New Rules would protect turtles

The national Marine Fisheries Service responded last May by imposing a 30 day ban on all gill netting from Cape Hatteras to the Virginia - Maryland BOrder. Fishermen protested. But stranding subsided.  NOW, with the spring coastal fishing season about to begin, Virginia i proposing new regulations to curb turtle deaths.

In NOrth Carolina, officials are taking a different path.  They're applied for a federal permit to allow limited fishing and to study links between monkfish, nets and dead turtles. They also ware weighing options to reduce stranding in the fall netting season in Pamlico Sound and other estuaries...., where hundreds of sea turtles perished late last year.

The Virginia Marine Resources Commission, which regulates fishing, has called a public hearing on March 20 in Newport News for its proposed five point turtle saving strategy.

Recommendations include:

The plan won't eliminate stranding, but it should minimize them," said Rob O'Reilly assistant director of state fisheries.  It also should keep the federal government at bay.  The national fisheries service has reminded Virginia that losing sea turtles to fishermen is state waters is a violation of the Endangered Species Act; sea turtles are considered "threatened" under the act.

Commercial fishermen on a state stranding task force are reluctantly endorsing the restrictions, mostly because they fear inaction would spur another federal crackdown.  Paul H. Herrick, a Virginia Beach water man and task force member, said fishing nets are only a small part of the problem.  The biggest factor these days, he said, is the turtles themselves.

"We've passed all the rules and protections along the coast and they're working: There's more sea turtles out there now than I can remember," said Herrick, 60, a lifelong fishermen. "If you get to much of any thing in nature, you'll get higher moralities," he said. "But no one wants to hear that. They  Want to show, Politically, that they're doing something for the turtles. So here we are stuck with more rules.  Jack Musick, a sea turtle expert and researcher at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, said Atlantic turtle populations have increased in recent years but not enough to life government protections.

Most sea turtles in Virginia and North Carolina waters are loggerheads. They can endure colder weather. So they normally arrive in early spring from the Outer Banks to Virginia Beach and the Eastern Shore.  The mid Atlantic also hosts a smaller number of Kemp's Ridleys, the most endangered of the sea turtles.  Last year, conditions conspired to create a crisis, according to state regulators, fishermen and scientists.  Turtles arrived especially early because of unusually early because of unusually warm water.  But then a cold snap hit, causing at least 23 stranding in North Carolina, said Nancy Fish, as state fisheries spokeswoman.

bout this time, an estimated 27 fishing boats from New Jersey and other northern states arrive off the Outer Banks in search of monkfish. They have been coming south for several years, but last spring the set their bowl shaped nets and left, said Red Munden, a special assistant to the North Carolina fisheries director. When they returned several days later, a raft of dead turtles was waiting, said several fishermen and officials.

Munden doubts the episode will be repeated, mostly because the federal government is limiting monk fishermen to 40 days at sea this year, which will likely keep Northeast water men at home. Also last spring, unusually strong easterly winds pushed many of the bloated turtles between Hatteras and Ocracoke Island, where stunned residents and scientist started counting, Munden said.

Then in the fall,, North Carolina applied for, and received a "take permit" under the Endangered Species Act. It allowed gill netters to go after flounder and other commercial fish in inland waters, with the understanding that the state would adopt strategies to reduce turtles deaths, Munden said.  soon, however the stranding escalated and North Carolina closed down the fishery, he said.

In trying to assigned causes to the record number of strandings last year, Carolina officials linked just four to fishing nets; the turtles were discovered on beaches with bits of netting wrapped around their bodies.

Ninety one % of the cases were unexplained.  Munden said, however, that several fishermen told him privately that nets had caused plenty of deaths, especially nets tied down for monkfish.  In Virginia, monkfish is not as active as in North Carolina. Still, it is growing.  Liver's from monkfish can be sold to Asian markets for as much as $9 apiece, one commercial fishermen said.  The fish's firm white meat tastes something like lobster.  But with the fishery being linked to sea turtles deaths, finding a monk fishermen to talk about his trade can be difficult these days.  Herrick, the Virginia Beach waterman, chuckled when asked if he knew of one who might site for an interview.  "I don't think they'd talk to you," he said. "They don't want to talk to anybody right now."

*2000 Strandings does not mean "deaths," the figures also include turtles that are beached and nursed back to health. 70 State officials are alarmed at this spike on May of 2000.