LOWER TOWNSHIP — The Mid-Atlantic $500,000 is billed to anglers as the world’s richest marlin and tuna tournament, but it is worth more than that to the local economy.

The tournament began Monday and will run through Friday out of the Canyon Club in Cape May. Prizes run in the tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars for the biggest sport fish brought in, and side bets can double the prize money. But making an impact on the local economy are the approximately 1,000 family members who stay behind and spend money while the anglers are out.

Tourney worker Linda Gilmartin sees the economic effects firsthand. The Cape May resident drives the participants and their families around the area during the weeklong fishing tournament. Most arrive by boat, so the tournament uses rented vans to take people where they want to go.

“Some go to dinner at 410 Bank Street, or another favorite is Carney’s. We run three shuttles at night, and it’s nonstop from 5 to 11,” Gilmartin said.

No one has an exact figure on how much money is pumped into the local economy during the tournament, which is one of nine fishing contests put on by South Jersey Marina each year. One estimate is that $450,000 is spent on accommodations alone, said Mark Allen, of South Jersey Marina.

Tournament Director Bob Glover said his budget to stage the event is about $350,000, which pays for alcohol, food, bands, security, temporary labor such as bartenders, a linen service, portable toilets, sound and lighting, and many other things supplied by local businesses.

On Friday night, some of that money will go to the Lobster House Restaurant to cater a dinner for 1,400 people. Another local restaurant, Lucky Bones, is catering one of the dinners. On Sunday night, the Lobster House set up a raw bar for the pretournament captains meeting.

While the tournament provides dinners under a big tent — rented from a local company, of course — at the Canyon Club Resort Marina, the participants fend for themselves for breakfast and lunch. Gilmartin drives some to ShopRite and Wawa to pick up food.

A Sea Isle City Ice truck made a delivery while Dave’s Trash Service, a Middle Township company, picked up trash from a 30-cubic-yard container.

A Wildwood company, Event Management Service, handled security while Grace Oil was busy delivering diesel fuel for the 136 boats in the contest, which burn about 110 gallons per hour.

Many of the fishermen arrive with their families and rent hotel rooms or condominiums in Cape May. Allen said a few years ago, a participant who brought his family told him he spent $58,000 to $63,000 during the week.

“If you do the math, we have maybe 20 locals, and the others are going to need accommodations. That means they’re pumping a lot into the economy,” Allen said.

One indication of how many and how often people eat at a local business is how many eat under the big tent. The tournament begins with the Sunday meeting of the captains and will end after the fishing day Friday. They all attend the Friday night awards dinner, about 1,400 people. Allen said a dinner during the week can draw as few as 400 people. That means about 1,000 people are eating somewhere else.

Allen said even a Cape May hairdresser has told him that the Mid-Atlantic $500,000 week is her best of the year as wives of fishermen come in to get their hair done.

Glover said the tournament received little recognition locally when it started 19 years ago. Over the years, the fishermen have turned the week into a family vacation. The wife and children typically will do vacation activities while the husband/father fishes. Fishermen compete only three of the days from Monday through Friday, so for two days, the whole family is together. Each boat has about six people manning it, but the boats bring in 10 to 12 people total with wives, children and girlfriends, Glover said.

“When we started this tournament, you didn’t hear much from the people in town. Now, people are renting condos, going to the beach, buying supplies. Now, we hear from people that this is one of the best weeks they have. The impact has definitely grown over the years,” Glover said.

One complaint at the shore during the recession is that tourists are not spending as much money as they usually do. That has not been a complaint at a fishing tourney that costs a minimum of $6,000 to enter and as much as $18,000 for those who enter all the side bets.

“There are some people that still have money. They have the boats and want to use them,” said Dave Wrigley, a service manager at the Canyon Club.

But Glover said many big-game fishing tournaments are hurting due to the economy. Fishermen are entering fewer of them and “picking and choosing” the ones they do, but Glover said the Mid-Atlantic $500,000 has held steady and been somewhat recession-proof.

The tournament has drawn a low of 125 boats to a high of 179. The 136 this year is down one boat from last year.

“Our tournament has more than held its own. Most tourneys are down 40 (percent) to 60 percent. We’re having an average year, and I’m real happy with that,” Glover said.

Part of the draw is the prize money. The tournament’s name comes from the $500,000 in upfront prize money that increases to about $1.7 million this year with the calcuttas, or side bets. The tournament needs 125 boats to assure $500,000 in prize money. The biggest payout to one boat over the years came to about $800,000.

The heaviest white marlin or blue marlin is worth $100,000, while the biggest tuna can fetch $75,000. Even a wahoo or a mahi mahi can translate to $10,000. These prizes do not include the calcuttas.

When that kind of money is on the table, some greenbacks are bound to filter down to the local economy.

“I don’t feel Cape May as a city recognizes what the Mid-Atlantic and the other tournaments do for the local economy,” Wrigley said.

Depleted oxygen leading theory in death of thousands of fish along Delaware Bay

The state Department of Environmental Protection is leaning toward the oxygen theory after water sampling showed low levels of dissolved oxygen in the water.

Robert Van Fossen, the DEP's assistant director for Emergency Management, said three of four samples came in under the acceptable level of 5 micrograms of oxygen per liter of water. The lowest reading, 3.4 micrograms, came from Pierce's Point in Middle Township where many of the dead fish were concentrated.

"Although taken after the fact, these tests suggest that oxygen levels in the bay were probably very low and caused the die-off of fish," Van Fossen said.

The low levels of oxygen could have been caused by warm weather, Van Fossen said. Warmer water has less dissolved oxygen in it.

Lenora Boninfante, a spokeswoman for Cape May County, said recent water testing by the Cape May County Health Department showed acceptable oxygen levels at three of four sites tested. Waters off Pierce's Point and The Villas passed. The one sample that was below 5 micrograms was off Del Haven in Middle Township, she said.

The DEP is also exploring the possibility that predators of menhaden may have played a role. The fish, which also are known as bunker, could have been driven into shallow areas by larger predators. By concentrating in such a small area the fish could have rapidly depleted the dissolved oxygen levels in the water and perished.

Matt Newman, a Rutgers University biologist, was fishing on a bay beach Tuesday night and reported seeing the waters teeming with bunker, with bluefish causing them to jump out of the water.

While Newman did not report seeing any dolphins, in recent days dolphins have been feeding on bunker off Cape May Point, an area with such swift currents that oxygen levels would not be likely to cause a problem even if the fish were squeezed into a small area.

There is less current and waters are shallower up the bay where the fish kill occurred.

The DEP said the fish kill likely occurred at night, and dissolved oxygen levels tend to drop at night because aquatic plants stop the process of photosynthesis.

Could bluefish, dolphins or some other predators have scared the bunker into a small area where they used up the oxygen? The DEP said it is exploring the possibility.

The DEP plans to continue sampling oxygen levels in the water and tissue samples on the dead fish but so far has found no signs of any toxins.

"While this appears to have been a natural event, we are continuing to work with Cape May County in trying to come up with a definitive cause and will be offering direction to local officials regarding the disposal of the fish," Van Fossen said.

Boninfante said the cleanup would begin at about 8 a.m. today, with some of the fish picked up by hand but others collected using heavy equipment. Lower Township, Middle Township and Cape May County are all taking part. Boninfante said the tides have already taken some of the dead fish away

The fish kill has led to renewed calls from environmental groups to address water quality issues in the bay. One concern is high nutrient levels from runoff. Nutrients, which can come from fertilizers and other sources on land, can lead to algae blooms that in turn deplete oxygen levels. Delaware Riverkeeper Maya van Rossum surveyed the beaches Wednesday and was concerned nutrient levels played a role. She pushed the Delaware River Basin Commission, which oversees the watershed, to consider strong regulations on nutrients.

"Perhaps the menhaden die-off is the first overt sign of stress needed to convince the DRBC that strong action is needed today to regulate nutrients entering the Delaware River and tributary streams, before it is too late," van Rossum said.

More testing by the DEP and the Cape May County Health Department could provide more definitive answers. There are other theories, including the possibility that the recent heat wave raised water temperatures in some shallow tributaries. This could deplete oxygen levels and kill fish. Juvenile menhaden, also called "peanut bunkers," are especially susceptible to low oxygen levels.

Van Fossen said testing thus far has not found any evidence of pollutants or toxic algae blooms, such as red tide, and he said there is no evidence the fish died as a result of a commercial fishing operation.

Contact Richard Degener:

609-463-6711

RDegener@pressofac.com

By RICHARD DEGENER Staff Writer | Posted: Thursday, August 5, 2010 | 14 comments

That was the story on the party boat Duke o' Fluke on Wednesday morning. The four-hour excursion in the back bays between Ocean City and Longport produced one fish at 17.5 inches - but none that met the 18-inch minimum size requirement to become dinner. The pool money, $93, was given out using a numbers drawing since nobody on the boat had a keeper.

Click for photo gallery

That's been the norm on the New Jersey coast this summer. A few more keepers are being caught in the ocean, but the ratio of throwbacks to keepers has been something like 40 to 1.

"We're catching more but keeping less. We see disappointment. A lot of people come with the hope of taking a fish home," said Duke o' Fluke Capt. Brook Koeneke.

Some are questioning whether the 18-inch size limit for fluke, also known as summer flounder, isn't a ruse to prevent anglers from keeping them. They have seen the size regulation creep up from 13 inches in 1986, to 14 inches in 1993, to 16.5 inches in 2006, to 17 inches in 2007 to 18 inches in 2009.

Retiree Tony Pagano, of Egg Harbor Township, goes out just about every day on the Duke o' Fluke, 70 trips so far this year, and he catches eight to 10 fluke a day. He has two keepers this year to show for it.

"Do they ever get to 18 inches? I don't think so. I don't believe it. I think the commercial fishing is killing them," Pagano said.

It's a popular discussion on the water. Commercial fishermen get to keep 14-inch fluke. Some people theorize the commercial fishermen take all the fluke before the fish can grow to the legal size for recreational anglers.

The East Coast fluke quota has been cut in recent years, although it is starting to rise again, and commercial fishermen face similar restrictions. Once the quota is set, anglers get 40 percent of the total and commercial netters get 60 percent. Quota cuts hurt both sides.

"The commercial guys have been hurt harder with the regulatory restrictions than we are," Koeneke said.

But the larger sizes are helping a federal mandate to rebuild fluke stocks by Jan. 1, 2013. The mandate began with a 1996 federal law called the Sustainable Fisheries Act. Biologists are telling anglers to stay the course and there will be big dividends in the future as fish grow to keeper size.

"It's not a bad thing. It's future fish. The bulk of these fish will move into the (keeper group) in a year or so. That's the plan," said Jessica Coakley, who coordinates the fluke plan for the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council.

The mortality for fluke caught and released is about 10 percent, so a few of them won't contribute to the future. But Coakley said the survivors will continue growing. She said it takes about four years for a flounder to grow to 18 inches, and a very large number were born in both 2008 and 2009.

Fluke figures from the National Marine Fisheries Service show huge spawning years in 2008 and 2009. An estimated 49 million fluke were born in 2008 over the East Coast range that runs from North Carolina to Canada, 17 percent higher than the yearly average, according to the NMFS data. In 2009, about 82 million fluke were born, nearly twice the normal rate. In 1988 only 13 million fluke were born, according to the fisheries service.

Anglers aboard the Duke o' Fluke are undoubtedly catching many of these 2008 and 2009 fish.

"It's frustrating for fishermen when they get one keeper and throw 15 back. The bulk of those 15 will move into the fishery in a year or so," Coakley said.

Anglers reaction

Some anglers aboard the Duke o' Fluke argue for lower size limits since there are more fish out there as the spawning stock climbs. John McMullen of West Chester, Pa., notes the limit used to be 14 inches before the federal government got heavily involved.

"Why don't they fix the economy instead of worrying about the fish?" McMullen said.

Linda Vanis, of Philadelphia, found out the bright side of the strict size limit as the 10-inch fluke she hooked got away before first mate Michael Mulkeen arrived to help her boat it.

"It wasn't big enough, so it doesn't matter," Mulkeen told her.

"Next year it will be bigger," Vanis replied.

A lot of anglers are willing to sacrifice this year for future years. Dom Lucisano, of Rochester, N.Y., said he has no problem throwing back fish less than 18 inches.

"A couple years from now there are going to be a lot of big flounder around," Lucisano said.

Young anglers seem especially unconcerned about keeping the fish. They just want to catch them. The Duke o' Fluke caters to parents and grandparents taking their children fishing.

"They're happy just catching them," said John Grega, of Ocean City, who brought his granddaughter Amanda Grega, 14, and her friend Kelly O'Hanlon, 15, of both of Easton, Pa.

Ryan Vetter, 12, of Langhorne, Pa., had a great time pulling in undersized fluke.

"I'm not much of a fish eater. The fun part is just catching fish," Vetter said.

Dick Herb, who runs a charter boat in Avalon and serves on the New Jersey Marine Fisheries Council, said his customers are getting more keepers this year, with 83 percent of his trips producing at least one. He said many are just short.

"The 17 inchers are so thick it's unbelievable," Herb said.

Still, Herb questions the commercial harvest and wonders if anglers will ever really cash in.

"Everybody says the same thing every year, that all the 17 inchers should be 18 inches next year. Where did they go? Where are they? The size never catches up."

Rewards

Some have suggested allowing one smaller fluke per angler per day. Recreational fluke catches are regulated by size but also by a bag limit and season. Each state picks a mix of the three to stay within its quota. In New Jersey the bag limit is six fish per angler per day and the season runs from May 29 through Sept. 6. Herb said a smaller fish would be nice but then "you could have a two-week season."

Tom Fote of the Jersey Coast Anglers Association said the size was raised to 18 inches to keep New Jersey within its quota. The proposed quota for 2011 will come out later this month, and if it increases then regulations could ease up.

"Do people want a lower size limit or a longer season? I'm not sure. I'm hoping we get an increase and it means a half-inch smaller size and an increased season," Fote said.

Koeneke isn't counting on regulatory relief. He is counting on the fish growing.

"There's more flounder out there than we've ever seen, but no increase in the number of keepers," Koeneke said. "I think they're going to go over 18 (inches). I think it's going to happen. I wish it would happen soon."

Contact Richard Degener:

609-463-6711

RDegener@pressofac.com

Fewer boaters take to New Jersey waters as economy slumps and costs rise

John Hiros, 71, pulled his small boat up to the ramp at the 10th Street Waterfront Park in Ship Bottom after an afternoon of crabbing.

Hiros, a retired consultant, lives in Pemberton Township, Burlington County, but he goes out on the Barnegat Bay about three times a week. On this day, he trapped enough crabs for a feast to go along with market-fresh corn on the cob.

But even in his 17-foot bay boat, his hobby is getting expensive, he said.

“Boat-ramp fees, fuel, registration — the price of everything has gone up,” he said. “The state has a captive audience. If you have dedicated boaters who like to fish and crab, you don’t have an option.”

The number of boat registrations is on the decline in New Jersey, despite an abundance of waterways that support a thriving marine culture. The state in March had about 170,000 registered boats — down 28 percent from 10 years ago, says the state Motor Vehicle Commission, which records boat registrations.

The last time boating interest declined so sharply was in 1991, when New Jersey passed a luxury tax on yachts. That tax was so unpopular and devastating to the boating industry that lawmakers repealed it two years later.

Now the recession, stricter licensing requirements and even the federal banking crisis have contributed to fewer boats on New Jersey’s waters, experts said.

“For a guy who lost his job and is struggling to feed his family, a boat is a luxury,” Hiros said.

Nationwide, states are reporting a similar decline in boating.

Dealers sold 19 percent fewer boats in 2009 than in the year before, according to the National Marine Manufacturers Association. Revenue from boat sales dropped 24 percent. Adult participation in recreational boating dropped 6 percent to 65.9 million boaters, the group also said.

Boat registrations nationwide fell by 1 percent to 12.7 million boats last year. New Jersey registrations dropped by nearly twice that rate between 2008 and 2009, to 171,185. They dropped again in the first half of 2010 to 170,379, Motor Vehicle Commission figures show.

“The economy is still the big issue,” said Jon Mohr, managing editor for Boating Industry, a trade publication.

“It has bottomed out in different places, but according to the most recent forecast, it may never get back to where it was,” he said.

With a recession in 2008, All Seasons Marina in Upper Township, Cape May County, did not order new boats for its showroom, owner Brian Tersaga said. It proved to be a savvy move.

“When the credit markets froze up, you couldn’t buy a boat with anything less than a whole lot of cash. Nobody would lend money regardless of your credit history without a huge down payment,” he said. “You have to have financing or sales. If you don’t have either, you’re in trouble.”

Dealerships suffered in the mortgage crisis when banks tightened their lending requirements. This has had a ripple effect in the boating community.

“Last year was the worst. Everyone pulled back. There was little discretionary spending. The boats didn’t go in the water,” he said. “They didn’t get re-registered and they didn’t get used.”

Tersaga said he thinks the worst is over.

“We’re seeing a slight increase in business this year,” he said. “We’ll see very gradual improvement as consumer confidence increases and unemployment goes down.”

Despite its 130 miles of Atlantic Ocean coastline, New Jersey ranks 29th nationally in the number of registered boats.

Boaters said the price of a boat is only the first expense to consider.

Boaters pay between $12 and $250 per year in registration fees, depending on the size of their watercraft.

Add to that insurance, fuel, membership to a towing service, boat slips, winter storage, launch fees and annual maintenance, and a boat can become a costly burden.

Marlton boater Domenic Maio, 45, spent an unsuccessful day of fishing off Long Beach Island.

Last year, his boat stayed on land all summer because its steering cable was broken. The car mechanic said he normally goes on the water about five times each summer. It’s hardly worth the aggravation, he said.

“I’d have to say half the time, no. It’s fun but there’s a lot of stress involved. I have a better time when I go out on someone else’s boat,” he said.

But Hiros said his lighter wallet is soon forgotten on the open water with a warm sun on his back and a cool breeze on his face.

“Every day on the water is a good day,” he said.

Staff writer Elaine Rose contributed to this report.

Contact Michael Miller:

609-272-7247

MMiller@pressofac.com

U.S. Coast Guard's 5th District stepping up boating safety with Operation Bow Rider

The U.S. Coast Guard has announced it is stepping up efforts to improve boating safety to specifically prevent people from riding on the bows of boats.

Named Operation Bow Rider, the campaign is to continue through the end of the boating season in October and aims to increase awareness about the dangers of having passengers in the bow of a boat while the watercraft is traveling.

The focus is taking place throughout the Coast Guard’s 5th District from New Jersey to North Carolina, and is necessary as more people are becoming inclined to sit in the front of boats, said Petty Officer 2nd Class Jesse Ellison of Station Atlantic City.

“It’s something that we are seeing more a problem of and we want to head it off now before it gets worse,” Ellison said.

Boat passengers seated on the front edge of vessels is an occurrence Ellison said he sees on a daily basis during patrols that span from Little Egg Harbor north of Brigantine to Corson’s Inlet at the southern tip of Ocean City.

The Coast Guard considers the practice hazardous because it increases the possibility a person could go overboard when a boat travels through a wake, especially on a boat that is not designed to have passengers in the bow or doesn’t have handrails.

The danger also persists if a vessel has to quickly change direction, putting a person who falls into the water more at risk of being run over by the boat.

He added there have been 12 deaths this year in the 5th District related to bow riding, though none occurred locally.

Ellison said area Coast Guard patrols will concentrate on looking for people in bows of boats in addition to the standard requirements such as life jackets, fire extinguishers and flares. Any extreme cases could warrant a penalty of negligent operations.

“We are mostly looking where it’s not designed to have a seat and a lot of those boats don’t have handrails,” Ellison said.

Twins Jack and Matt Compton, of the English Creek area of Egg Harbor Township, were crouched in the bow of the boat driven by their grandfather, Skip Compton, on Sunday afternoon as they returned from a fishing outing to Smith’s Marina in Somers Point.

But they only moved to the front of the vessel once they closed in on the marina to help their grandfather and older brother, Charles Compton V, tie up the boat.

Skip Compton, of the Germania section of Galloway Township, wouldn’t allow it any other time, he said.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea with your feet hanging over,” Skip Compton said.

Chip Roman also doesn’t permit passengers in his 20-foot boat to place their legs over the edge, which is something he said he sees often.

But while safety is paramount on his boat since he has two young children, he doesn’t entirely object to people riding in the bow, if the situation is right.

“I think if you’re going slow it’s not a big deal,” said Roman, a Philadelphia native, as he sat in his boat at the All Seasons Marina in Ocean City.

Nearby, a group of about a dozen adults and children piled onto Matt Higgins’ 24-foot boat for a day on the water.

Higgins, who lives in Medford Township, said his main concern is to keep people away from the rear of the vessel, where there is no back wall around the covered housing for the engine. Each of the kids wore life vests and with people in the front sitting area, Higgins said he would be far from pushing the motor to its peak.

He and a friend, Jason Kurtz, both agreed that the Coast Guard’s operation has good intentions.

“If the Coast Guard is doing it, then it’s for safety and a good thing,” Kurtz said.

Bridges make for popular fishing spots across coastal New Jersey

Keith Timberlake held court on a narrow bridge ledge while casino-bound tourists rumbled past on the Black Horse Pike.

"You add your spices -- your Old Bay -- and salt and vinegar and steam it with beer. Not good beer, but cheap beer," he said.

Timberlake, 57, was addressing one of his favorite summer topics -- the best way to cook blue-claw crabs. Timberlake should know. Ever since he was a child, Timberlake has been catching crabs off one of Atlantic County's busiest bridges -- the Route 40/322 concrete span over Great Thorofare in Atlantic City. He was crabbing here when cars trundled over a wooden bridge.

Southern New Jersey's bridges offer fishermen such as Timberlake ready and convenient access to waterways. Bridge fishing takes as much skill as fishing from a boat, but it's a lot cheaper.

And Great Thorofare is great -- great for crabbing, anyway. Timberlake, a retired union construction worker from Pleasantville, spent his career shaping the skyline in Atlantic City. Now the widower whiles away the hours fishing and crabbing and walking Atlantic City's Boardwalk.

After a couple hours, he had a cooler of crabs chilling on ice. They would make a nice dinner on their own, he said. Anything else is a needless distraction, he said.

"Why do you need side dishes when you have a table full of crabs? You don't need green beans or cornbread," he said. "Well, I might have some corn on the cob. I grow that in my back yard."

Timberlake's favorite spot is hardly a secret since thousands of motorists drive past every day. He does most of his fishing on weekdays, when he has more elbow room at the rail for his crab pots and fishing rods.

"How are you going to fish when everyone from Delaware and Pennsylvania comes here? I don't mess with it," he said.

But at the peak of summer, it's hard to find any bridges without a fisherman wetting a line. Some bridges have a better reputation than others for drawing fish big enough to bend a rod into a question mark.

"I can't reveal my spots. The locals would kill me," said Richard Orth, owner of Cape May Bait & Tackle on Sunset Boulevard in Lower Township.

John Andrus cast his buck-tail jig over the wooden rail into the olive-green water 15 feet below the Rush Chattin Bridge above Cape May County's Corsons Inlet State Park.

Andrus, 41, of Ocean City, has been fishing off bridges such as this one since he was a child and his father taught him to cast.

"A boat would be ideal, but you need money. Being on a bridge is almost like being on a boat," he said. "You can get to some of the deeper channels with the drop-offs and the ledges."

A dozen people fishing last week were pulling up keeper flounder on the incoming tide. But Andrus said he has caught striped bass, bluefish and even sharks from the bridge.

Nick Dutton, owner of Hand's Bait and Tackle in Cape May said most anglers use artificial lures that mimic the movement of baitfish.

"A lot of bridge fishing we do at nighttime. You use finesse lures," he said. "Where most bridges are, you have good currents with all the baitfish moving. You're looking for what's in the water and what they're feeding on."

Bridge fishing is largely hassle-free. People can usually park nearby, which means they do not have to haul their gear very far. The bridges sit high enough to keep fishermen out of the way of greenheads and other biting insects.

The one downside to some causeway bridges is the constant stream of traffic, which forces fishermen to watch their step on some of the narrower walkways. Some of Cape May County's toll bridges have no-fishing signs posted to keep anglers off the narrow traffic lanes.

Cape May County's causeway bridges are especially popular at night when the traffic thins.

The closed Beesleys Point Bridge was popular with anglers who liked to fish in the Great Egg Harbor Bay. Meanwhile, fishermen are looking forward to the completion of the $400 million Route 52 causeway, which will have its own fishing piers.

The Whitehorse Pike has several good fishing spots, said Dave Showell, a charter captain and owner of Absecon Bay Sportsmen's Center in Absecon.

"Bridge fishermen usually are looking for something to eat," Showell said. "That's why crabbing is the most popular activity on any of the bridges."

Showell said even some of the smaller bridges that cross tidal creeks are good fishing holes.

Bridges account for a good portion of the recreational-fishing dollars spent in New Jersey, he said.

"If you count the recreational hours, you'd find these bridges are worth a whole lot," he said. "We don't have too many fishing piers. The jetties are hazardous. Any water access that gives people a chance to go fishing is valuable."

On the Rush Chattin bridge, Marc Goldbacher of Upper Gwynedd Township, Pa., taught his 9-year-old son, Liam, how to fish for flounder. They caught four keepers a day earlier, took them home to their Ocean City summer home and served the broiled fish with garlic-and-basil rice and fresh cilantro.

Goldbacher, who wore a floppy hat to protect himself from the relentless sun, cast a live minnow into the water as recreational boaters and personal watercraft rumbled beneath the bridge. Terns squawked on a distant bank. A sea of green marsh stretched for miles to the west.

Goldbacher used fishing tackle that belonged to his late uncle, the man who taught him how to fish in Ocean City when he was Liam's age. Goldbacher said he sometimes thinks about these generational connections when he is on the bridge.

"There's something timeless about fishing here. These are the same wooden rails with the same notches we see every summer. It's as familiar as your own handprint," he said.

"We can sit here and enjoy this panoramic view, have a serious conversation or just ignore each other," Goldbacher said.

Goldbacher went silent when he felt a tug on his line. A few seconds later, he reeled up another keeper flounder. Liam smiled and grabbed the pliers from the tackle box.

The boy learned how to filet the odd-looking fish over the July 4th holiday weekend. In a couple hours, he would enjoy another flounder dinner.

Four million cubic yards of rock generated from New York District, Army Corps of Engineers dredging operations is being deployed on nine New Jersey reefs over the next three years as part of the Artificial Reef Program. The dredge rock, consisting of shale, sandstone and granite ranges in size from baseball-sized pieces to boulders. The rock is being transported from areas along the Kill Van Kull, Arthur Kill and Newark Bay via tugboats and deployed by hopper scows at predetermined locations.

During these reef construction efforts the work will be continuous so boaters must constantly be aware of the reduced maneuverability of the tugs and allow them the right-of-way. Commercial fishers must relocate their gear to other areas not slated for deployment or risk gear damage.

The following nine reefs will be receiving dredge rock:

Shark River, Axel Carlson, Garden State North, Atlantic City, Great Egg, Townsend Inlet, Wildwood, Deepwater and Cape May.

Adding rock to the ocean floor provides much needed hard-structure habitat for fish, lobster and other marine life. The rocky ridges and rock piles will become attachment surfaces for invertebrate marine life, such as mussels, barnacles, sponges and anemones, and will provide hiding places for bottom-dwelling species like sea bass, blackfish, crab and lobster. The rock will create productive fishing grounds for centuries to come.

A hopper scow of rock being towed to reef site.
Click to enlarge

Rock deployments commenced on April 21, 2009 and will continue through April 2013. For further information on this deployment contact Hugh Carberry at 609-748-2022.

Below are maps of reef grids for the nine reefs in PDF format. Each grid depicts the deployment locations as well as associated 150-foot buffer areas. These deployment locations and buffers should be avoided by commercial fishers who set unattended gear such as pots and traps. Setting pots or traps in these areas may result in damage or loss of gear.

National Marine Fisheries Service reduces maximum keeper size for tuna

LOWER TOWNSHIP — Anglers at the one of the richest big-game fishing tournaments around won’t be seeking the biggest bluefin tuna they can find this year.

The National Marine Fisheries Service this week announced it is lowering the maximum keeper size for bluefin tuna. It’s one of the more prized catches at the Mid-Atlantic $500,000, a tournament set to run Aug. 15-20.

Anglers at the tourney, where first prize is $500,000 but the total take last year was almost $2 million, can still catch the largest tuna. They just can’t bring it in.

“There’s something wrong with the biggest fish not being able to win,” said Rick Weber of South Jersey Marina, which is putting on the event.

Weber’s event will not be the only tournament affected, just the biggest. Yet he does not disagree with the decision. Anglers overshot their quota of the larger bluefin tunas last year by 338 percent.

Because some commercial fishermen, such as those who harpoon or purse seine net their catch, were way below their 2009 quota, the fishing community overall stayed within its allowed landing level.

“We can’t count on the commercial guys not catching their quota this year and the National Marine Fisheries Service had to do something drastic. The National Marine Fisheries Service had to do something to get us back in line,” said Weber.

The NMFS announced that anglers can have one bluefin tuna per vessel, per day, or trip at a size of 27 inches to just shy of 59 inches. Tunas are named and categorized by size. The NMFS is allowing one tuna per day that is either a school or large school tuna.

Last year they were also allowing one bluefin at a size of 27 to just shy of 73 inches, so this also included the category called small mediums. They can no longer catch small mediums or the next two sizes up, large mediums and giants.

“We get one blue less than 59 inches. It can be 58 and a half. It can be 58 and thirty one thirty seconds. It just can’t be 59,” said Weber.

Tuna fishermen in the charter and head boat category will be allowed one bluefin 27 inches to just shy of 47 inches (school) and one 47 inches to just shy of 59 inches (large school). This limit applies to each vessel per day or trip.

A second change concerns trophy fish 73 inches and above. Anglers were allowed one of these trophy fish — large mediums or giants — once a year. The NMFS is now only allowing one for people fishing north of the latitude that runs offshore roughly from Great Egg Harbor Inlet. The NMFS also transferred 1.7 million metric tons coastal quota to the north to allow this harvest.

Weber said anglers in Massachusetts were mostly responsible for overfishing the quota last year.

“It was the Mass. boys taking the big fat fish. I’m not pleased, but it’s the way things are right now. We don’t have quota by states,” Weber said.

It can work both ways. In 1996, too many bluefin were caught down south so the NMFS on Aug. 17 shut down the fishery from New Jersey through Maine. That didn’t seem fair either, though some local fishermen head south in the winter to catch bluefin on wintering grounds. New Jersey seems to be caught in the middle sometimes.

Weber said the changes would “be a pain” but would not disastrous for local tournaments. There are plenty of other species to catch and even some bluefins will be brought in.

“The game in the tournament will be to catch the heaviest fish that is less than 59 inches,” Weber said.

State to sink barge in memory of Avalon fisherman

The state will sink a 90-foot barge over the Townsends Inlet reef Friday in memory of a local fisherman who spent some of his happiest days on the water.

Howard Preston Bahnsen, a summer resident of Avalon, was an avid saltwater angler who shared his enthusiasm with his wife and three daughters.

Bahnsen, 68, of Berwyn, Pa., died of a brain hemorrhage in November, during an annual family Christmas outing to a cut-your-own-tree farm.

Kimberly Bahnsen Harris, also of Berwyn, Pa., her sisters, Kristin Bahnsen and Barbie Jenn Scott, and their mother, Barbara, decided to donate the barge to the state’s artificial reef program in his name.

“We knew if we were going to do anything, it would have to do with fishing. That’s perfect. Our friends and family came through. They were amazing,” Harris said.

New Jersey has one of the most extensive artificial reefs in the country — 15 different sites along the coast between New York and Cape May composed of sunken ships and other vessels, decommissioned military tanks, concrete and rock. The reefs provide a home for fish and their food, ranging from coral to crabs.

Many of the sunken items were dedicated to people who spent their free time fishing off the reefs. The state keeps a log of these donations of concrete castings, tug boats, reef balls and barges bearing the names of beloved family and friends.

For example, the Strathmere Fish and Environmental Club in Upper Township dedicated material for the Ocean City Reef to the club’s co-founder, Jack Clements, who died in 2002.

The Bahnsen family asked friends and relatives to donate to their reef project instead of sending flowers.

The family paid about $4,000 to Northstar Marine of Dennis Township for the old deck barge and its environmental preparation as a future home for fish.

Avalon charter boat Captain Dick Herb, a friend of Bahnsen’s, made the arrangements with the marine company to buy the barge. The vessel had to be inspected both by the U.S. Coast Guard and the state Department of Environmental Protection to ensure it was suitable for the reef program, he said.

“They won’t take just anything. Of course, with a barge like that the cleanup was not that expensive. There is no engine or oil. No fuel on it,” he said.

The barge was used as a floating work platform when the company installed bulkheads or conducted other marine work, Herb said. It was past its useful life, he said.

“It’s a good permanent memorial to him. We used to talk fishing a lot, compare notes. We’ll be thinking about him every time we go fishing out there,” he said.

Bahnsen was a former employee at SmithKline who later owned his own pharmaceuticals training company. He introduced his three daughters to fishing when they were little girls. They do not remember a time when they did not love the sport.

“He was an incredible teacher. I’m hoping I can teach my kids to fish the way he taught us,” Harris said.

The family left their husbands behind for an all-girls trip aboard their father’s boat for the first time during Memorial Day weekend. As usual, the rods had new line that their father replaced at the end of the season last year. The tackle box was freshly stocked, every lure neatly in place.

But none of the women could bring themselves to cast a rod that day, not without their dad at the helm, Harris said.

Besides, they didn’t have minnows, and they knew their dad would disapprove if they bought bait instead of catching it themselves.

“We weren’t ready emotionally,” she said. “We didn’t feel we could do it right so we decided not to.”

The family has rented a boat to watch Friday’s sinking about 4 miles off the coast of Avalon.

“It will be bittersweet,” Harris said. “We all know he’d be really proud of what we did. It will be hard. It’s almost symbolic, watching this big ship go down. My dad was larger than life, too.”

Coast Guard has plan in event of Delaware Bay oil spill

The U.S. Coast Guard has a detailed plan to address a major oil spill in the Delaware Bay.

Why the concern? Nearly 1 million barrels or 42 million gallons of crude oil pass by Cape May every day en route to refineries near Philadelphia. The Delaware Bay is the No. 1 destination for crude oil cargo ships in the United States.

The massive British Petroleum oil spill is an unqualified ecological and financial catastrophe for Gulf Coast shore communities.

Likewise, if a cargo ships spilled oil in the Delaware Bay, “it would be totally disastrous,” said Joanna Burger. She is a professor of cell biology and neuroscience at Rutgers University.

She is spending the week in Cape May County to study red knots, endangered shorebirds that are migrating through southern New Jersey on their way to their arctic breeding grounds.

“First of all it depends upon the timing. The immediate and really horrible effects would be if it happened from the first of May to the end of June. If there were a spill earlier than that the oil would still be on the beaches.”

A late-spring oil spill would threaten populations of red knots already in danger of extinction, along with thousands of other shorebirds that converge on the Delaware Bay to feed on horseshoe crab eggs.

“Their feathers would get oiled. They would preen their feathers and ingest a lot of the oil,” she said.

Unlike hard surfaces that are comparatively easier to clean, marshes sop up oil, which persists in the environment for a long time, Burger said.

“Many oil spills have been studied in salt marsh. The effects were still there 20 and 30 years later,” she said.

Far-reaching effects

Oil spills in the Delaware Bay could cause far-reaching financial and delivery problems due to an extended closing of the port. The port of Philadelphia is the world’s largest freshwater port and welcomes 3,000 cargo ships each year. More paper, fruit and meat enter the United States there than anywhere else, generating $19 billion in revenue.

And ship traffic here is expected to increase in the next decade.

When the Athos I spilled 265,000 gallons of fuel oil into the Delaware River in Camden in 2004, container ships from around the globe were lined up for days off Cape May like ducks on a pond waiting for clearance to go upriver.

The Coast Guard has a detailed plan to respond to a Delaware Bay spill, said Capt. Meredith L. Austin, commander of Sector Delaware Bay. The agency has three teams nationwide that respond to spills, including the Atlantic Strike Team based at Fort Dix in Burlington and Ocean counties.

About 20 members of that team went last month to assist with the Gulf Coast spill. Austin’s expertise is in addressing oil spills, and she joined them Tuesday.

“It’s horrible when these events happen, but we do get the benefit of experience,” she said. “We don’t have too many oil spills, thankfully. We can send people down, and they can see it firsthand, so if we had an event up here, they would know what to expect.”

A 1990 law passed after the devastating Exxon Valdez spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska, requires cargo and container ships to designate someone as the ship owner’s representative. This person is responsible for making decisions for the company for accidents caused in American waters, she said.

The Coast Guard’s first priority is finding the source of the spill and containing it, she said. Simultaneously, they determine the extent of the spill and identify whatever sensitive environments, wildlife or historic properties the spill threatens.

“Before we get eyes on a scene, my focus is always on assuming a worst-case scenario before I know otherwise,” she said. “It’s always easier to call for resources and find out they’re not needed than to find you don’t have enough.”

The Coast Guard also supervises the cleanup, which is usually limited to a handful of options, she said. Many of these were employed already in the Gulf Coast spill, such as burning off large quantities of oil, booming and skimming it and using chemical dispersants.

Once the oil reaches the shore, the task becomes more difficult.

Anticipating problems

The company responsible for the spill is responsible for the cleanup. But the federal government will step in if the company is negligent or simply can’t afford to pay, she said.

Environmental agencies from New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania are partners in the response along with experts in various fields. The Haskins Shellfish Research Lab in Cumberland County’s Commercial Township serves on the Coast Guard committee that drafts revisions to the response plan.

Many things need to be considered. “What are the most sensitive areas? What are the sensitive species? How does that work year-round? What areas should we boom first? You can’t boom everything at once,” Austin said.

Eric Powell, director of the Haskins lab, said shellfish are resilient when it comes to oil pollution.

“Spills come in a variety of flavors from diesel fuel to heavy crude,” he said. “The worst-case scenario for oysters would be if the oil came in contact with the animals directly.”

Hydrocarbons usually pass through oysters quickly. Those that survive eventually could be harvested for human consumption, he said.

“As long as it’s not an unbelievably big event that would cause direct mortality, you’re talking about a temporary closure and not some sort of permanent closure,” he said.

“It’s a mistake to look at the Gulf and think about it in terms of the Delaware Bay,” he said. “You’re not talking about an immense quantity in the bay. There are many procedures to deal with it.”

The state Department of Environmental Protection this week appointed a team to monitor how the spill affects New Jersey, if at all.

The DEP said oil from the spill is not likely to reach New Jersey. But under one of the less likely scenarios, storms and unusual ocean currents could bring some oil in the form of floating tar balls to isolated beaches later this summer, the agency said.

“We want to gather the best scientific data available to help guide us,” DEP Commissioner Bob Martin said in a statement. “We have to be fully prepared to protect the interests and residents of this state.”

Martin said the DEP is getting daily briefings from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. DEP scientists are working with Rutgers University and the Stevens Institute of Technology to map the potential flow of oil out of the gulf.

Martin said officials were very optimistic the oil would not reach New Jersey and would not affect fishing or the summer beach season.

Tourism concerns

Southern New Jersey’s No. 1 industry, tourism, can learn lessons from the Gulf Coast disaster, said Diane F. Wieland, director of tourism for Cape May County. She just returned from a trip to Florida, where she learned that some tourists are needlessly canceling vacations because of unfounded fears about fouled beaches in parts of the state still largely unaffected by the spill.

“It’s a wake-up call for us. If your economy depends on tourism, you need to have better communication to tell your visitors what is happening,” she said.

Without specifics, tourists will make uninformed decisions or rely on speculation and rumors, she said. Even if the news is bad, tourism operators have to be candid or else lose credibility, she said.

“At least then people are working off accurate information. You don’t want disgruntled people who spent a lot of money never coming back,” she said.

Contact Michael Miller:

609-272-7247

MMiller@pressofac.com

Man, 76, dies after apparent fall from dock in Lower Township

LOWER TOWNSHIP — A 76-year-old local man died Monday night after apparently falling off a floating dock into the water at the Harbor View Marina in Lower Township.

Robert Schumann, of Stimpsons Lane, recently returned from a drum-fishing trip with his grandson, Lower Township police said.

Schumann had just finished filleting some fish when he walked to the end of the dock to throw the fish carcasses in the water.

A rescue boat from Coast Guard Station Cape May and a local medical services member located the man, who was unresponsive, near the floating dock, the Coast Guard said.

Sgt. Ronald Lutten, of the Marine Division of the State Police, said the incident is under investigation but authorities believe his death was accidental.

After being recovered from the water, Schumann was brought to the dock, where the Lower Township Rescue Squad performed CPR.

Paramedics pronounced him dead while en route to Cape Regional Medical Center, Lower Township police said.

For most of his life, Schumann worked as a butcher for A&P supermarkets before retiring, said Maria Schumann, his daughter-in-law.

“He was always around the docks helping out and getting the boats ready for the season,” she said.

Years ago, he took over a mobile fish-cleaning operation at the South Jersey Marina, filleting, skinning and removing the bones from people’s catches.

Recreational fishermen cast doubt on science behind catch limits

GALLOWAY TOWNSHIP - About 50 recreational fishermen attended a public hearing Tuesday night to ask questions and speak out against a proposed federal regulation that could ban fishing for black sea bass, scup (porgies) and summer flounder after Sept. 1, a measure that would halt fishing on Labor Day weekend.

The hearing, held at The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, is the last of four held by the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council.

The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act, signed into law in 2007, calls for setting limits on the number of fish of each species that can be caught each year to prevent overfishing, Jessica Coakley of the MFMC told the fishermen during a two-hour presentation on the proposed rules. Catch limits will be based on scientific estimates of the population of each species of fish and the degree of certainty of those estimates.

Comments from the four hearings, plus those sent in writing, will be summarized and sent to the National Marine Fisheries Service in August, Coakley said. The regulations will be put in writing and issued, followed by more opportunities for public comment. The rules would go into effect no earlier than Jan. 20, 2011, but more likely in February or March.

"The primary objective is to prevent overfishing and to achieve optimum yield," Coakley said.

If recreational fishermen in the mid-Atlantic region and southern New England caught half the year's quota of a given species by June 30, the season for that fish would close Sept. 1, Coakley said. That would prevent overfishing the species for that year and therefore a reduction in the next year's quota.

But the fishermen said the new regulations are seriously flawed and would harm their ability to make a living.

Recreational fishing is a $1.6 billion-per-year business in New Jersey, and contributes $100 million in tax revenue for the state, Adam Nowalski of Port Republic, chairman of the Recreational Fishing Alliance New Jersey chapter, said before the hearing. Limiting the fishing season would affect not only the captains who run the boats, but the hotels, restaurants, gas stations, bait-and-tackle shops and other businesses that cater to tourists who fish at the New Jersey shore.

"This is an issue that affects more than fishermen. It affects the entire state," said Nowalski, who runs the Queen Ann II out of Little Egg Harbor Township, Ocean County. "The trickle-down effect is enormous."

Another problem is that the law says the Marine Recreational Fishing Statistical Survey should be improved, Nowalski said. The National Academy of Sciences has said the survey has serious defects, but the government is going ahead with measures that depend on it before the flaws are fixed.

"They're betting on their probabilities of accuracy," said Bert Gibbs, who runs the Captain Robbins out of Sea Isle City, Cape May County. "So many assumptions went into making the charts" that Coakley displayed in the presentations, and those assumptions could be false, Gibbs said.

If a trigger point in the season's catch is reached earlier in the summer, the government could announce on Aug. 15 that it will end the season for a certain fish Aug. 30, Gibbs said. That means boat captains cannot schedule fishing excursions or hire staff in advance.

There are serious problems with the MRFSS's method of counting the catch, said Tom Siciliano, a fisherman from Little Egg Harbor Township. A count is taken from only about a dozen excursions per day and the results extrapolated statewide.

"They assume a guy catching fluke up at Sandy Hook is doing the same in Sea Isle City," Siciliano said.

On a typical party boat with 30 guests, 90 percent of the fish are caught by three people, Siciliano said. If those guests happen to be in the random sample, the count is highly exaggerated.

The captain of each boat is required to send a count of how many fish of each species were caught on the excursion and how many were thrown back into the ocean, "and they have not used any of that data," Siciliano said.

Officials identify body pulled from Cape May dock area as local man, 76

CAPE MAY - A 76-year-old local man pulled from the water near Harbor View Marina here has died.

Sgt. Ronald Lutten with the Marine Division of the State Police said the body of Robert Schumann was identified by family members who were on the scene.

The U.S. Coast Guard along with a local emergency medical services member found Schumann's body on Monday after he went missing while cutting fish on a floating dock near the Harbor View Marina in Cape May. The Coast Guard received a call at approximately 10 p.m. from the Lower Township Police Department reporting the man had not been heard from for 25 minutes and his vehicle was still in the parking lot.

A rescue boat crew from Coast Guard Station Cape May and a local emergency medical services member arrived on scene and located the man near the floating dock unresponsive.

Lutten said while the incident is still under investigation, authorities believe the incident may be accidental.

Lutten said Schumann ran a mobile fish cleaning operation at South Jersey Marina.

Local Coast Guard aids search for two missing in Delaware Bay

Delaware authorities and crews from southern New Jersey Coast Guard stations searched for two people Saturday night after finding their 16-foot boat capsized a half-mile off the coast of Port Mahon Beach, Del., Saturday.

David Whitehair Sr., 40, and David Whitehair Jr., 18, of Felton, Del., were both reported missing.

Police said the men have not been heard from since 3 p.m. Friday after they departed from Woodland Beach, Del., aboard their boat to go on a drum-fishing trip.

The Coast Guard received a call at 2:20 p.m. from a member of Delaware Natural Resources and Environmental Control reporting a capsized boat with a net tangled in the propeller.

Two rescue helicopter crews from Coast Guard Air Station Atlantic City, a rescue boat crew from Coast Guard Station Cape May, members of the Little Creek, Del., Volunteer Fire Company, the Delaware State Police and Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control are searching for the two men.

Old destroyer will help create East Coast's largest artificial reef 30 miles off Ocean City

The largest artificial reef on the East Coast is coming in cheaper than predicted but later than expected, with anglers and scuba divers possibly using the site by August.

The state of Delaware announced Wednesday that it had received from the U.S. Navy the title to the USS Arthur W. Radford. Delaware taking ownership of the mothballed 563-foot destroyer was a key development in the plan to sink it at the Deljerseyland Reef, an underwater site that serves New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland.

The reef is 30 miles from Cold Spring Inlet, 30 miles from Ocean City, Md., and 26 miles southeast of Indian River Inlet, Del.

“The ship will be released within the next couple weeks and moved to dry dock for tentative sinking in late summer or early fall,” said Bill Figley, a retired reef coordinator for New Jersey working on the project.

Jeff Tinsman, administrator of Delaware’s Reef Program, is shooting for a sinking in August at the height of the summer tourist season. He said the latest date would be in October, when the weather could be dicey.

Tinsman said the contractor that will get the ship ready to scuttle, the Virginia-based American Marine Corp, has six months to do its work but believes is can be accomplished in 110 days.

The announcement of the title transfer was made by Secretary Collin P. O’Mara of the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control.

“Delaware is proud to be at the helm of a conservation project from which sportsmen and the environment alike can expect to derive great benefits,” O’Mara said.

Florida sank the 904-foot U.S. Navy aircraft carrier Oriskany in the Gulf of Mexico in 2006, but the USS Radford will be the largest ship ever reefed in the Atlantic Ocean, Tinsman said.

It will be the culmination of an effort that began in 2004 when the Navy announced it would release large vessels for reef sites, he said. The project was so huge Tinsman and Figley hatched the plan to create a joint deepwater reef.

When the project was first announced in 2008, the organizers said the project could cost as much as $4 million and be done by the end of that year. It has taken longer, but Tinsman said costs are expected to come in at just $795,000. The three states and the U.S. Navy will share the costs. Recreational fishermen and divers are expected to pay much of New Jersey’s share through donations.

The ship is currently at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. The next step would be to move the ship to dry dock — Pier 5, Dry Dock 2 — where the contractor will begin removing toxic materials and some of the superstructure.

Tinsman said there are “minimal toxics” on the vessel but some polychlorinated biphenyls or PCB’s have been found and would be removed.

The superstructure on the 9,000-ton ship will be lowered to achieve a navigational clearance of 60 feet at the reef site, which is in about 130 feet of water.

“We need to reduce it to 70 feet from the keel to the top of the wheelhouse. It’s now over 100 feet. It would be nice to have it completely intact, but then you have to sink it in deeper water,” said Tinsman.

Deeper water would also reduce diving times. Water depth is a factor in how long divers can stay on a site. From a scuba diving perspective, Tinsman said, the shipwreck would be set up for recreational divers with the keel at 130 feet but the deck at only about 65 feet.

At almost two football fields in length, and 55 feet wide, it would still take several dives to see the whole ship.

Fishing is the other draw, and Tinsman noted it should draw enough growth and baitfish where black sea bass and lobsters are not the only attraction.

“There’s no reason bluefin tuna won’t be attracted to this site,” said Tinsman.

The ship is named for U.S. Navy Admiral Arthur W. Radford. The Navy will help tow the ship to its final resting place before the hull is cut open to allow water to come in.

If it happens in August, the height of the summer boating season, the sinking should attract quite a bit of attention. More importantly for the future is how much marine life it attracts.

New regulations for the recreational and commercial harvest of black sea bass, summer flounder, and weakfish became effective in New Jersey on March 25, 2010. New Jersey's adoption of the regulations was necessary to remain in compliance with the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission's (ASMFC) Interstate Fishery Management Plans (FMP) for these species.

The regulation changes include a reduction in the recreational black sea bass season, a minor change in the summer flounder recreational season and a recreational and commercial possession limit reduction for weakfish.

At its February 2010 meeting, the ASMFC's Summer Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass Board approved a reduction in the coastwide black sea bass recreational season due to significant overages in the 2009 coastwide recreational black sea bass harvest quota. To assure recreational landings do not exceed the established 2010 coastwide recreational quota, the ASMFC established a coastwide black sea bass season of May 22 through September 12, which is now in effect in New Jersey. The recreational black sea bass possession limit and minimum size remain at 25 fish per day and 12.5 inches.

The same ASMFC Board approved the NJ Marine Fisheries Council recommendation to change the New Jersey summer flounder recreational season to May 29 through September 6, which includes both Memorial Day and Labor Day. The 2009 season was May 23 through September 4. The recreational possession limit and minimum size remain at 6 fish per day and 18 inches.

The ASMFC's Weakfish Management Board (Board) implemented stock-wide management measures to reduce the recreational and commercial weakfish possession limit due to a determination that the Atlantic Coast weakfish stock is currently depleted and at the lowest population level since estimates have been recorded (1981-2008). The Board implemented stock-wide management measures to promote stock rebuilding, which result in a recreational possession limit of one (1) fish per angler per day. The former New Jersey recreational possession limit was six fish per angler per day.

The new commercial weakfish regulations reduce the daily possession limit to 100 pounds during the open commercial season and establish a minimum size of 13 inches for all gear types at all times. During the closed commercial weakfish season, the possession limit has also been reduced to100 pounds and may only be kept if it does not exceed 50 percent, by weight, of the total weight of all species landed and sold.

New Jersey's plan to implement the required regulations was outlined in a letter from DEP Commissioner Bob Martin to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. As a result of the commitment by Commissioner Martin, the federal government has delayed imposition of a fishing moratorium. A shark fishing moratorium may be imposed on July 30 if New Jersey fails to meet its regulation implementation schedule.

The DEP encourages all anglers to voluntarily comply with the ASMFC shark plan regulations prior to their implementation in New Jersey. The regulations can be found on pages 12 and 18 of the 2009 Marine Issue of the Fish and Wildlife Digest (pdf, 525kb) and will be published later this spring in the 2010 Marine Issue of the Fish and Wildlife Digest.

Assembly approves state registry for recreational saltwater fishermen

The state Assembly voted Monday to approve the creation of a state registry for recreational saltwater fishermen.

Fishermen and naturalists again fight over beach access, piping plover nesting

Anglers for years have been upset about the annual closure of the beaches at Holgate on the southern end of Long Beach Island to protect endangered shorebirds, including the piping plover. They don't want the same thing to happen here at Cold Spring Inlet at the southern end of Two-Mile Beach.

"The last thing any surf fisherman wants to see is loss of access. We have plovers on a lot of beaches in New Jersey, not just Two-Mile Beach," said Greg O'Connell, a surf fishing delegate with the Galloway Township-based Recreational Fishing Alliance.

O'Connell is worried the pending closure of the U.S. Coast Guard's Loran radio-navigation station on Two-Mile Beach could again jeopardize access to the jetty at Cold Spring Inlet. The rock pile extends far out into the ocean and provides some of the best fishing in the region for those who don't own a boat.

Access first became an issue in 1999 when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service took over 550 acres of the Coast Guard base and wanted to close the beach to protect piping plovers.

U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo was instrumental in working out a deal to close off the beach from April 1 through Sept. 30 to protect nesting plovers but also creating safe access to the jetty.

At the 2002 dedication of the trail system, LoBiondo said the right balance had been struck between the need to provide public access and the need to protect endangered species.

The issue arose again recently when the Obama Administration decided to shut down the nation's loran system. The base stopped transmitting radio navigation signals to the continental United States on Feb. 8 but plans to do some transmitting until Oct. 30 to honor international agreements with Canada and Russia.

Once that is done the 520-acre base could become available and the Fish and Wildlife Service has already expressed interest in it. This would double the size of the Two-Mile Beach Unit of the Cape May National Wildlife Refuge.

Refuge Manger Howard Schlegel said piping plovers nest on the base, right near the jetty, and he would want to close the area off during the nesting season.

The RFA has already contacted LoBiondo. O'Connell said a coalition of more than 35 fishing clubs is getting behind the effort.

O'Connell said fishermen would be more than willing to work on solutions, such as setting up a trail away from the plovers or using fencing to protect them.

"There are ways to protect the birds and still have access to the beach and jetty," said O'Connell.

Schlegel said it is premature to discuss the issue.

"I don't want to speculate at this point in time. If we get closer to time where potentially the property will come to the refuge, there will be a discussion internally and externally. There's no guarantee it will come to us," said Schlegel.

Even if the Wildlife Service gets the Coast Guard beach, Schlegel noted the jetty is controlled and owned by the Army Corps of Engineers. It's not in Coast Guard jurisdiction. He said there is a sign on it now that says it is not for recreational use.

"Plovers have traditionally nested there right by the jetty. Being the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, our interest is the protection of threatened and endangered species," said Schlegel.

LoBiondo, who has helped garner funding for the refuge over the years, engineered the last deal and told the RFA he plans to be involved again.

"It is no secret that the jetty is one of the best land-based fishing spots in South Jersey. As the Coast Guard determines the future of its Two-Mile Beach property, rest assured I remain committed to preserving access to the jetty for fishermen," LoBiondo said.

Coast Guard Cmdr. Gary Thomas, who runs the Loran station, said the Coast Guard may want to retain the property. The Coast Guard has looked into constructing windmills and owns the large base, Coast Guard Training Center Cape May, on the other side of the inlet.

"We're evaluating the use potential for something other than the loran program. The Department of Energy has talked to me about windmills. There is interest," said Thomas.

Thomas said an area near the jetty "is one of the bigger places for piping plover," but he noted the access plan worked out with LoBiondo in 2001 has worked. Anglers walk the wet beach on the Coast Guard property where plovers are not nesting.

"We're going to continue allowing access. The decision will be made by whoever takes over the property, if we vacate the property," said Thomas.

The General Services Administration would be involved in deciding who gets the property and other federal agencies would get the first crack at it, followed by state and local governments. Schlegel previously said if the property became part of the Two-Mile Beach Unit he would want the beach closed from April 1 to Sept. 30.

Schlegel has also said the Coast Guard buildings and the 625-foot Loran antenna, which could pose a threat to migrating birds, might be removed.

Ron Sinn, a local marine safety advocate, has been pushing for the antenna to be saved for use transmitting VHF radio signals. Sinn said VHF signals could go out much farther from this tower and this could help save lives on the water. He said VHF signals now go about 20 miles but could go 70 or 80 miles with the loran tower.

"What's more important, are you going to worry about the birds or people's lives?" Sinn asks. "It seems to me mariners should have input on that."

LoBiondo said any determination on the Loran tower is months, if not years, away. He said the Coast Guard and Department of Homeland Security must first decide if they don't want the property. LoBiondo said he would stay involved in the process if the GSA disposes of the property.

A radio station has also expressed interest in the tower but said it would reduce its height to about 250 feet and provide safeguards for birds.

With raw video of the fire damage

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP — A marina owner was killed Friday afternoon when his 30-foot cabin boat exploded, caught fire and sank, State Police said.

Gary Theno, 51, owner of the Hidden Mill Marine Center, was at his Thompsons Lane facility when the boat exploded at about 2:30 p.m., State Police spokesman Sgt. Stephen Jones said. His body was recovered at about 5:30 p.m., and he was pronounced dead at 6:55 p.m.

The victim might have been working on the boat or on a nearby dock when the explosion took place, Jones said.

“We’re not exactly sure what he was doing and where he was at the time of the explosion,” Jones said.

The marina is near the Great Egg Harbor River in the Scullville section of the township.

Ron Kennedy, a resident along nearby Somers Point-Mays Landing Road, was washing his car with his wife when he saw thick, dark smoke rising from behind a thicket of trees.

“My wife wondered if it was a tree fire, and I told her, ‘No, it’s not a tree fire,’” Kennedy said. “I thought it might be a house on fire.”

Firefighters sprayed the fiberglass boat, which melted in the intense heat, as dozens of fire personnel watched from a nearby dock.

More tanker trucks were called to the scene later in the afternoon, and firefighters put out the fire and inspected the damage. Only the metal railing at the bow of the boat remained intact.

The marina was closed for the winter, but boat owners could make an appointment to come to the site to work on their craft, according to the message on the marina’s answering machine. A second branch of the business, on the Black Horse Pike in Folsom, has some limited winter hours.

Egg Harbor Township Mayor James “Sonny” McCullough said Friday night, “He was a hard-working, great marine mechanic, well-known in the area.”

Theno is survived by his wife, Sheri, and two children, McCullough said.

Great Egg Harbor River Watershed Association administrator Fred Akers sat with Theno for several years on the River Council of the Great Egg Harbor National Scenic and Recreational River. Theno lived in Folsom but represented Egg Harbor Township on the council because his business was located there, Akers said.

“He had a lot to say about the river and the environment,” Akers said Friday night. “That was his business and his livelihood.”

Theno knew a lot about river issues, especially as they related to recreation and boating, and was knowledgeable about technical topics such as the waste that boats pump into the river and how changes in fuel affected boat engines, Akers said.

The cause of the explosion remained under investigation, Jones said Friday night. The State Police Marine Unit was investigating, assisted by the Arson Unit and Major Crimes.

Staff writer Michelle Lee contributed to this report.

Contact Dan Good:

609-272-7218

DGood@pressofac.com

Contact Elaine Rose:

609-272-7215

Researchers study a large trash slick growing in the Atlantic Ocean

Mariners for decades have known about concentrations of floating trash in the Pacific Ocean. But now researchers are turning their attention to a smaller but equally troublesome slick hundreds of miles southeast of Atlantic City.

The Algalita Marine Research Foundation, based in Long Beach, Calif., completed a 25-day voyage in February to examine the trash.

Some descriptions of the Pacific Ocean patch have likened it to a floating island the size of Texas. But Stiv Wilson, who documented the expedition for the travel magazine Wend, said that is a poor analogy, especially for the Atlantic patch the group studied.

“It’s more like an archipelago,” he said.

The trash slick was observable when researchers dragged the ocean’s surface with fine screens and collected thousands of bits of plastic.

“Our course took us to the Sargasso Sea between the Virgin Islands, Bermuda and the Azores,” he said. “We collected 37 samples. We were positive for plastic in every one.”

Wilson belongs to a group called 5 Gyres that studies the effects these trash slicks have on the world’s oceans. Gyres are enormous ocean currents that form vortices where trash collects.

Along the way, the researchers encountered rafts of items, including plastic lids, barnacle-encrusted milk crates, soda straws and bottle caps, that collected in the sea grass.

“Some would be 20 feet wide and extend to the horizon, like chains with a couple links broken,” he said.

Polluting the food chain

Wilson said the concern is that tiny bits of plastic bond with toxic pollutants that enter the food chain when fish and smaller organisms accidentally eat them. Fish are attracted by the plastic’s shine and color, which mimic a fish’s scales.

“That’s the part we’re really scared about,” he said. “When the plastic is ingested by fish, we believe that forms the link getting those toxins into your sushi. We’re talking about a global environmental disaster of epic proportions in international waters. It doesn’t fall within the jurisdiction of any one country to clean up.”

Not that anyone is jumping to do so.

“Cleaning it up is not the answer worldwide. The oceans are very big. It’s not that marine debris covers every square inch,” said Seba Sheavly, an environmental consultant who has been studying the problem for 15 years. She is the author of a 2007 report for the nonprofit Ocean Conservancy about the group’s five-year study of material that washed up on the nation’s beaches.

Most of this trash originates from land, the study found. Ocean-dumped material such as lost buoys or fishing nets represented just 18 percent of the junk.

But Sheavly this week said this larger trash probably poses a bigger risk to marine life than plastic bottle caps and other ubiquitous leftovers of modern life.

“I can hold 20 bottle caps in my hand. But I’d much rather go after one rope. The most immediate threat would be derelict fishing gear,” she said.

Misconceptions about marine debris abound, she said. Removing the tiny bits of plastic from the ocean would be like finding a grain of rice in an Olympic swimming pool.

“Is there trash in the Pacific gyre? Of course, there is,” she said. “But is it the size of Texas? No, it’s not. Is it an island? No, it’s not.”

Sheavly said the focus should be on preventing more material from getting into the world’s oceans.

“What we can take from seeing things in the gyre is that it’s evidence that our waste-management practices are not working on land or at sea. That’s the call to action,” she said.

‘Hard problem to clean up’

The Sea Education Association, an educational nonprofit based in Woods Hole, Mass., has an ongoing study of Atlantic Ocean trash. Six times a year, undergraduate oceanography students set sail through the trash patch.

The group has skimmed the ocean 6,000 times with fine-mesh nets to count and document plankton and other ocean life. In 62 percent of these tows, they found plastic, principal investigator and oceanographer Kara Lavender Law said.

“We don’t know how big these patches are. Nobody has actually defined the edges of where this is accumulating,” she said.

Identifying the source of the material is difficult, she said. But researchers suspect a lot of it comes from the East Coast of the United States.

“It suffers from the out of sight, out of mind mentality. But it’s a really hard problem to clean up,” she said.

Blame manufacturers?

One solution to this pervasive ocean dumping is to make product manufacturers more responsible for reclaiming their waste, said John Weber, northeast regional manager for the Surfrider Foundation.

This environmental group conducts beach cleanups each year in New Jersey, including one last weekend in Ventnor.

“Imagine the world if Coke was responsible for the bottle their product came in. They had to take it back or make sure it got recycled,” Weber said. “Right now, manufacturers are getting a free ride on the backs of local government for the disposal of their packaging.”

Weber plans to give a presentation on this concept Saturday during a symposium on ocean litter at the Brookdale Community College in Lincroft.

The nonprofit group Clean Ocean Action and U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, D-6th, are among the speakers who will attend.

Others in New Jersey want to curb how much waste people generate each day. Northfield resident Steve Mullen participated in Saturday’s beach sweep in Ventnor. He said the idea of a giant trash slick polluting the Atlantic Ocean gives him even more incentive to lobby for local changes.

Last year, Mullen solicited towns such as Ocean City to ban plastic bags commonly used in pharmacies, supermarkets and convenience stores. During a beach sweep in April in Ocean City, volunteers picked up 500 plastic bags along with plastic bottles and other wind-blown litter, he said.

“A lot of people think it’s extremist or crazy, but the more you look into it, the more you realize plastic is poisoning our seas at an alarming rate,” he said.

In response, merchants in Ocean City agreed to promote cloth shopping bags and other alternatives to plastic.

Contact Michael Miller:

609-272-7247

MMiller@pressofac.com

Fluke season to include Memorial Day, Labor Day, fisheries council rules

TOMS RIVER - New Jersey's fluke fisherman will get to angle for the tasty flatfish on both Memorial Day and Labor Day this year, the New Jersey Marine Fisheries Council ruled Thursday.

Last year, anglers were angered when the season ended Sept. 4, before Labor Day.

Fishermen pushed the council to pick a season that included both holidays. The council chose from 12 options to stay within the state's quota for fluke, also called summer flounder.

Dozens of fishermen commented on the options, and the council chose the most popular one, May 29 through September 6. The season includes 101 days of fishing. Fishermen will be allowed six fish per day, with 18 inches being the minimum fish size.

Every year, the state uses a combination of bag limits, minimum fish sizes and days fishing to meet a quota divided among the East Coast states.

The 12 options had minimum fish sizes of 18 inches and 18.5 inches. A larger fish could result in more fishing days or more fish per day, but there was little support to raise the fish size since the great majority of fish are already being thrown back because they are too small.

The bag limit options ranged from four to six fish per day. Nobody wanted to have a bag limit under six.

That only left some flexibility with seasons. The options had them starting as early as May 4 and ending as late as Sept. 26.

A group of anglers pushed for Option 4, which would have run from June 26-Sept. 21.

"We want to be able to fish for fluke in September. In May and June we have stripers and blues, but there's not much in September," fisherman Paul Hartel said.

Brook Koeneke, operator of the Duke o' Fluke party boat out of Somers Point, pushed for both holidays.

"Any option that blocks us out of Memorial Day weekend is untenable. We need that early holiday," Koeneke said.

Anglers got both holidays in 2008 as the season ran from May 24 to Sept. 7, but the state was ordered to cut back harvests by 4.2 percent in 2009 due to over-fishing in 2008.

New Jersey anglers exceeded catches again in 2009, by 24 percent, but were only ordered a 1 percent reduction this year.

Some fishermen had a hard time believing figures read at the meeting showing excessive landings last year since the majority of fish caught were less than 18 inches and had to be thrown back.

"24 percent over?" questioned Belmar, Monmouth County, party boat captain Robert Quinn. "It rained the whole month of June, and the rest of the summer we threw everything back. You guys have to come up with something to help us out. If not, we'll be out of business and our children won't be able to fish for anything."

Marilyn Reingold, an angler from Atlantic Highlands, Monmouth County, urged the council to at least let children keep one fish under 18 inches just so they can go home with a fish.

That was as controversial as the meeting got, even though anglers are reporting more fluke than they have seen in years but will not get to catch more of them. Council member Patrick Donnelly said this saddened him because it shows anglers are so beaten down that they almost accept not being able to catch fish.

"A few years ago these meetings used to be contentious. We're so beat down. We're getting beat over the head with a stick, and we're happy if it's not too big of a stick," Donnelly said.

Ed Goldman, another council member, said he grew up when there was no fluke season. Anglers could fish for them at will.

"Nobody likes the options. I'd like no closed season. It's a pipe dream, but it's something I grew up with," Goldman said.

The council normally meets in Galloway Township, but to accommodate northern New Jersey fishermen, it hold its meeting in Toms River. The meeting drew a large crowd of northern New Jersey fishermen who normally do not attend. Chairman Gil Ewing said he would consider using different locations for the meetings in the future.