NMFS opens comment on plan to let Alaska sablefish fleets release small fish

Two amendments that would loosen Alaska's ban on discarding sablefish open for public comment Friday, when the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) publishes them in the federal notice. They would let fixed-gear vessels in the Individual Fishing Quota and Community Development Quota programs release small sablefish. The Secretary of Commerce will decide whether to approve them.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council recommended the change in an April 2025 motion. Under it, catcher vessels in both programs could release sablefish under 22 inches but must keep the rest. Catcher/processors, which catch and process fish aboard, could discard in the Community Development Quota fishery; those in the individual quota fishery keep their existing ability to discard. Released fish must be carefully released.

Each year a Sablefish Discard Allowance for the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands, and another for the Gulf of Alaska, would be deducted from the fixed-gear catch limit before individual quotas are set. The council's science committee would recommend a discard mortality rate, the share of released fish expected not to survive. The council also asked NMFS to prohibit discarding once an area-wide allowance is reached.

The notice traces the request to record-breaking year classes of sablefish beginning in 2014. By 2017 those fish were big enough to be caught as what the notice calls "an overwhelming number of small fish," which are worth less by weight than large fish. A February 2021 initial review, described in the 2021 sablefish stock assessment, stalled because it had no size limit and no way to account for release mortality.

When the council made its 2025 recommendation, its Advisory Panel backed the plan 17-3; opponents said there was not enough data collection or monitoring for accountability and enforcement. In June the Advisory Panel voted 15-0 to recommend the council ask NMFS headquarters for help meeting the 2027 season.

Alaska News reported June 6 that the rule was not expected to take effect until 2028. At the council's Oct. 8 meeting, Jon Kurland, the agency's Alaska regional administrator, said recent direction from NOAA led NMFS to speed the rule up in two phases. He said NMFS aims to allow release in 2027 and start the discard allowance in 2028.

Gretchen Harrington, the agency's assistant regional administrator for sustainable fisheries, said the size limit and careful release rules would take effect after a final rule, "just we wouldn't have a sablefish discard allowance for the 2027 fishery." She said the plan would allow the change to start mid-year if it is not finished before the fishery opens in March 2027, adding, "we can't guarantee anything until our proposed rule is published." The notice does not say when release would begin; NMFS still plans to publish a separate proposed rule.

Comments go through the regulations.gov docket and must be received, not just postmarked, by Jan. 5, 2027.