New Coastwide Menhaden Science Estimates Smaller Population, Indicates Major Catch Reductions Needed
Fisheries Regulators to Consider New Coastwide Harvest Limits, Chesapeake Bay Management
There are fewer menhaden along the Atlantic Coast than previously thought, leading to potential major catch reductions, according to scientific assessments released this week ahead of a fisheries regulators meeting.
Forecasts show that the menhaden catch must be cut in half to provide a better than 50 percent chance of a sustainable menhaden harvest in the future. This comes amidst mounting warning signs linked to menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay.
Menhaden are a small fish that are an important food for many species, including osprey, whales, and striped bass. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) menhaden board meets on October 28 to consider the results of this assessment. It will also continue deliberations on how to better manage the menhaden harvest in the Chesapeake Bay.
The new menhaden coastwide stock assessments by the ASMFC take into account the latest science available to estimate the menhaden population from Maine to Florida. These new assessments factor in several updates, including a lower number of menhaden that die naturally, to more accurately estimate numbers of the fish and fishery impacts.
For example, the 2025 assessments find that the biomass of menhaden was 37 percent lower than the previous assessment. As a result, the current catch limits were likely set far too high. New catch limits are needed to correct course.
Menhaden industry giant Omega Protein has previously championed this assessment process when it showed higher numbers of menhaden, leading to higher catch limits. The industry has not yet publicly commented on the latest assessment.
That industry harvests more than 100 million pounds of menhaden annually in Virginia’s portion of the Chesapeake Bay. The new coastwide assessments released this week do not consider the impacts of concentrating this fishery in the Bay. A separate study to specifically address menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay has been delayed due to Omega Protein’s lobbying efforts in Virginia.
There are mounting warning signs linked to menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay. Osprey chicks are dying in parts of the Bay where menhaden are traditionally a staple of the bird’s diet, according to research by the Center for Conservation Biology at William & Mary
The U.S. Geological Survey attributes the osprey decline to a scarcity of food, stating “limited prey availability, their capture or their delivery to nests is seemingly the principal driver of poor reproductive success,” in a recent letter to Congress.
There are also plummeting menhaden catches by local watermen who harvest the fish for bait—a separate, much smaller, fishery than the massive industrial effort driven by Omega Protein. The menhaden bait harvest dropped from 5.4 million pounds in 2019 to less than 1 million pounds in 2024, according to data from the Virginia Marine Resources Commission.
Recent bipartisan polling shows that 92 percent of Virginians want action to leave more menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay.
Chesapeake Bay Foundation Forage Campaign Manager Will Poston released the following statement:
“The new menhaden assessment confirms the alarm bells we’ve been hearing for years. With the latest science showing populations down coastwide and signs of mounting trouble in the Chesapeake Bay, it’s time to act.
“To protect menhaden’s role in the food web, and meet science-based Ecological Reference Points, fisheries regulators must follow the science and immediately cut the coastwide harvest by at least 50 percent while also beginning the process to give menhaden additional protections urgently needed in the Chesapeake Bay.
