According to the available data the commercial fishermen landed 62.9 million pounds of fish and shellfish in 2007, an 8.5 percent drop from 2006. The data showed the total dockside value of the 2007 harvest was estimated at $82.3 million, which was $12.2 million more than in 2006. Louis Daniel, director of the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries, informed the figures indicate that higher fuel prices are forcing fishermen to target the high-dollar catches.
He added that in some cases the drop may be closely related to coastwide quotas and other regulations. According to him the bluefish, summer flounder, snowy grouper, river herring, sharks and spiny dogfish are examples of species where regulations are significant enough to affect landings. Daniel also told that the declines are also apparent in some of the higher volume, often lower valued fisheries, like croaker and spot.
According to Daniel high valued seafood, such as sea scallops, vermillion snapper, triggerfish, wahoo, red grouper and sea mullet showed significant increased landings. However, hard crabs remained the top commercial seafood harvest in North Carolina by weight and value. Fishermen landed 20.5 million pounds of crabs in 2007 worth $18.1 million. But even the crabs landing also 16 percent below 2006 levels and 35 percent lower than the previous five-year average.
Shrimp harvest was reported 9.5 million pounds, up 66 percent from 2006 and 64 percent from the previous five-year average. Total recreational landings by pounds decreased by 7.3 percent from 2006 to 23,052,903 pounds. However, the number of fish caught and kept increased from 12 million in 2006 to 14.7 million in 2007.
