Menhaden Boat Changes Everything for Coastal Communities - Away State Journal
Menhaden support an important commercial fishery. They constitute the largest landings, by volume, along the Atlantic Coast of the United States. Menhaden are harvested for use as fertilizers, animal feed, and bait for fisheries including blue crab and lobster.
Atlantic menhaden are common fish in estuaries and coastal waters from Nova Scotia to northern Florida. Menhaden are small, flat-bodied, fish with deeply forked tails. They have bright silver scales, and are characterized by a series of smaller dark spots behind the main, black humeral spot.
Menhaden, any of several species of valuable Atlantic coastal fishes in the genus Brevoortia of the herring family (Clupeidae), utilized for oil, fish meal, and fertilizer.
The Atlantic menhaden is a herring indigenous to the Western Atlantic. It’s a warm-water baitfish commonly occurring from New England to North Florida, and throughout the Gulf of Mexico.
Menhaden are a type of forage fish or critical prey for larger predators that depend on them to survive. Menhaden are dense in calories and nutrients, critical for species like striped bass, bluefish, osprey, whales, and dolphins’ survival.
There have been many words written about menhaden and how they support various segments of the wild and the human world. Unfortunately, there has not been very much real science directed at menhaden and how they move about, spawn, and react to different water temperatures and oxygen levels. The current regulations that govern the number of menhaden that may be taken from the Chesapeake Bay are ...
