Hot Topic: Red Snapper

LDWF currently manages the recreational red snapper fishery in state waters, and the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council and NOAA Fisheries are responsible for managing this fishery in federal waters of the Gulf. One of the most widely supported solutions is to have the Council and NOAA Fisheries give Louisiana authority to manage the recreational fisheries in both state and federal waters off our coast. This idea is popular because it would allow us more flexibility to manage Louisiana’s fishery to our recreational fishermen’s preferences and provide recreational fishermen better access to red snapper fishing in the Gulf.

Since June 2016, LDWF has been working with the Council on a fishery management plan amendment that would allow the state to manage the recreational red snapper fishery in both state and federal waters off Louisiana’s coast. In April 2019, the Council approved this amendment, giving Louisiana the authority to establish seasons, bag and size limits, and other regulations for private recreational fishing for red snapper starting with the 2020 season. Check out our Louisiana Recreational Reef Fish Management Plan page for more information on this amendment, including how you can participate in future management of the recreational red snapper fishery in Louisiana.

LDWF developed the Louisiana Recreational Creel Survey (LA Creel) to improve the quality of recreational landings data and replace the federal Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP). LA Creel was designed to more accurately account for recreational landings of saltwater finfish species such as red snapper, spotted seatrout, and red drum, to make landings data available more quickly than was possible with MRIP, and to be more flexible and responsive to management needs. LA Creel uses a combination of data gathered through interviews at public fishing areas and phone and email surveys to estimate recreational landings on a weekly basis.

LA Creel has been highly successful. In 2015, LDWF operated LA Creel side-by-side with MRIP to compare harvest estimates from the two surveys. For red snapper, the harvest estimate was very similar, yet the uncertainty (error) around that harvest estimate was far smaller for LA Creel, indicating a more precise method for determining harvests (landings). In January 2018, NOAA Fisheries certified LA Creel as an alternative for MRIP. To use LA Creel catch statistics in stock assessments and management actions, scientists and managers must convert them into a “common currency” that makes them comparable to historical MRIP estimates. Such a conversion requires development and implementation of peer-reviewed scientifically valid methods, an ongoing process.

*In 2014, recreational anglers supported legislation to fund LA Creel through an increased saltwater fishing license fee. This license fee increase will sunset on May 31, 2022. State funding for LA Creel will cease at that time unless legislation is introduced and passed to extend the license fee increase.

LDWF has proposed the following options to the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission for restructuring the state season to provide recreational anglers with more quality access to red snapper in state waters:

• Opening the season in April or May (rather than January) when recreational fishing is more popular to allow for increased daily harvest without exceeding our self-imposed limit.
• Only opening the season on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and certain holidays during a designated time period.

There are numerous options available for seasons within a given recreational quota. The rate of harvest determines the length of the season that can be allowed under a given recreational quota. The number of anglers fishing each day as well as the ability of anglers to harvest fish (availability of fish, creel and size limits, etc.) influence the rate of harvest. For example, more anglers go fishing during the summer than the winter so the daily harvest rate is higher in the summer, potentially limiting the length of the season. An increased bag limit would reduce the season length but increase the number of fish that could be harvested on an individual fishing trip. While the season length may be shorter, the quality of individual trips would be increased. We are continuing to develop options for further consideration by the Commission.

While the current level of scientific sampling of reef fish off Louisiana provides adequate data to assess red snapper on a Gulfwide basis, it is insufficient to provide enough data to perform a sound Louisiana-specific stock assessment for red snapper. Currently, NOAA Fisheries mostly samples outer natural banks and bottom breaks. As part of the annual Southeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program (SEAMAP), LDWF conducts vertical line surveys to gather data on red snapper at oil and gas platforms and artificial reefs off Louisiana and provides data from these surveys to NOAA Fisheries to use in their stock assessments for red snapper. However, the coverage of critical reef fish habitats needs to be improved to better understand the red snapper population off of Louisiana’s coast. While current stock assessments incorporate information from oil and gas platforms and artificial reefs, both through existing scientific sampling and recreational and commercial catch data, additional scientific sampling will increase the ability to observe changes in the age structure and biomass of reef fish on those habitats.

In recent years, there has been a decrease in donations of oil and gas structures to the Louisiana Artificial Reef Program. A moratorium on accepting structures as Special Artificial Reef Sites (SARS) may have contributed to this decline. However, in April 2017, the Artificial Reef Council revoked the SARS moratorium at LDWF’s request. This action will allow LDWF greater flexibility to take advantage of unique opportunities to reef decommissioned oil and gas structures in-place, rather than moving them tens of miles into a planning area. LDWF will focus on oil and gas structures in known red snapper habitat but lifting this moratorium will also allow for preservation of important offshore habitat for other valuable fisheries species. In addition, LDWF will continue to urge oil and gas companies to use less lethal methods (e.g., cutting rather than explosives), where and when appropriate, to sever the legs of their structures below the mudline to reduce mortality of fish in the area.

NOAA Fisheries can issue an exempted fishing permit (EFP) to authorize activities, which would otherwise be prohibited by federal fishery regulations, for limited testing, data collection, exploratory fishing, and other purposes. LDWF has developed ideas for pilot programs to test new methods of providing recreational fishermen more flexible and quality access to red snapper in federal waters. Such program ideas included harvest tags, days-at-sea, multi-species harvest permits, and electronic reporting.

In January 2018, LDWF submitted an application for an EFP to test a state-based management approach that allows recreational harvest of red snapper in federal waters off Louisiana, evaluate fishing effort by habitat type off the Louisiana coast, and assess angler acceptance and validity of electronic reporting methods. In April 2018, NOAA Fisheries approved the majority of LDWF's EFP request. This EFP permits LDWF to manage the private recreational red snapper fishery in state and federal waters in 2018 and 2019; NOAA Fisheries retains management authority for federal for-hire captains. Under this EFP, private anglers who hold valid Louisiana Basic and Saltwater Recreational Fishing Licenses as well as a Recreational Offshore Landing Permit (ROLP) are permitted to fish for red snapper in both state and federal waters during seasons determined by the LDWF Secretary or Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission. LDWF monitors recreational landings on a weekly basis through LA Creel, the state's recreational landings data collection program, and the season is closed when landings approach or reach Louisiana's allocation of red snapper approved under the EFP (about 743,000 pounds in 2018 and 816,000 pounds in 2019). Participants also have the opportunity to test electronic reporting via a smart phone app and website. Review our Frequently Asked Questions for more information.

We continue to create educational materials to help constituents understand more about the basic biology of red snapper and stay up to date on new and upcoming fishery management decisions. Our staff is available at fishing club meetings, fishing rodeos, and other events along the coast, both to distribute these materials and to answer fishermen’s questions and discuss their concerns. We hope to help make the complex information about red snapper management easy to understand.

• Red snappers can live up to 60 years, but few actually survive that long. Older red snappers (greater than 20 years) are very scarce in the Gulf population these days.
• Most red snappers harvested in both the recreational and commercial fisheries are between 2 and 10 years old.

• Red snappers don’t migrate to specific sites to congregate for spawning as some other snappers and many groupers do. However, large numbers of individual red snapper may spawn in groups wherever and whenever it’s time for them to spawn.
• Female red snappers mature and start spawning sometime between the ages of 2 and 6; males generally mature at younger ages than females.
• Red snapper spawning season begins in May and ends in September; spawning peaks from May through July.
• Female red snappers spawn a batch of eggs every 4 to 5 days throughout the spawning season. Individual batches of eggs may number from as few as 1,000 to as many as 2.5 million depending on the size of the female. A small, young female red snapper can spawn 30,000 eggs in a season, but an older, larger female can produce as many as 75 million eggs in a season.

• During their first 10 years of life, red snappers grow very quickly, up to about 30 inches in length; afterwards, they grow very slowly for the remainder of their lives.
• Size and age are totally unrelated in red snapper—a 5 year old fish may be a little as 13 inches in length or as long as 32 inches, though the average length is about 25 inches.

• Red snappers live in three different habitats during the course of their lives. One and 2 year olds inhabit shoreward mud/sand bottom areas. At age 3, they move to structure (natural and artificial reefs, oil and gas platforms, shipwrecks) and stay there for 7 to 8 years. At about age 10, they move to remote, more isolated habitats in the deep waters of the Gulf.
• Red snapper do not make seasonal long distance migrations like some other Gulf fish. In fact, they don’t move around very much at all, except for changing habitats as they grow older.

Yes, federal stock assessments include both fisheries dependent (harvest by fishermen) and independent data (biological information gathered by scientists) collected from these structures.

• Through LA Creel, LDWF closely monitors recreational landings of red snapper. The majority of red snapper landed in Louisiana are caught at platforms and other artificial structures. LDWF provides these landings data to NOAA Fisheries. Similarly, a portion of commercial landings come from oil and gas platforms as well as artificial reefs. Commercial landings are monitored through LDWF trip tickets and reporting to NOAA Fisheries. These landings data (fisheries dependent data) are a critical part of their stock assessments.
• LDWF participates in annual Southeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program (SEAMAP) surveys. Under this program, researchers across the Gulf sample different types of habitat with four types of fishing gear to capture fish samples at various life stages. Researchers use vertical long lines to sample reef fish like red snapper at oil and gas platforms, artificial reefs, and natural hard bottom areas in the Gulf, including Louisiana waters. From 2011 to 2018, 1,162 vertical longline drops have caught more than 4,500 red snappers. Red snapper are also sampled in SEAMAP groundfish and bottom longline surveys. Population and other biological data collected from these surveys (fisheries independent data) are supplied to NOAA Fisheries to help them estimate populations of red snapper and other reef fish (through stock assessments).

Several factors affect the length of the federal season:

• Catch rates have more than doubled since 2007 due to an increase in numbers of both fishermen and fish.
• The average red snapper is now more than twice the average size in 2007, increasing from 3.3 pounds (2007) to 8.11 pounds (2018). Catching larger fish means that fishermen will harvest their annual quota (measured in pounds) more quickly.
• The Council and NOAA Fisheries established a 20% buffer on the recreational quota. This means that the annual recreational catch quota is decreased by 20%. The buffer is in place to decrease the chance of overfishing as it is not possible for NOAA Fisheries to predict what the actual harvest will be in advance of the season. (Note that the buffer was not applied to Louisiana’s 2018 and 2019 EFP seasons.)
• If recreational harvests exceed the annual quota, any excess is deducted from the quota for the following fishing season. This is called a “payback provision.”
• State recreational red snapper seasons have gotten much longer since 2012, so a large fraction of the total harvest comes from state waters. When NOAA Fisheries set the 2017 recreational red snapper season, they estimated that 81% of the annual catch target would be caught during state seasons, leaving less than 600,000 pounds for the private recreational federal season.

In recent years, LDWF has managed the recreational red snapper fishery in Louisiana’s state waters (out to 9 nautical miles). The Council and NOAA Fisheries managed the recreational red snapper fishery in federal waters, from 9 to 200 nautical miles. Red snapper is part of the federal Reef Fish Fishery Management Plan, originally implemented in 1984. Gulf red snapper is managed as a single population (stock). All federal regulations apply to all federal waters of the Gulf.

However, in 2018, NOAA Fisheries approved LDWF's Exempted Fishing Permit which allows Louisiana to manage the private recreational red snapper fishery in state and federal waters in 2018 and 2019. Under the EFP, participating anglers are allowed to fish red snapper in the state territorial seas and adjoining federal EEZ, from shore to 200 nautical miles, during the season set by the Commission.

In 2019, the Council approved an amendment that gives Louisiana the authority to establish seasons, bag and size limits, and other regulations for private recreational fishing for red snapper, starting with the 2020 season.

Federal for-hire vessels are not part of the EFP or the aforementioned amendment; NOAA Fisheries continues to regulate these vessels.

In 1990, Amendment 1 to the Reef Fish Fishery Management Plan allocated the total catch of Gulf red snapper to the recreational and commercial fishing sectors at 49% and 51%, respectively, based on 1979-1987 landings data. The Council changed this allocation to 51.5% recreational and 48.5% commercial for the 2016 season, but the courts overturned that action. The allocation has now reverted back to the original 49% recreational and 51% commercial split. The Council will be discussing allocation again at their August 2019 meeting in New Orleans.  

The Council has 17 voting members drawn from the five Gulf states, currently including three from Louisiana. Members included representatives of the recreational and commercial fishing sectors, state marine fishery management agencies, and the Regional Administrator of NOAA Fisheries’ Southeast Regional Office.

Overfishing a population of fish means there is too much fishing mortality (excess harvest). An overfished population has too few individuals (insufficient biomass).

LDWF tracks recreational landings of saltwater fish through LA Creel. LDWF provides these landings data to NOAA Fisheries to estimate Gulf-wide harvests. All landings, whether from state or federal waters are counted toward the harvest quota.