The NMFS has opened a public comment period pertaining to the entry they made in the Federal Registry regarding the petitions submitted by Oceana and other NGOs regarding the Turtle vs. Longline issue.

If you read this website, you probably know those petitions use poor science and misrepresent the figures to convince otherwise well meaning people that the bottom longline fishery in the Gulf of Mexico must be shut down to protect the loggerhead turtles.  This simply is not the case and the real figures of 2007 and 2008 show that to be true, however the people at Oceana and Center for Biological Diversity would prefer that the NMFS use an incomplete and poorly documented set of data from 2006 and 2007 to make it easier to manipulate the figures to show the conclusion that they are happiest with.

It will be helpful if many of us take a few seconds to send in one of these Public Comments.

You can cut and paste all or any part of the message below into the Comments field at the public comment web site which is here, or you can write your own message.  Either way, please submit a comment. 

Make sure you fill in all the required information or your comment will surely be discarded.  If you fill in the form completely, presumably it will be read and considered when they consider what action to take on the petitions.

<cut text from sample below>

RE: Docket: NOAA-NMFS-2009-0031
        Document ID: NOAA-NMFS-2009-0031-0001
        Regarding Petitions submitted by Oceana and threat of litigation from CBD.

Please take these petitions for what they are really worth, which is not much. They are electronically "signed" documents that people were convinced to sign after reading misleading and downright dishonest figures.

I agree we should do everything possible to limit the threat to any kind of animal that has become threatened or endangered by man. However, after reading some information on the science being used as a basis for this proposed closure of a productive and healthy fishery, I believe this closure would be uncalled for and unjustified. More study is definitely needed before closing down the Gulf bottom longline fishery and putting many Americans out of work. The data set being used is simply too small to justify this drastic measure and the supposed benefit to the threatened (not endangered) Loggerhead Turtle has not been conclusively shown to be great enough to support such a measure.

Why isn't the available data from 2008 being used? Why isn't the fact that the Loggerhead is not considered "endangered" being considered? Why are fishermen being targeted as the cause of something they have a minor effect, at the most, on? Why ignore the compromises the fishermen themselves offered to make while more information was gathered and the effects of those and other possible measures can be studied? Why would these groups want the government to rush into this decision without considering, as the NMFS has been mandated by the Magnuson-Stevens act to consider, the economic effects on the fishermen and their communities of any new regulations?

It is well known that many factors have contributed to the drop in nesting and perceived (but undocumented) drop in the total loggerhead turtle population. Coastal construction, overdevelopment, beach bulkheads and beach re-nourishment as well as a large and growing number of interactions with recreational boats all do far more damage to the loggerhead population than the bottom longline fishery does. Science has simply not shown that the threat from those fishermen is equal to or greater than any of the above and the fishery should not be made to bear the brunt of the blame for something in which they are only a very small factor.

Again, the public comment site is here:  Thank you for your interest in this matter and for taking the time to contribute.