BATON ROUGE, LA / December 4, 2025

Ocean Harvesters' Ben Landry joined host Brian Haldane yesterday morning, December 3, 2025, on Talk 107.3 WBRP-FM to discuss Louisiana's long-standing menhaden (pogie) fishery and proposed changes to nearshore buffer zones that govern how close industry vessels can operate to the coast.

WASHINGTON, DC / December 2, 2025

They provided risk projections for managers to choose, the chosen 20% TAC reduction yields 0% probability of overfishing

BATON ROUGE, LA / November 6, 2025

The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition applauds the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission for voting today in favor of a balanced proposal to modify menhaden buffer zones along portions of the Louisiana coast. The vote reflects a careful, science-first approach: state officials studied the issue, listened to stakeholders, and brought forward a proposal that adds new protections and enlarges the total protected footprint, even as it makes targeted, common-sense adjustments where warranted. Paired with the fleet's standardized hose-end cage gear and ongoing collaboration with stakeholders, this is the right path to keep Louisiana's fisheries healthy and its coastal communities working.

ABBEVILLE, LA / November 5, 2025

Last week, Backwoods University, a podcast series from the MeatEater network, explored the menhaden fishing industry, known locally as "pogie" fishing, along the Louisiana coast. At that time, host Lake Pickle was unable to reach a representative from the commercial sector. Since then, he connected with Ben Landry, Vice President of Public Affairs for Ocean Harvesters, who joined him for a bonus episode to provide the industry's perspective. "My job is not to tell anyone how to think," Pickle said. "My job is to try my best to present both sides and let people make up their own mind."

REEDVILLE, VA / October 29, 2025

Yesterday the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) voted to reduce the coastwide Atlantic menhaden quota by 20% for the 2026 season and to revisit specifications again next year rather than adopting a full three-year package through 2028.

WASHINGTON, DC / October 27, 2025

At a Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) event titled "The Impacts of Climate on Fisheries," held on September 24, 2025, at the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center in Virginia Beach, Chris Moore, CBF's Senior Regional Ecosystem Scientist, made several inaccurate statements about the Atlantic menhaden fishery and its management.

WASHINGTON, DC / October 27, 2025

Tomorrow, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission's Menhaden Board is slated to take up several issues which have the potential to gravely impact this historic fishery. First, it will consider the results of the menhaden and ecological reference points ("ERP") stock assessment. Despite a lower estimate of menhaden fecundity, the stock status remains not overfished and overfishing is not occurring. The assessment team attributed this to the fact that menhaden "management has consistently been more conservative than single-species reference points would have historically prescribed."

WASHINGTON, DC / October 27, 2025

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF), American Sportfishing Association (ASA), Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP), and the American Saltwater Guides Association (ASGA) are circulating claims about Atlantic menhaden that don't match the assessment record or how this fishery is managed.

REEDVILLE, VA / October 27, 2025

The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 400 Union has released a new video highlighting the voices of its members who work as commercial fishermen in the Atlantic menhaden fishery. The video showcases the pride, tradition, and hard work of union members whose livelihoods depend on a fishery that has operated from Virginia’s Northern Neck for well over a century.

WASHINGTON, DC / October 24, 2025

Coalition supports new SCEMFIS-funded research roadmap to develop ecological foundation for Bay management; regulators' statements confirm current cap not based on science

OCEAN SPRINGS, MS / October 23, 2025

The Science Center for Marine Fisheries (SCEMFIS) has funded a new project that will create a detailed and actionable roadmap that identifies the research needed to develop a scientifically defensible and ecologically meaningful Chesapeake Bay harvest cap for Atlantic menhaden.

WASHINGTON, DC / October 15, 2025

The Maryland DNR's 2025 survey confirms Atlantic menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay are "widespread for the third consecutive year." This reinforces last year's finding that juvenile menhaden were at their highest levels since 1990 and directly contradicts claims from the same agency that menhaden are absent from Maryland waters.

WASHINGTON, DC / October 9, 2025

The Menhaden Fisheries Coalition (MFC) is calling out an error-laden article published by The SandPaper, a newsmagazine based in Long Beach Island, New Jersey, titled "Menhaden Scarcity Leads to Bleak Outlook for Ospreys." The article is factually inaccurate, journalistically unbalanced, and overtly reliant on unsupported claims from a single advocacy group. MFC has repeatedly contacted The SandPaper's managing editor Jay Mann asking for corrections, but unfortunately, Mr. Mann has ignored our requests.

REEDVILLE, VA / October 8, 2025

As Virginians, we share the public concern about the poor 2025 osprey breeding results reported by the Center for Conservation Biology (CCB). But the Chesapeake Bay Foundation's (CBF) attempt to pin those outcomes on the menhaden fishery misstates the timeline, overextends the CCB advisory's inferences, and ignores other environmental factors that CCB itself noted.

WASHINGTON, D.C. / September 29, 2025

For the second year in a row, Maryland's top delegates to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) claimed menhaden were absent from Maryland's upper Chesapeake Bay, blaming Virginia's commercial fishermen for intercepting the fish. Yet within weeks of their irresponsible statements, tens of thousands of menhaden turned up dead in a series of massive fish kills in Baltimore Harbor, directly contradicting their testimony.

WASHINGTON, DC / August 11, 2025

One year ago, scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) presented data to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) showing that osprey reproduction was under stress in multiple regions across the country-including on the West Coast and along parts of the East Coast where no menhaden fishing occurs at all. Their findings suggested that while the Chesapeake Bay osprey decline was real, it likely stemmed from a complex array of ecological stressors, not simply the availability of menhaden. In fact, USGS explicitly did not attribute osprey declines to menhaden harvest pressure.

GULFPORT, MS / July 31, 2025

What do some of the Gulf of America's most iconic predator fish really eat? Scientists at the University of Southern Mississippi are moving closer to answering that question with a groundbreaking new study that delivers some of the most detailed insights to date on the Gulf food web. To do this they've combined two powerful approaches: cutting-edge stable isotope analysis and an extensive meta-analysis of hundreds of published stomach content studies dating back to the 1950s.

BATON ROUGE, LA / July 8, 2025

New independent data confirms that the Gulf menhaden fishery accounts for just 3.4% of all red drum removals in Louisiana waters, while recreational fishing is responsible for 96.6% by number of fish.

WASHINGTON, DC / June 30, 2025

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) issued a press release on June 25, 2025 that includes multiple false and misleading claims, omits important context, and makes unfounded accusations that misrepresent both the scientific record and the operations of the menhaden fishery.

WASHINGTON, DC / May 28, 2025

The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP) promotes several inaccuracies and omits key scientific and regulatory findings in its description of the recent meeting of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission's (ASMFC) Menhaden Management Board ("Menhaden Management Board to Continue Exploring Chesapeake Bay Management Changes"). These claims are inconsistent with peer-reviewed science, the most recent ASMFC stock assessments and management decisions, and the reality of fishery operations.