News & Announcements

When Exxon Valdez ran aground 25 years ago, spilling 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound, the results were plainly visible on the nightly news: fouled beaches, oiled carcasses, and closed fisheries. Responders worked to

Scientists recently mapped the migration routes of baby loggerhead sea turtles for the first time. It took four scientists and one manicurist to make this breakthrough possible.

For more than a century, a concrete wall stood in the way of steelhead reaching their prime spawning and rearing habitat in San Francisquito Creek, a tributary to south San Francisco Bay.

Observers are independent field biologists that are deployed aboard commercial fishing boats and at-sea processing facilities, and their work is vital to NOAA's mission of ensuring the economic and ecological sustainability of US fisheries.

Even low levels of oil pollution can damage the developing hearts of fish embryos and larvae, reducing the likelihood that those fish will survive.

How will we manage fish populations as the climate changes? NOAA Fisheries biologist John Manderson is working on one small piece of the puzzle.

Since being declared overfished in 2000, cowcod (Sebastes levis) has been managed for recovery as a continuous population throughout its range, from the U.S.–Mexico border to just north of Cape Mendocino, California. But what if it’s more than one population?

Each year NOAA Fisheries compiles key fisheries statistics from the previous year into an annual snapshot documenting fishing’s importance to the nation. The 2013 report provides landings totals for both domestic recreational and commercial fisheries by species and allows us to track important indicators such as annual seafood consumption and the productivity of top fishing ports. These statistics provide valuable insights — but to fully understand the overall condition of our fisheries, they must be looked at in combination with other biological, social, and economic factors of ecosystem and ocean health.

Alaska Fisheries Science Center Quarterly Report.

Scientists are working to understand why the population of Southern Resident killer whales isn’t rebounding, and what we can do to help them recover.