Fish & Fisheries

Preliminary evidence from an annual survey shows that blue crab populations in the Chesapeake Bay are starting to rebound.

"On a recent afternoon, Gregg Houghaboom pointed to a photo of a fish fillet and asked a room full of ocean experts to identify it. They couldn't. Absent a head, tail and scales, it looked like a hunk of grouper -- but it was actually Lake Victoria perch."

"A U.S. government agency that manages West Coast fisheries approved a prohibition on Tuesday on fishing seven categories of forage fish in a groundbreaking decision that signals a shift toward an ecosystem-based management."

"Most of Michigan’s congressional delegation backed legislation introduced Thursday to stop Asian carp and other invasive species from entering the Great Lakes."

"The U.S. Supreme Court threw overboard on Wednesday a Florida fisherman's conviction under an evidence-tampering provision of a federal white collar crime law for disposing of undersized red grouper fish while he was under investigation."

"U.S. shellfish producers in the Northeast and the Gulf of Mexico will be most vulnerable to an acidification of the oceans linked to climate change that makes it harder for clams and oysters to build shells, a study said on Monday."

"Just north of Iliamna Lake in southwestern Alaska is an empty expanse of marsh and shrub that conceals one of the world’s great buried fortunes: A mile-thick layer of virgin ore said to contain at least 6.7 million pounds — or $120 billion worth — of gold."

"For West Coast commercial fishermen and seafood lovers, there is reason to cheer. Rockfish, a genus of more than 100 tasty species depleted decades ago by excessive fishing, have rebounded from extreme low numbers in the 1990s."