Chapter III — Marine Mammal/Fisheries Interactions 



account the economics of the fishery, existing technol- 

 ogy, and applicable state or regional fishery manage- 

 ment plans. 



Implementing Regulations — As discussed in 

 previous annual reports, the National Marine Fisheries 

 Service published regulations implementing section 

 118 on 30 August 1995. Among other things, the 

 regulations include procedures for vessel owners to 

 register for an authorization certificate, observer and 

 reporting requirements, and criteria for classifying 

 fisheries. Although the Service had proposed a 

 definition to be used to determine when the zero 

 mortality and serious injury rate goal of the Act had 

 been achieved, it did not include that element in the 

 final regulations. As such, this issue remains unre- 

 solved. 



The 1994 amendments require that commercial 

 fisheries reduce incidental mortality and serious injury 

 of marine mammals to insignificant levels approaching 

 a zero mortality and serious injury rate by April 2001. 

 Toward this end, the amendments require the National 

 Marine Fisheries Service to review the progress of 

 commercial fisheries in meeting this goal and to report 

 its findings to Congress. The report was to have been 

 submitted by 30 April 1998. As of the end of 1998, 

 however, it was the Commission's understanding that 

 completion of the report was awaiting a determination 

 by the Service as how best to quantify the phrase 

 "approaching a zero mortality and serious injury 

 rate." The Service expects to resolve this issue and 

 complete the report during the first half of 1999. 

 Shortly after transmitting the report to Congress, the 

 Service intends to publish proposed regulations that 

 will govern when the zero mortality and serious injury 

 rate goal has been met. 



Several provisions of the incidental-take regime for 

 comm.ercial fisheries are geared toward reducing 

 marine mammal mortalities and serious injuries to 

 certain levels. As such, it is important that there is 

 some mechanism for determining which injuries are to 

 be considered serious. Regulations promulgated by 

 the National Marine Fisheries Service in 1995 define 

 serious injury as any injury that will likely result in 

 mortality. However, it is not always apparent at the 

 time a marine mammal is released from fishing gear 

 whether its injuries are life-threatening. To address 



this issue, the National Marine Fisheries Service 

 convened a workshop in April 1997 to consider ways 

 to differentiate between serious and non-serious 

 injuries. Representatives of the Marine Mammal 

 Commission participated in the workshop. 



The workshop report was published by the Service 

 in January 1998. In noted that workshop participants 

 had considered the different ways in which marine 

 mammals may be injured by a variety of types of 

 fishing gear and assessed the likelihood that different 

 types of marine mammals would survive interactions 

 with fishing gear. The report also recognized that 

 some marine mammals may succumb from the physio- 

 logical effects of stress associated with entanglement 

 in fishing gear. In addition, it summarized views as 

 to the types of information that should be collected by 

 observers to enable the Service to determine which 

 injuries should be considered serious. 



The workshop report noted that general guidelines 

 had been developed for different types of marine 

 mammals. Participants generally agreed that, for 

 large whales, any entanglement that resulted in the 

 animal trailing gear such that its mobility or ability to 

 feed was impeded should be considered a serious 

 injury. For small cetaceans, animals that ingest 

 hooks, that are trailing gear when released, or that 

 swim away abnormally after being released should be 

 considered seriously injured. For pinnipeds, animals 

 should be considered seriously injured if they are 

 trailing gear or are hooked in the mouth. The Service 

 intends to draw on the findings of the workshop to 

 develop guidelines for determining what constitutes a 

 serious injury. A draft version of the guidelines has 

 been prepared and will be made available for public 

 review and comment once agency review is complete. 



Take of Endangered and Threatened Species — 



As noted above, the incidental-take regime enacted in 

 1994 includes a provision for authorizing the inciden- 

 tal taking of species listed as endangered or threat- 

 ened, provided certain findings are made. In 1996 

 three-year permits were issued to participants in 

 Alaska fisheries, authorizing the incidental taking of 

 North Pacific humpback whales and Steller sea lions 

 from both the eastern and western stocks. Those 

 authorizations were to expire on 31 December 1998. 



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