MARINE MAMMAL COMMISSION — Annual Report for 1992 
harbor porpoises in commercial fisheries in the Gulf 
of Maine. The group recommended, among other 
things, that the harbor porpoise in that area be listed 
either as threatened or endangered under the Endan- 
gered Species Act. The Commission forwarded the 
letter to the National Marine Fisheries Service in 
October 1990, advising the Service that it agreed that 
there was reason to believe that incidental take may be 
having a significant adverse effect on harbor porpoises 
in the northwestern Atlantic. The Commission further 
noted that incidental take in commercial fisheries also 
may be having a significant adverse effect on harbor 
porpoises off central California and possibly off 
Washington and Alaska. The Commission therefore 
requested that the Service advise it as to what was 
being done or planned to assess and monitor the status 
of harbor porpoise populations in these regions. 
On 12 February 1991 the Service published in the 
Federal Register a notice of intent to conduct a status 
review and a request for information to determine 
whether the species or any distinct population of 
harbor porpoises should be designated as depleted 
under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. During 
the ensuing months, the Service made no formal 
determination on the status of harbor porpoises in the 
northwestern Atlantic, and on 17 September 1991 the 
Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund, acting on behalf of 
13 environmental and conservation organizations, 
petitioned the Service to list the Gulf of Maine/Bay of 
Fundy harbor porpoise population as threatened under 
the Endangered Species Act. On 13 December 1991 
the Service published a notice of receipt of the petition 
in the Federal Register, requesting comments and 
noting that substantial information had been received 
with the petition indicating that the listing may be 
warranted. 
Late in 1992 the National Marine Fisheries Service 
publicly announced that a proposed rule to list the 
Gulf of Maine/Bay of Fundy harbor porpoise popula- 
tion as threatened under the Endangered Species Act 
would be published in the Federal Register in January 
1993. 
As a related matter, by letter of 23 October 1992 
the Service advised the Commission that it had 
received a number of proposals from staff researchers 
at the Service’s regional science centers to fund 
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marine mammal population assessment projects to be 
undertaken during Fiscal Year 1993. . Two of the 
proposals concerned harbor porpoise populations in 
the northwestern Atlantic and two others involved 
populations on the west coast of the United States. 
The Service requested that the Commission review 
and comment on the proposals before it took action on 
them. The Commission agreed to do so. 
The two proposals related to northwestern Atlantic 
populations are to continue research on harbor por- 
poise abundance and migration in the Gulf of Maine 
and Bay of Fundy, and to assess marine mammal 
bycatch and biology in commercial fisheries in New 
England and the mid-Atlantic states, particularly the 
Gulf of Maine groundfish sink gillnet fishery. The 
Commission, by letter of 3 December 1992, advised 
the Service that, as it understood the proposals, the 
basic purpose of the proposed studies is to obtain 
information necessary to implement the Service’s 
proposed regime to govern interactions between 
marine mammals and commercial fishing operations. 
In its letter the Commission noted that the proposal 
related to abundance and migration research sought 
funding for a range of related, but largely independent 
studies, the objectives of which are to (1) determine 
the seasonal migratory patterns of harbor porpoises in 
the Gulf of Maine, the Bay of Fundy, southern Nova 
Scotia, southern New England, and the mid-Atlantic 
region, (2) identify sources of bycatch mortality other 
than the Gulf of Maine and Bay of Fundy sink gillnet 
fishery, (3) predict the likely effect of time and area 
fishing restrictions on total bycatch levels, and 
(4) develop procedures for long-term monitoring of 
the abundance of harbor porpoises and the effects of 
harbor porpoise bycatch in U.S. and Canadian fisher- 
ies. The Commission noted that insufficient informa- 
tion was given to ascertain how the proposed study 
would meet the second objective. It also noted that 
additional work likely would be necessary to meet the 
fourth objective. 
With regard to the proposed study of marine 
mammal bycatch and biology, the Commission noted 
that certain objectives of this study are to use data and 
specimens collected in an observer program to (1) es- 
timate the number of harbor porpoises being caught 
incidentally in fisheries in the New England and mid- 
Atlantic areas, (2) determine the biological signifi- 
