Atlantic Sea Scallop

There is no recreational fishing allowed in the Atlantic sea scallop fishery.

Atlantic sea scallops may only be harvested from federal waters by vessels issued a federal scallop permit.

• There is no charter/party component to the scallop fishery in federal waters.
• Atlantic sea scallops may not be harvested from federal waters by recreational anglers.

Reporting Requirements

Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) Requirements

All vessels issued a federal scallop permit are required to have an active VMS unit and must use their VMS unit to declare all vessel activity including fishing trips and transiting. 

Observer Requirements

• Limited Access (LA) Vessels: Call for both Open Area and Access Area trips. 72 hours notice before the intended sail date is required and notice should be no more than 10 days prior to sail date.

• LA General Category Vessels: Call for both Open Area and Access Area trips. Notify weekly by Thursday if you expect to make any trips from Sunday through Saturday of the following week.

Review the Industry-Funded Scallop Observer Program Call-In Guide.

Catch Reporting and Vessel Trip Reports

Vessel Trip Reports

A vessel trip report (VTR) must be received by NOAA Fisheries or postmarked within 15 days after the end of the reporting month. For vessels that also hold a Northeast multispecies permit, VTRs must be submitted weekly by Tuesday of the week after the fishing trip ends. 

Copies of VTRs must be retained on board the vessel for one year after the date of the last entry on the log and otherwise retained for three years after the date of the last entry on the log. 

If no fishing activity took place during a reporting period (week or month), then a VTR must be submitted stating that no fishing trips were taken. 

Read the VTR Instructions. 

VMS Catch Reports

Scallop vessels may be required to submit two catch reports through VMS. Read the instructions for completing VMS forms. 

Scallop Catch Report

The first form is required by all LA and LAGC vessels that are fishing for, possessing, or retaining scallops, and not also fishing under a Northeast multispecies DAS or sector allocation. The form, often referred to as the scallop catch report, is used to monitor scallop and yellowtail flounder catch on scallop trips.

These reports must be submitted in 24-hour intervals for each day of fishing that begins at 0000 hours and ends at 2400 hours. The reports must be submitted before 9 a.m. each day for the previous day’s catch. The reports include:

• Fishing Vessel Trip Report logbook page number;

• Total pounds of scallop meats kept;

• Total pounds of all other fish kept.

The Scallop Pre-Landing Notification Form

The second report you may need to submit is the Scallop Pre-Landing Notification Form, which is required under the following four circumstances:

• When on a declared limited access trip;

• When on a declared limited access general category (LAGC) trip; or

• When a vessel with an LAGC or Northern Gulf of Maine scallop permit is on a declared trip outside the scallop fishery when scallops are kept.

(This includes limited access vessels that are also issued IFQ or NGOM permits when landing scallops and not on a declared scallop day-at-sea or on an access area trip allocated through their full-time, part-time, or occasional permits.)

The pre-landing notification form must be submitted at least 6 hours before landing scallops, and before crossing the VMS demarcation line. If your scallop harvesting ends less than 6 hours before landing, then the report is to be sent immediately upon leaving the fishing grounds.

This form serves two important purposes: (1) To support timely monitoring and attribution of scallop landings to vessel permits; and (2) to notify NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement of where vessel operators plan to land scallops.

Please contact the Northeast VMS Team with questions.

Dredge Gear Requirements

Maximum Dredge Width

Limited Access vessels (excluding vessels in the Small Dredge Program) may not use a dredge(s) with a combined dredge width of more than 31 ft. Limited Access vessels enrolled in the Small Dredge Program may only fish with one dredge, and the dredge width may not exceed 10.5 ft.

LAGC vessels may fish with a maximum combined dredge width of 10.5 ft, measured at the widest point in the bail of the dredge.  The only exception is for LAGC vessels fishing in the Mid-Atlantic Exemption Area, where vessels may use dredge gear with a combined dredge width of no more than 31 ft.

Minimum Mesh Size

The mesh size of any material on the top of any scallop dredge (twine top) may not be smaller than 10-inch square or diamond mesh.

Minimum Ring Size

The ring size in any scallop dredge possessed or used by scallop vessels may not be smaller than 4 inches.

Link Restrictions 

No more than double links between rings may be used in or on all parts of the dredge bag, except the dredge bottom. No more than triple linking shall be used in or on the dredge bottom portion and the diamonds.

Damaged links that are connected to only one ring, i.e., “hangers,” are allowed if they occur between two links that both couple the same two rings. Dredge rings may not be attached via links to more than four adjacent rings. Thus, dredge rings must be rigged in a configuration such that, when a series of adjacent rings are held horizontally, the neighboring rings form a pattern of horizontal rows and vertical columns.

Gear Restrictions and Obstructions   

No material, device, or link configuration may be used if it results in obstructing the release of scallops that would have passed through a legal sized and configured net and dredge.  No chafing gear or cookies may be used on the top of the dredge.

All limited access and LAGC IFQ vessels that are fishing for scallops must have no more than seven rows in the apron between the twine top and the clubstick, year-round and in all areas. This is intended to further reduce flatfish bycatch.

 

Scallop Dredge Gear Stowage Requirements

Scallop vessels may transit closed areas and access areas (excluding Closed Area II unless there is a compelling safety reason to do so) on either a scallop access area or open area trip, provided gear is properly stowed.

Seasonal Turtle Chain Mat and Turtle Deflector Dredge (TDD) Requirements

Effective Date, Season, and Area Required:

• Between May 1 and November 30

• Scallop vessels fishing west of 71° W. longitude must use both TDDs and Turtle chain mats during the entire TDD and chain mat season

Chain Mat Description

The mat must cover the entire opening of the dredge bag. The vertical and horizontal chains must be hung to cover the opening of the dredge bag such that the vertical chains extend from the back of the cutting bar to the sweep. The horizontal chains must intersect the vertical chains such that the length of each side of the openings formed by the intersecting chains is less than or equal to 14 inches with the exception of the side of any individual opening created by the sweep. The sweep is defined as a chain extending, usually in an arc, from one end of the dredge frame to the other which the ring bag including the diamonds, is attached. The sweep forms the edge of the opening of the dredge bag.

Vessels That Must Use the TDD

All scallop vessels fishing in the TDD area during the TDD season described above with the exception of Limited Access General Category (LAGC) vessels that use a dredge less than 10’ 6” in width.  Specific examples are listed below.

Requirements of the TDD Design

(1) The cutting bar must be located in front of the depressor plate.

(2) The acute angle between the plane of the bale and the strut must be less than or equal to 45 degrees.

(3) All bale bars must be removed, except the outer bale (single or double) bars and the center support beam, leaving an otherwise unobstructed space between the cutting bar and forward bale wheels, if present. The center support beam must be less than 6” wide. For the purpose of flaring and safe handling of the dredge, a minor appendage, not to exceed 12” in length, may be attached to each of the outer bale bar (“flaring bar”). If the flaring bar is attached in a u-shape, none of the three sides of the flaring bar can exceed 12 inches in length. The appendage should at no point be closer than 12” to the cutting bar so that it does not interfere with the space created by the “bump out”.

(4) Struts must be spaced no more than 12” apart from each other, along the entire length of the frame.

(5) For all dredges with widths of 10’ 6” or greater, the TDD must include a straight extension ("bump out") connecting the outer bale bars to the dredge frame. This "bump out" must exceed 12” in length, as measured along the inside of the bale bar from the front of the cutting bar to the first bend in the bale bar. 

Trawl Gear Requirements

Authorized Scallop Trawl Vessels

Limited Access vessels permitted to use trawl gear (Categories 7, 8, and 9) to harvest scallops must comply with the maximum sweep, minimum mesh, and gear obstruction requirements of the Northeast Multispecies regulations. Trawl gear is not allowed in the northern scallop access areas (Closed Area I, Closed Area II, and Nantucket Lightship).

Limited Access General Category scallop vessels fishing west of 72°30’ W. longitude in the Mid-Atlantic Exemption Area, may fish for scallops with trawl gear provided they comply with all applicable trawl gear restrictions, which depend on the species retained, including scallops.

Maximum Sweep

The trawl sweep of nets shall not exceed 144 ft, as measured by the total length of the footrope that is directly attached to the webbing, unless the net is properly stowed and not available for immediate use.

Minimum Mesh Size  

The mesh size for any scallop trawl net in all areas shall not be smaller than 5.5 inches. However, if a vessel possesses other species, other mesh size restrictions may apply.

Scallop Trawl Gear Stowage

Scallop vessels may transit closed areas and access areas (excluding Closed Area II and Elephant Trunk Closed Area, unless there is a compelling safety reason to do so) on either a scallop access area or open area trip, provided gear is properly stowed.

 

 

Under the industry-funded observer program, if a vessel is selected to carry an observer, the vessel is responsible to pay for that observer on that trip. In order to help defray the cost to vessel owners for this observer coverage, one percent of the ABC/ACL is set aside as the Observer Set-Aside. This set-aside is then distributed to vessels that carry observers. 

LA vessels either receive additional pounds in access areas or DAS in open areas, and LAGC IFQ vessels receive additional pounds attributed to their IFQ allocations.

History

The industry-funded observer program was first used when scallop vessels gained access into portions of groundfish closed areas under Joint Framework Adjustments 11 and 39 to the Scallop and Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plans (FMPs), respectively. The set-aside program was expanded in Amendment 10 to the Scallop FMP to include other access areas and open areas. Since its beginning, the industry-funded observer program has applied to LA vessels, and more recently LAGC IFQ vessels were incorporated into the program.  The industry-funded observer program has enabled higher observer rates in the scallop fishery compared to other fisheries in the region.

Observer Set-Aside Compensation Rate

The observer compensation rates refer to the amount of additional pounds of scallops, or scallop DAS for LA vessels on open area trips, that will be allotted to vessels that are selected to carry observers. 

Using the one-percent observer set-aside described above, as well as information on expected trip lengths, trip costs, landings-per-unit effort, and expected scallop prices, NOAA Fisheries selects compensation rates that are expected to provide sufficient compensation for the observer fee, while also providing sufficient observer coverage based on anticipated coverage levels needed for a given fishing year.

NOAA Fisheries monitors the compensation rates and the observer set-aside use in each area very closely throughout the year. If information suggests that a different rate is necessary to account for unexpected fishery conditions, we will change the compensation rate as appropriate and necessary.