New Management Plan for Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary (SBNMS)

by Robert D. Stevenson, Dept of Biology, UMass Boston

Change is awash at the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary (SBNMS). [See their web page http://vineyard.er.usgs.gov]. The government is reviewing and updating the SBNMS management plan, which can be accessed at http://vineyard.er.usgs.gov/message.html. There will be a new SBNMS web site at end of May with a likely address of http://www.sbnms.nos.noaa.gov. The National site is http://www.sanctuaries.nos.noaa.gov/oms/oms.html. One might question the thinking behind a process that is supposed to reoccur every five years but takes two years to complete. However, the National Marine Sanctuary Program, which was founded in 1972, has only 12 understaffed and underfunded sanctuaries; its management process is perhaps best viewed as an example of growing pains.

The Stellwagen Bank management plan must address many challenging conservation issues, including pollution from the MWRA outfall pipe, non-point source runoff, dumping of ballast water, shipping traffic, and communication cables being laid across the ocean floor of the sanctuary (NOAA workshop 1995). The most significant and politically challenging issues for Stellwagen Bank are overfishing and protecting whales.

To understand the context of the new SBNMS management plan, conservation biologists must consider three perspectives: 1) marine conservation issues, 2) marine protected areas, and 3) the politics of fisheries management. Of utmost importance is translating what conservation biologists know into activities that improve society's attitudes and actions toward conservation.

MARINE CONSERVATION ISSUES

The Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary provides seasonal habitat for several threatened and endangered species of whales including the Northern right whale, which is thought to be in danger of extinction. (Caswell et al. 1999). Whales are being killed by collisions with ships -- including whale watching boats -- and by entanglement in fishing gear such as drift nets and lobster lines. The Great South Channel (GSC) between Cape Cod and Georges Bank is important habitat for right whales, particularly during whale migration in late winter and early spring. Richard "Max" Strahan's (Environmental Justice/Environmental Conservation Panel National Campaign Director, GreenWorld) efforts to protect the whales include suggestions for reductions in ships' speeds or the elimination of ship traffic in the GSC. The Massachusetts Port Authority, however, has visions of an economic boom that includes increased shipping which, in turn, would lead to increased traffic in the GSC.

Fishing is the most important issue in marine conservation as overfishing is a problem world wide (Ludwig et al. 1993, Pauly et al. 1998 ). Current rates of harvesting are not sustainable [see Vitousek et al. 1997 for overview)]. There is strong evidence of overfishing in the Gulf of Maine (Committee to Review Northeast Fishery Stock Assessments 1998) . Habitat damage to the benthos by trawling gear is another fishery-related issue in the Gulf of Maine (Dorsey and Peterson 1998, Watling and Norse 1998).

MARINE PROTECTED AREAS

In the realm of Marine Protected Areas, local conservation biologists are making headway in New England (Jegalian, 1999) as are their colleagues worldwide (http://www.wcmc.org.uk:80/marine/data/). However, the general understanding that we have for terrestrial systems is unlikely to hold in marine systems because for marine systems: 1) a much greater proportion of the biological action (productively and biomass) is in the water column, and 2) the density of water allows organisms to migrate long distances cheaply. The first observation suggests that we need to protect water masses as they move; the second point implies that protection is needed over larger spatial scales.

POLITICS OF MANAGEMENT

Many conservation issues, including fisheries management, are complicated by politics. When the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary was founded in 1992, most resource use issues were decided locally. The New England fishing industry argued successfully that fishing would not be regulated by the sanctuary manager. Although the sanctuary is charged with protecting biodiversity and ecological integrity, sanctuary managers have had very little input about fishing within the sanctuary.

Furthermore, the last sanctuary director, Brad Barr, was moved to another positon more than a year ago and was not replaced, leaving the SBNMS program without local leadership. The difficulties of sanctuary management are clear from the large number of suits (over 100 according to FishMonger News Network, May 24,2000) brought by the fishing industry and conservationists against NMFS. Time will tell how the fish and ecosystems fare in a confrontational and litigious culture in which conservation has not always been a priority.

There are many interesting perspectives on fisheries management (Botsford et al. 1997, Dayton 1998, Costanza 1998, Committee to Review Individual Fishing Quotas 1999, http://www.nap.edu/books/0309063302/html/, Committee on Ecosystem Management for Sustainable Marine Fisheries 1999; http://books.nap.edu/books/0309055261/html/index.html Hastings, Alan and L. W. Botsford 1999; Jennings 1999). Unfortunately, academic discussions often seem removed from the New England Fisheries Council meetings in which the political power of fishermen far exceeds scientific considerations. Many scientists argue that since the 200-mile EEZ zone was put in place in 1976, overcapitalization by the US government has dramatically exacerbated the depletion of commercial fisheries. However, not all fishermen are bent on destroying their livelihood. Currently, some NMFS sponsored programs do exist in which scientists and fishermen collaborate.

Recently, two significant changes offer hope for the future of groundfish and shellfish in New England. The Essential Fish Habitat management mandate of the Sustainable Fisheries Act (SFA) of 1996 promises to improve fish conservation significantly and change attitudes toward fishing. [For more information, see websites: http://www.nefmc.org, http://www.nmfs.gov/sfa/reports.html, and http://www.nefsc.nmfs.gov/nefsc/habitat/efh/ ].

Also, the National Marine Sanctuary Program has been elevated in rank recently within the NOAA structure. Its budget has been increased, but it is still very small compared to the National Marine Fisheries Service, which was founded to promote the commercial exploitation of fish.

What does the future hold? Marine biologists believe that 20% of the ocean should be protected by the year 2020 (Costanza et al. 1998). For terrestrial systems, conservation biologists have suggested that 50% of the land needs to be protected. Historically, conservation biologists have underestimated the amounts of habitat that need protection. Therefore, I suggest that we raise the goal -- 50% of the ocean should be protected by 2050. Because the physical and biological nature of marine systems differs from terrestrial ecosystems, simply restricting habitat use may not be suffcient to achieve the goals of marine conservation.

Conservation biologists still have opportunities to participate in the management review process for the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. Perhaps MassSCB can officially provide comments on the draft plan when it is released sometime this summer. [See the schedule at http://vineyard.er.usgs.gov/process.html ]. The most significant changes we could suggest would be to increase the size of the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary and to designate "no take" zones within its boundaries.

Literature cited

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Caswell H, Fujiwara M, Brault S. 1999. Declining survival probability threatens the North Atlantic right whale. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1999 Mar 16; 96(6):3308-13.

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