Hawaii ban is official.

ClownWrangler

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When I was on the West Hawaii Fishery Council, I voiced an unpopular view: Any Hawaiian fish that could be captive bred on a commercial scale should be placed on the collection restriction list. Didn't happen then, and might have prevented future issues. Who knows.

The issues are caused by the fishing industry. This hobby is the scapegoat. Captive breeding isn't profitable enough for the fishing industry when people eat yellow tangs like tuna in Hawaii and the market for the aquarium hobby might be too small for them to justify it. Looking for a solution in a different place than the source of the problem isn't an effective approach IMO. I'm willing to bet the amount of wildlife exported for aquariums is negligible in comparison to what's consumed by locals. Regulating hand collecting by divers is sort of nonsensical when you consider the scale of things.

I don't even like yellow tangs. I prefer halibut.
 
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reefcleaners

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Any updates on the ban? Will Hawaiian fish be available again in the foreseeable future?

This is a good article:

Still in place. The fishery, the DNR and the universities there submitted an environmental plan and the judge threw it out and told them to redo it. They want only a handful of people to be allowed to collect, and only in western coast of the island of Hawaii, with no fishing on the other islands which is very limiting. You can still catch the fish though, as long as you eat them. (Summary)
 

Kona Diver

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This is a good article:

Still in place. The fishery, the DNR and the universities there submitted an environmental plan and the judge threw it out and told them to redo it. They want only a handful of people to be allowed to collect, and only in western coast of the island of Hawaii, with no fishing on the other islands which is very limiting. You can still catch the fish though, as long as you eat them. (Summary)
That’s mostly incorrect

in 2018, the Hawaii Supreme Court instructed the state to stop issuing aquarium permits until a HEPA review was completed. This was instigated by EarthJustice, a radical environmental group. The State wouldn’t pay for the review so the cost fell upon the fishers. This review process has NEVER been applied to fisheries in the state before so this was novel. Typically, it’s for new business projects(hotels) not managed/ regulated fisheries. Nonetheless, the fishermen in Oahu and the west side of the big island, teamed up with Pijac to commission these documents, one for each island. These things cost ALOT of money(over 600k currently and climbing)so this is why every fisher didn’t choose to participate. The fisheries are different in size, quantities of fish captured, types of fish, and management programs in place. The West Coast of the Big island has a management plan that was implemented in 2000, that put all sorts of restrictions and requirements in place to better ensure the sustainability of the fishery. This was a community based effort, much was decided at the West Hawaii Fishery council. The program was updated through the years leading up to the court ruling. The science is clear. This fishery is sustainable. It’s the most studied and managed fishery in the State of Hawaii. All the top ichthyologist support the fishery, in fact, Dr. Rich Pyle presented our document to the BLNR
Populations of the most targeted species have doubled since implementation of the program. Oahu just submitted their first EIS recently and was denied by the land board. They are back to the drawing board. West Hawaii has now been before the board twice and prevailed in the second attempt. We have an accepted document. This still isn’t good enough for Earth Justice. They don’t care about the science or the review, they just want the fishery BANNED. We are currently in the courts again. They want to overturn our document. Once we prevail, we will then be moving to permitting.

the fishery in west Hawaii will be open again
 

Dana Riddle

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That’s mostly incorrect

in 2018, the Hawaii Supreme Court instructed the state to stop issuing aquarium permits until a HEPA review was completed. This was instigated by EarthJustice, a radical environmental group. The State wouldn’t pay for the review so the cost fell upon the fishers. This review process has NEVER been applied to fisheries in the state before so this was novel. Typically, it’s for new business projects(hotels) not managed/ regulated fisheries. Nonetheless, the fishermen in Oahu and the west side of the big island, teamed up with Pijac to commission these documents, one for each island. These things cost ALOT of money(over 600k currently and climbing)so this is why every fisher didn’t choose to participate. The fisheries are different in size, quantities of fish captured, types of fish, and management programs in place. The West Coast of the Big island has a management plan that was implemented in 2000, that put all sorts of restrictions and requirements in place to better ensure the sustainability of the fishery. This was a community based effort, much was decided at the West Hawaii Fishery council. The program was updated through the years leading up to the court ruling. The science is clear. This fishery is sustainable. It’s the most studied and managed fishery in the State of Hawaii. All the top ichthyologist support the fishery, in fact, Dr. Rich Pyle presented our document to the BLNR
Populations of the most targeted species have doubled since implementation of the program. Oahu just submitted their first EIS recently and was denied by the land board. They are back to the drawing board. West Hawaii has now been before the board twice and prevailed in the second attempt. We have an accepted document. This still isn’t good enough for Earth Justice. They don’t care about the science or the review, they just want the fishery BANNED. We are currently in the courts again. They want to overturn our document. Once we prevail, we will then be moving to permitting.

the fishery in west Hawaii will be open again
I sure hope so. My heart goes out to all the aquarium collectors in Hawaii. I hear David Dart got out, while others are hanging on.
 

Jase4224

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That’s mostly incorrect

in 2018, the Hawaii Supreme Court instructed the state to stop issuing aquarium permits until a HEPA review was completed. This was instigated by EarthJustice, a radical environmental group. The State wouldn’t pay for the review so the cost fell upon the fishers. This review process has NEVER been applied to fisheries in the state before so this was novel. Typically, it’s for new business projects(hotels) not managed/ regulated fisheries. Nonetheless, the fishermen in Oahu and the west side of the big island, teamed up with Pijac to commission these documents, one for each island. These things cost ALOT of money(over 600k currently and climbing)so this is why every fisher didn’t choose to participate. The fisheries are different in size, quantities of fish captured, types of fish, and management programs in place. The West Coast of the Big island has a management plan that was implemented in 2000, that put all sorts of restrictions and requirements in place to better ensure the sustainability of the fishery. This was a community based effort, much was decided at the West Hawaii Fishery council. The program was updated through the years leading up to the court ruling. The science is clear. This fishery is sustainable. It’s the most studied and managed fishery in the State of Hawaii. All the top ichthyologist support the fishery, in fact, Dr. Rich Pyle presented our document to the BLNR
Populations of the most targeted species have doubled since implementation of the program. Oahu just submitted their first EIS recently and was denied by the land board. They are back to the drawing board. West Hawaii has now been before the board twice and prevailed in the second attempt. We have an accepted document. This still isn’t good enough for Earth Justice. They don’t care about the science or the review, they just want the fishery BANNED. We are currently in the courts again. They want to overturn our document. Once we prevail, we will then be moving to permitting.

the fishery in west Hawaii will be open again
Thanks for going to the trouble of writing that out. Best of luck.

It’s really a shame the way things are going these days where science is pushed aside in the name of justice.
 

Tcook

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I saw a highlighted paragraph in one of the aquarium trade magazines this weekend at my lfs. It showed that there were 75 yellow tangs (present or increased?) In the managed portion of the reef and 100 in the unmanaged section of reef. I'm sorry that I can't remember the exact definitions of these numbers as I only looked at it for 30 seconds but it shows the restrictions didn't result in a significant increase in the population compared to unmanaged reef. Maybe @Kona Diver has seen this and can comment.
 

Kona Diver

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I saw a highlighted paragraph in one of the aquarium trade magazines this weekend at my lfs. It showed that there were 75 yellow tangs (present or increased?) In the managed portion of the reef and 100 in the unmanaged section of reef. I'm sorry that I can't remember the exact definitions of these numbers as I only looked at it for 30 seconds but it shows the restrictions didn't result in a significant increase in the population compared to unmanaged reef. Maybe @Kona Diver has seen this and can comment.
Without seeing exactly what you’re referring too I’d don’t have too much to say. Yellow tangs in the entire management area have increased significantly since the plan took effect 22 years ago. Yellow tangs are at or near max carrying capacity/saturation and this has been been verified through intense scientific study and scrutiny through environmental review

it’s the best managed aquarium fishery in the world
 

haitian_reefer

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Without seeing exactly what you’re referring too I’d don’t have too much to say. Yellow tangs in the entire management area have increased significantly since the plan took effect 22 years ago. Yellow tangs are at or near max carrying capacity/saturation and this has been been verified through intense scientific study and scrutiny through environmental review

it’s the best managed aquarium fishery in the world
Where are you getting this info from? I want to read.
 

Kona Diver

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Where are you getting this info from? I want to read.
I’m getting it from WHAP data and the five year reports to the legislature. I’m also drawing from the accepted environmental review that took place over the last four years(thousands of pages) and my own observation and lived experience. If you want to read all of that it’s public info and can be traced through a search engine
 

KrisReef

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This was the objection to fishing that I find very interesting.
from their document page 7 point 3;
The RFEIS only presents part of the results from prior, peer-reviewed literature on the aquarium industry. One example is its use of Tissot and Hallacher (2003). Despite the RFEIS citing this reference at least eight times, the RFEIS fails to acknowledge the primary finding of Tissot and Hallacher (2003): Seven of the ten aquarium fish species were significantly reduced by collecting, and aquarium fish abundances were up to 75% lower in control sites in comparison to sites where aquarium fishing was permitted

That's an interesting way of saying that fished areas had a greater number of fishes than the control sites (presumably unfished areas?) When something in an argument is that convoluted, I tend not to believe the people making the argument. These are the people against fishing, and they stopped it by legal methods contending that the Environmental Impact documents were flawed. Court just ruled against them, so let's hope people can catch fish legally again.
 

Kona Diver

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This was the objection to fishing that I find very interesting.
from their document page 7 point 3;
The RFEIS only presents part of the results from prior, peer-reviewed literature on the aquarium industry. One example is its use of Tissot and Hallacher (2003). Despite the RFEIS citing this reference at least eight times, the RFEIS fails to acknowledge the primary finding of Tissot and Hallacher (2003): Seven of the ten aquarium fish species were significantly reduced by collecting, and aquarium fish abundances were up to 75% lower in control sites in comparison to sites where aquarium fishing was permitted

That's an interesting way of saying that fished areas had a greater number of fishes than the control sites (presumably unfished areas?) When something in an argument is that convoluted, I tend not to believe the people making the argument. These are the people against fishing, and they stopped it by legal methods contending that the Environmental Impact documents were flawed. Court just ruled against them, so let's hope people can catch fish legally again.
And it’s misleading right off the rip because the management plan didn’t even take effect until 2000 when the Tissot study began. If you look closely(which it seems you do) you’ll notice that earth justice is dishonest in their approach and positions. They twist and misrepresent data and findings to suit their narrative
 

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