THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 25, 1994 TAG: 9408250580
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B01 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY BETTY MITCHELL GRAY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ATLANTIC BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 84 lines
Catches of river herring and American shad - valuable Albemarle-area harvests - have plummeted in the last few decades in North Carolina, and some state regulators say it's time to do something about it.
``River herring and shad are not in good shape at all,'' said Harrel S. Johnson, head of the Division of Marine Fisheries' regional office in Elizabeth City. ``Recently, things keep getting worse and worse and worse every year.''
The Marine Fisheries Commission this week is scheduled to consider a proposal that would close the herring and shad seasons - centered on the Chowan and Roanoke rivers near Edenton, Colerain and Jamesville - after April 15. The move would give fish a better chance to avoid commercial fishing nets.
But area commercial fishermen say state regulators are targeting the wrong people, and that the proposal would have devastating effects on the industry.
River herring and shad are anadromous fish, meaning they migrate each spring from the ocean to spawn in rivers, primarily in northeastern North Carolina.
The proposed rule is designed to protect the fish after they spawn and head back to the ocean, giving them a better chance to return to Albemarle-area waters again, Johnson said.
``We have proposed cutting off the season so fish on their way back to the ocean won't be subject to harvest,'' he said.
But one Chowan County fisherman said the commission is targeting the wrong group of fishermen. He thinks the proposal will likely spell the death of the herring fishery along the river.
Herbert Ray Byrum, 49, of the Cannon Ferry community in northern Chowan County, said herring runs do not usually begin on the upper reaches of the river until April 10.
Closing the season on April 15, he said, would not give him time to catch enough fish to make a living.
Byrum, a third-generation fisherman who followed his father and grandfather into the herring fishery as a small boy, said most of the decline in the herring population is due to giant offshore fishing boats. Those should be the target of fisheries regulators, he said, not the inshore commercial fishermen.
``I think I'm going to be the last one,'' he said. ``Pollution took the biggest part of the industry, and overfishing did the rest.''
``It will completely put me out of business,'' Byrum said of the proposal.
The commission will debate this proposal and 16 others on Friday and Saturday and will decide whether they have enough merit to warrant additional consideration.
Issues that receive the go-ahead this week will be discussed at public hearings in the fall before they become official.
The panel is also scheduled to discuss a request to ban most commercial fishing nets in a section of the Perquimans River near Hertford and Winfall.
Also on the agenda is a proposal to continue recent restrictions on commercial net fishing off Oregon Inlet and other sections of Dare County.
River herring, also known as alewife, have been a significant part of the commercial fishing industry in northeastern North Carolina since the Colonial era. Landings in North Carolina peaked in 1887 at 23.7 million pounds, according to the Division of Marine Fisheries.
In the last five years, the American shad catch has dropped by about 50 percent, and during the last decade the river herring catch has dropped about 92 percent. But problems with the fisheries date back to the 1960s and 1970s, Johnson said.
During that time, the river herring were the target of foreign fishing fleets operating in the Atlantic Ocean. Efforts to move foreign fleets offshore helped the herring population, but the fishery has never rebounded to historic levels, Johnson said.
Ricky Nixon, owner of Murray L. Nixon Fishery near Edenton, said commercial fishermen throughout the region would be affected by the restriction on the herring and shad season.
``The only things we've got left are herring, shad and catfish,'' Nixon said. ``This is going to put the fishermen on the Albemarle Sound and Chowan River out of business.''
The commission considered a proposal last year to restrict gill nets operating in the Roanoke River but dropped it after it met with considerable opposition from local fishermen.
KEYWORDS: NORTH CAROLINA STATE MARINE FISHERIES COMMISSION FISHING
by CNB