According to NOAA a team of biologists has been set up to examine the decline of five rockfish specifies in the Puget Sound and determine if it should formally propose listings under the Endangered Species Act. NOAA has accepted a petition filed by a Washington citizen.
It is evident that the bocaccio, canary rockfish, yelloweye rockfish, greenstripe rockfish and redstripe rockfish species are much reduced from historical levels. Excessive harvests during the 1970s and 1980s have depleted the stocks to very low levels. But, the fisheries agency opined that here is little information regarding their present abundance.
Sam Wright, a retired biologist from Olympia, petitioned NOAA last April to list five species under the Endangered Species Act. He added at that NOAA could not tell if the petition described a genuine population declines because it lacked the information necessary to interpret the limited data it had been provided. But recently Wright provided enough information on fishing efforts and other factors.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service said that it will complete a formal proposal as early as fall would be followed by a year-long period of peer review, public comment and public hearings before any final decision about an official listing could be made.
