Wampanoag Tribe Opposes Harwich Herring Harvest

 HARWICH – The select board’s decision to allow the opening of the town’s herring run for public harvest has drawn a strong protest from the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, which is claiming that the town’s initiative is an attack on ancient aboriginal rights.

 Tribal Council Secretary Talia Landry and Jyrzie Alves, a youth native environmental ambassador with the tribe, were before the select board on March 30 to oppose the board’s decision the previous week to approve new herring regulations based on recommendations from the state Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF) and the town’s Natural Resources Director Stephanie Ridenour. The change lifts a 21-year moratorium on the taking of herring.

The vote was based on a sustainable fishery management plan (SFMP) approved by DMF, the town’s natural resources department and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC). 

 The plan calls for issuing up to 150 harvest permits, allowing a maximum of 20 fish to be taken on each of the seven days fishing will be allowed in April at Johnson’s Flume in West Harwich. No more than 15,750 herring, 2.9 percent of the average herring count, is expected to be harvested under the newly approved regulations, according to Ridenour.

Landry, a lifelong resident of Mashpee, said she was speaking on behalf of the Tribal Nation.

 “Our access to the waters for fishing and other purposes is an integral component of our ancient and aboriginal way of life,” she said. “And yet our legal rights are constantly under attack, and we see this action as another attempt to degrade our natural resources that we rely on for personal and community needs.” 

Alves said the regulations are disheartening, knowing that the Wampanoag Tribe was not consulted when the decision falls within the tribe’s ancestral homeland. Alves called the daily catch limit of 20 fish excessive, adding that it is more than any tribal member has taken at one time.

 “If you allow this large amount, it will cause the population to decrease again and will put us in a position that caused the moratorium in the first place,” Alves said. “Herring is more than bait fish for our people. They are our lifeline.” 

 Landry said steps have been taken under tribal law to protect the herring population, which is of vital importance to tribal culture, subsistence and traditions. 

 In April 2023, the Tribal Council enacted an emergency resolution on the rights of herring presented by the youth native environmental ambassadors due to a critical depletion of the herring population as measured by the tribe’s natural resources personnel. The failure of the state to consult with the tribe prior to implementing certain herring conservation and/or harvest measures was also a factor, Landry said.

 “The scarcity of herring creates an ecological crisis for the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, which would be exacerbated by this initiative,” said Landry.

 She noted that the town has been granted permission to open the herring run for the harvest through the sustainable fishery management plan (SFMP), but Landry points out that the plan was approved before the tribe’s findings that herring numbers are at a critical all-time low. 

Landry noted that the SFMP contains provisions relating to the Native American harvest, including recognizing the aboriginal practice of harvesting river herring. Memorandums of agreement have been signed allowing for harvests for sustenance purposes only. The annual catch estimates by the tribe are in the 1,000-fish range, she said.

 Landry said federal Indian law, as mandated by the Supreme Court, has declared that state and local regulations cannot infringe on the aboriginal rights of Native Americans and Native tribes. Tribes have the right to harvest a fair share of the fish that pass through their tribal lands. As such, state and local regulations that threaten a significant decrease in harvestable fish passing through tribes’ reservations and traditional lands can’t stand, Landry said.

 DMF Diadromous Fish Project Leader Brad Chase said on Friday that he reached out to the tribes’ natural resources director but had yet to hear back. The division wants to open up a line of communication, he said.

 According to Chase, when the agency began initiating a sustainable fishery plan in 2016, DMF staff sat down with the tribe and discussed their participation in shaping the plan, but the tribe did not want to be part of the process. Chase said that in 2022 when the plan was being approved, there continued to be no interest expressed by the tribe.

 The management plan, Chase said, is based on sound DMF and marine fisheries metrics. Chase sits on the ASMFC’s sustainable fisheries management plan review committee and he called the Harwich plan, one of three dozen put in place, the most conservative of all. 

Ridenour said her department worked with DMF in developing the management plan, but neither the town nor her department has had any feedback from the Wampanoag tribe.

 “We see this as an opportunity to share our traditional environmental knowledge with you and discuss ways to protect our natural resources, instead of opening the floodgates to what may be irreparable and irreversible harm to the herring population, on which the tribe relies for sustenance, cultural and traditional purposes,” Landry told the select board.

 Permits for the harvest went on sale on Saturday. The line outside the natural resources office at Saquatucket Harbor started forming at 6 a.m. for the 10 a.m. opening of permit sales. The regulations allow the issuance of 120 resident harvest permits and 30 nonresident permits. Ridenour said the nonresident permits sold out on Saturday, and as of Tuesday morning 53 residential permits were still available.

 According to Ridenour, there were three permits purchased by members of the Wampanoag Tribe. She said tribal members who have a tribal card do not need permits. They can fish as an indigenous right, Ridenour said, adding that the tribal members gave no reason for the purchase of a permit.

The new herring regulations set seven days when harvest can occur: April 12 and 13, 8 to 11 a.m.; April 19, 1 to 4 p.m.; April 20, 2 to 5 p.m.; April 27, 8 to 11 a.m.; April 28, 9 a.m. to noon; and April 29, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

 The schedule is subject to change based on ongoing fish counts. Any updates to the schedule will be posted on the website, said Ridenour.

 “We would expect the maximum harvest to be around 15,750 fish (or 2.9 percent of the average herring count). Harvesting is fully monitored with 100 percent catch accounting, so Harwich Department of Natural Resources and DMF can use the active run counts and harvest counts to make in-season management decisions,” she said. The harvest schedule is subject to change as a management tool, she added.