 50 individual state reports.

The survey hopes to include 19,000 anglers and hunters and 10,000 wildlife watchers (wildlife photographers, feeders, and observers). The reports, when completed, will be published by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

For more information, visit www.fws.gov

A nearly 17,000-acre area encompassing freshwater marshes, uplands and river on the shores of Lake Superior in Wisconsin has became the 28th member of NOAA’s National Estuarine Research Reserve System. Federal, state and local officials officially welcomed the site into the system at a ceremony in Superior, Wis.

“As the first reserve in the upper Great Lakes, the Lake Superior Reserve adds significant value to the National Estuarine Research Reserve System and broadens the opportunities to study, understand and manage America’s coastal and Great Lakes ecosystems,” said Larry Robinson, Ph.D., assistant secretary of commerce for conservation and management, who represented NOAA at the ceremony.

Official designation of the Lake Superior National Estuarine Research Reserve culminated a six-year process that began with site selection and continued with development of an environmental impact statement and a comprehensive reserve management plan. This multiyear process was done in partnership with scientists, agency land managers, public officials and citizens representing local, regional and tribal interests.

Research conducted at the reserve will focus on improving the health of local freshwater estuaries and can assist other Great Lakes communities in addressing similar challenges. The reserve’s educational programs also will allow individuals to experience freshwater estuaries and their unique resources, making it a community asset and a destination for students and visitors. The reserve will attract scientists and students from across the nation, including up to two national graduate research fellows funded annually by NOAA.

The Lake Superior site was proposed by Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle in May 2008 after a two-year site selection process. The reserve will be managed by the University of Wisconsin Extension. It is the second to be established in the Great Lakes and the first in the upper Great Lakes. Old Woman Creek Reserve was established in 1980 on the shores of Lake Erie in Ohio.

The University of Wisconsin-Extension has been working closely with the University of Wisconsin-Superior on establishing and developing the Lake Superior Reserve. These two entities will work in partnership to provide long-term facilities, staffing, and programming for the reserve.

“The upper Great Lakes region has a number of features that will help in understanding the unique nature of freshwater estuaries,” said Patrick Robinson, Lake Superior Reserve Acting Manager. “The research and monitoring programs here will help us understand the potential impacts of climate change on these important ecosystems and will provide critical, scientifically sound information to help communities and coastal managers deal with those impacts.”

“The Wisconsin reserve will fill a significant gap in the Great Lakes biogeographic region and enhance our ability to conserve, study and manage these important freshwater estuary resources,” said Laurie McGilvray, chief of NOAA’s Estuarine Reserves Division. “It offers local communities an incredible resource to help them monitor their estuary, provide educational programs and advance the state of knowledge around this important natural resource.”

NOAA’s National Estuarine Research Reserve System comprises 28 estuarine locations in 22 states and Puerto Rico that are protected for research, education, outreach and stewardship. Estuarine research reserves are managed by state agencies or universities in partnership with NOAA, which provides funding and national program guidance and support.

source: NOAA press release

NOAA’s Fisheries Service has announced $12.6 million in grants through the Protected Species Cooperative Conservation Grant Program to assist 19 states and territories with conservation projects designed to recover marine mammals, sea turtles, fish, coral and other species listed under the Endangered Species Act.

Several proposals selected during the fiscal year 2010 grant cycle will help sturgeon populations including:

Delaware Division of Fish and Wildlife ($1,019,486): To determine habitat requirements and migratory pathways to provide managers with essential information to recover Atlantic and shortnose sturgeon in Delaware, New Jersey and Connecticut.

Maine Department of Marine Resources ($315,330): To determine spatial distribution, key habitat, and movement patterns of shortnose and Atlantic sturgeon among Maine rivers and nearby states to inform management and recovery actions.

Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks ($297,714): To identify feeding habitat for and movement of juvenile and sub-adult Gulf sturgeon in the state’s Pascagoula River estuary.

New York Department of Environmental Conservation ($1,325,437): To collaborate with Maine, Connecticut and New Jersey partners in determining Atlantic sturgeon habitat use and movement throughout the Mid-Atlantic Bight and evaluating spatial strategies to minimize Atlantic sturgeon bycatch.

South Carolina Department of Natural Resources ($1,800,800): To determine shortnose and Atlantic sturgeon movements and habitat use with North Carolina partners to inform regional conservation efforts.

Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife ($576,668): To collaborate with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife in tracking coast-wide status and trends of green sturgeon and managing human caused impacts to the species.

source: NOAA press release

The Potomac River in Washington, D.C. is showing multiple benefits from restoration efforts, newly published research suggests.  Reduced nutrients and improved water clarity have increased the abundance and diversity of submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) in the Potomac, according to direct measurements taken during the 18-year field study.

Since 1990, the area covered by SAV in the lower Potomac has doubled, the area covered by native SAV has increased ten-fold, the diversity of plant species has increased, and the proportion of exotic species to native species has declined as nutrients have declined, according to the study by the U.S. Geological Survey and England’s National Oceanography Centre (NOC) in Southhampton, UK.

More than a dozen species of SAV, including the exotic hydrilla, co-exist in this reach of the Potomac that was almost barren in a 1978-1981 USGS study.

SAV are critical to the ecosystem in the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. They provide oxygen, food, and shelter so that invertebrates, fish, crabs and waterfowl can survive.  High nutrient levels stimulate algal blooms in the water, decrease water clarity, and block light needed for SAV growth.

The authors analyzed measurements of aquatic plant species abundance, nutrient effluent from the wastewater treatment plant, and water quality from 1990 to 2007. The surveys included a 50-mile reach of the tidal Potomac downstream from Washington.

Key Findings on the Potomac River’s SAV:

- Native SAV cover increased tenfold from 288 to 3081 acres.

- The overall area covered by SAV in the Potomac more than doubled since 1990, increasing from 4207 to 8441 acres.

- The diversity of SAV has increased. In 1990 the exotic hydrilla was 10 times more abundant than any other species. In 2007 the abundance of the 7 most frequently occurring species are more evenly matched.

- In 1990, more than 80% of the total SAV was hydrilla; in 2007 hydrilla declined to 20%.

- Results suggest declining fitness of exotic species relative to native species during restoration.

These results are consistent with a multi-agency study released in July, which correlated nutrient reductions with gains in the abundance of SAV in some Chesapeake Bay tributaries, while noting a negative correlation within the bay between SAV and nitrogen.

The study was supported by USGS National Research Program; U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Baltimore; the Metropolitan Washington Council of Government’s Aquatic Plant Management Program; and the Fisheries Division of the District of Columbia Department of Health.

The report, “Long-term reductions in anthropogenic nutrients link to improvements in Chesapeake Bay habitat is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1003590107.

source: USGS press release