14 Menhaden and Forage Fish Management
Learning Objectives
- Describe the historical development of Atlantic Menhaden fishing.
- Summarize key characteristics of life history and ecological role of Atlantic Menhaden.
- Articulate the special challenges of managing fisheries on small, pelagic forage fish that are low on the food chain and make them vulnerable to both environmental change and overfishing.
- Highlight the false assumptions of single-species management for maximum sustainable yield.
- Explain the benefits of adopting a fishery policy that uses ecological reference points.
- Describe value preferences of key stakeholders in the Atlantic Menhaden fisheries.
14.1 Early Lessons Learned from Menhaden Fishing
Indigenous people along the Atlantic Coast and early European colonists relied heavily on abundant Atlantic Menhaden (Brevoortia tyrannus) (Figure 14.1). At least 30 popular names are used to describe the menhaden. In Maine and Massachusetts, the names “pogy” and “hardhead” are used. In New York and New Jersey, the name “mossbunker” (with a variety of spellings) is common, whereas in Delaware and Chesapeake Bay, the names “old-wife,” “alewife,” “greentail,” and “bug-fish” are also used. In the Carolinas, they may be referred to as “fat-back,” “yellow-tail,” or “yellow-tailed shad.” “Pogy” and “menhaden” were likely derived from Native American dialects of New England. Somehow, the name “Munnawhatteaûg,” which means “fertilizer” or “manure,” was corrupted to menhaden. As early as 1661, the name “mossbanker” was in use based on Jacob Steendam’s poem “Praise of New Netherland”:
The black and rock-fish, herring, mackerel,
The haddock, mossbanker, and roach, which fill
The nets to loathing; and so many, all
Cannot be eaten.
The history of menhaden management reveals challenges of breaking from long-standing traditions in fisheries management. The Atlantic Menhaden was labeled as the “most important fish in the sea” by author and historian Bruce Franklin because of its utility to Native Americans and European colonists in the Atlantic coastal regions (Figure 14.2). Native Americans instructed early colonists how to plant their crops with abundant menhaden as manure. Later, colonists often plowed excess harvest of menhaden in the soil of farms along the shore, until new products utilizing them were discovered, initiating a large industrial fishery.
Soon colonists realized the value of the menhaden as a baitfish, as well as an important source of oil, manure (guano), and fish meal. From 1850 to 1870, numerous factories from Maine to North Carolina began to manufacture oil from menhaden. Soon the yield of oil from menhaden would exceed yield of oil from whaling. Fish scrap, or waste after oil was pressed out of the fish, was sold as manure for fertilizer.
A large industry based on menhaden developed along the Atlantic Coast in the late 19th century. Although there were no fishing regulations at the time, the U.S. Oil and Guano Association moni