2024-23841. Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; 2025 Specifications for the Summer Flounder, Scup, Black Sea Bass, and Bluefish Fisheries

Table 1—Summary of 2025 Summer Flounder Fishery Specifications

Specifications	Million pounds (lb)	Metric ton (mt)
Overfishing Limit (OFL)	24.97	11,325
ABC	19.32	8,761
Commercial ACL = ACT	10.62	4,819
Commercial Quota	8.79	3,987
Recreational ACL = ACT	8.69	3,942
Recreational Harvest Limit	6.35	2,879

The proposed initial 2025 state-by-state summer flounder quotas are provided in table 2. As required in Amendment 21 to the Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass FMP (85 FR 80661), if the commercial quota in any year is higher than 9.55 million lb (4,332 mt), the first 9.55 million lb (4,322 mt) is distributed according to the baseline formula, and any additional quota beyond this threshold will be distributed in equal shares to all states except Maine, Delaware, and New Hampshire, which would split 1 percent of the additional quota. Because this year's quota is below the threshold, the state-by-state allocations below are based on the baseline allocations that were established through Amendment 2 (57 FR 57358) and modified by Amendment 4 (58 FR 49937) to the Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass FMP. Any long-standing overages or potential 2024 overages may result in adjustments to these proposed quotas in the final rule.

Table 2—Initial 2025 Summer Flounder State-by-State Quotas

State	Percent share	Initial 2025 Quotas * (lb)	Initial 2025 Quotas * (mt)
ME	0.04756	4,180	1.90
NH	0.00046	40	0.02
MA	6.82046	599,507	271.93
RI	15.68298	1,378,507	625.28
CT	2.25708	198,394	89.99
NY	7.64699	672,157	304.89
NJ	16.72499	1,470,098	666.83
DE	0.01779	1,564	0.71
MD	2.03910	179,233	81.30
VA	21.31676	1,873,707	849.90
NC	27.44584	2,412,443	1,094.27
Total	100	8,789,830	3,987.02
* Initial quotas do not account for any previous overages.

This action makes no changes to the current commercial management measures, including the minimum fish size (14-inch (36-centimeters (cm)) total length), gear requirements, and possession limits. This action also proposes no changes to the recreational management measures. Any such changes would take place through a separate action.

Black Sea Bass Specifications

At the August 2024, meeting, the Council and the Commission's Black Sea Bass Board were unable to agree on the 2025 black sea bass specifications. The Black Sea Bass Board adopted a coastwide quota for black sea bass that is the same as the 2024 quota, while the Council adopted a quota that represents a 20-percent reduction from 2024. If implemented, the differing quotas ( print page 83442) would likely have significant negative socioeconomic impacts on Federal black sea bass permit holders. The regulations at 50 CFR 648.143(e) require that, in the case of different specifications, the Regional Administrator will take administrative action to align measures to prevent these differential effects on Federal permit holders. Given the current status of the black sea bass stock, which is well above the FMP's definition of the biomass capable of producing maximum sustainable yield, and the potentially significant social and economic harm to Federal permit holders that would result from divergent state and Federal quotas, we are proposing to implement 2025 black sea bass specifications consistent with those adopted by the Commission.

The proposed 2025 black sea bass catch and landings limits are shown in table 3.

Table 3—2025 Black Sea Bass Catch and Landings Limits

Specifications	Million lb	mt
OFL	17.01	7,716
ABC	16.66	7,557
Expected Commercial Discards	1.50	680
Expected Recreational Discards	2.89	1,311
Commercial ACL = ACT	7.50	3,401
Commercial Quota	6.00	2,721
Recreational ACL = ACT	9.16	4,156
RHL	6.27	2,845

This action proposes no changes to the other commercial management measures for black sea bass, including the commercial minimum fish size (11-inch (27.94-cm) total length) and gear requirements. This action also proposes no changes to the recreational management measures. Any such changes to recreational management measures for black sea bass would occur through a separate action.

On October 1, 2024 (89 FR 79778), we implemented Amendment 23 to the Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass FMP, which changes the Federal coastwide commercial in-season accountability measure such that the black sea bass commercial fishery will now close when the quota plus an additional buffer of up to 5 percent is projected to be landed. The intent of this buffer is to minimize negative economic impacts when the coastwide quota is reached before all states have fully harvested their allocations due to overages in individual states.

Pursuant to Amendment 23, each year, through the specification process, the Council and Board will recommend and NMFS will establish a buffer from 0 to 5 percent. For 2025, the Council and Board have recommended a 5-percent commercial in-season closure buffer, and this action proposes this buffer. Given recent patterns in the fishery, an in-season closure is not expected for 2025; however, in the unlikely event it is needed, a 5-percent buffer could have socioeconomic benefits with little risk to stock status.

Scup Specifications

The Council and Board-recommended 2025 scup catch and landings limits are shown in table 4.

Table 4—2025 Scup Catch and Landing Limits

Specifications	Million lb	mt
OFL	42.19	19,135
ABC	41.31	18,740
Expected Commercial Discards	7.38	3,318
Expected Recreational Discards	2.08	944
Commercial ACL = ACT	26.85	12,181
Commercial Quota	19.54	8,863
Recreational ACL = ACT	14.46	6,559
RHL	12.31	5,585

The Summer Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass FMP established three commercial fishery quota periods with corresponding percentages of the total quota for each period. Applying those percentages, which NMFS does not propose to change via this action, to the quota provided in Table 4 results in the allocations to quota periods outlined in table 5.

Table 5—Commercial Scup Quota Allocations for 2025 by Quota Period

Quota period	Percent share	lb	mt
Winter I	45.11	8,814,300	3,998
Summer	38.95	7,610,663	3,452
Winter II	15.94	3,114,608	1,413
Total	100.00	19,539,570	8,863

( print page 83443)

The current quota period possession limits are not changed by this action and are outlined in table 6.

Table 6—Commercial Scup Possession Limits by Quota Period

Quota period	Percent share	Federal possession limits (per trip)
		lb	kg
Winter I	45.11	50,000	22,680
Summer	38.95	N/A	N/A
Winter II	15.94	12,000	5,443
Total	100.0	N/A	N/A

The Winter I scup commercial possession limit is proposed to drop to 1,000 lb (454 kg) when 80 percent of that period's allocation is landed. If the Winter I quota is not fully harvested, the remaining quota would be transferred to Winter II. The Winter II possession limit may be adjusted (in association with a transfer of unused Winter I quota to the Winter II period) via announcement in the Federal Register . The regulations specify that the Winter II possession limit would increase to different levels consistent with any increase in the quota as described in table 7.

Table 7—Potential Increase in Winter II Possession Limits Based on the Amount of Unused Scup Rolled Over From Winter I to Winter II

Initial Winter II possession limit		Rollover from Winter I to Winter II		Increase in initial Winter II possession limit		Final Winter II possession limit after rollover from Winter I to Winter II
lb	kg	lb	kg	lb	kg	lb	kg
12,000	5,443	0-499,999	0-226,796	0	0	12,000	5,443
12,000	5,443	500,000-999,999	226,796-453,592	1,500	680	13,500	6,123
12,000	5,443	1,000,000-1,499,999	453,592-680,388	3,000	1,361	15,000	6,804
12,000	5,443	1,500,000-1,999,999	680,389-907,184	4,500	2,041	16,500	7,484
12,000	5,443	2,000,000- * 2,500,000	907,185-1,133,981	6,000	2,722	18,000	8,165
* This process of increasing the possession limit in 1,500 lb (680 kg) increments would continue past 2,500,000 lb (1,122,981 kg), but we end here for the purpose of this example.

This action proposes no changes to the 2025 commercial management measures for scup, including the minimum fish size (9-inch (22.9-cm) total length), gear requirements, and quota period possession limits. This action also proposes no changes to the 2025 recreational management measures. Any such changes would take place through a separate action.

Bluefish Specifications

The Council and Board-recommended 2025 bluefish catch and landings limits are shown in table 8.

Table 8—Summary of 2025 Bluefish Fishery Specifications

Specifications	Million lb	mt
OFL	27.49	12,467
ABC	21.83	9,903
Commercial ACL = ACT	3.06	1,386
Commercial Quota	3.03	1,375
Recreational ACL = ACT	18.78	8,517
Recreational Harvest Limit	15.70	7,121

The coastwide commercial quota is allocated to coastal states from Maine to Florida based on percent shares specified in the Bluefish FMP. Table 9 provides the proposed commercial state allocations based on the Council-recommended coastwide commercial quota for 2025 and the phased-in changes to the percent share allocations to the states specified in Amendment 7. No states exceeded their allocated quota in 2023, or are projected to do so in 2024; therefore, no accountability measures for the commercial fishery are required for the 2025 fishing year based on the data available at this time. ( print page 83444)

Table 9—2025 Bluefish State Commercial Quota Allocations

State	Percent share	Quota (lb)	Quota (kg)
Maine	0.35	10,582	4,800
New Hampshire	0.30	9,123	4,138
Massachusetts	8.66	262,663	119,142
Rhode Island	8.41	255,061	115,694
Connecticut	1.16	35,309	16,016
New York	15.74	477,518	216,598
New Jersey	14.26	432,630	196,238
Delaware	1.09	32,990	14,964
Maryland	2.38	72,265	32,779
Virginia	8.44	256,125	116,176
North Carolina	32.04	972,012	440,897
South Carolina	0.07	2,250	1,021
Georgia	0.06	1,897	860
Florida	7.04	213,625	96,899
Total	100	3,033,561	1,376,000