National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration October 2009 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

Notice is hereby given that Douglas Peterson, Ph.D., Warnell School of Forest Resources (Fisheries Division), University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, has been issued a permit to take shortnose sturgeon (Acipenser brevirostrum) for purposes of scientific research.

The Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council will convene a public meeting of the Outreach and Education Advisory Panel (AP).

NMFS is opening directed fishing for northern rockfish in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands Management Area (BSAI). This action is necessary to fully use the 2009 total allowable catch (TAC) of northern rockfish in the BSAI.

The Pacific Council and its advisory entities will hold public meetings.

The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council's (Council) Spiny Dogfish Monitoring Committee will hold a public meeting.

The ONMS is seeking applications for the following vacant seats on the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary Advisory Council: The Commercial Fishing seat and the Education seat. Applicants are chosen based upon their particular expertise and experience in relation to the seat for which they are applying; community and professional affiliations; philosophy regarding the protection and management of marine resources; and possibly the length of residence in the area affected by the sanctuary. Applicants who are chosen as members should expect to serve 3-year terms, pursuant to the council's Charter.

Notice is hereby given that Daniel P. Costa, Ph.D., Long Marine Laboratory, University of California at Santa Cruz, 100 Shaffer Road, Santa Cruz, California 95060, has been issued a minor amendment to Scientific Research Permit No. 87-1743.

NMFS is prohibiting directed fishing for pollock in Statistical Area 610 in the Gulf of Alaska (GOA). This action is necessary to prevent exceeding the 2009 total allowable catch (TAC) of pollock for Statistical Area 610 in the GOA.

We, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), designate critical habitat for the threatened Southern distinct population segment of North American green sturgeon (Southern DPS of green sturgeon) pursuant to section 4 of the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Specific areas proposed for designation include: Coastal U.S. marine waters within 60 fathoms (fm) depth from Monterey Bay, California (including Monterey Bay), north to Cape Flattery, Washington, including the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Washington, to its United States boundary; the Sacramento River, lower Feather River, and lower Yuba River in California; the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and Suisun, San Pablo, and San Francisco bays in California; the lower Columbia River estuary; and certain coastal bays and estuaries in California (Humboldt Bay), Oregon (Coos Bay, Winchester Bay, Yaquina Bay, and Nehalem Bay), and Washington (Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor). This rule designates approximately 515 kilometer (km) (320 miles (mi)) of freshwater river habitat, 2,323 km\2\ (897 mi\2\) of estuarine habitat, 29,581 km\2\ (11,421 mi\2\) of marine habitat, 784 km (487 mi) of habitat in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, and 350 km\2\ (135 mi\2\) of habitat within the Yolo and Sutter bypasses (Sacramento River, CA) as critical habitat for the Southern DPS of green sturgeon.

Notice is hereby given that the Oregon Coast Aquarium, 2820 S.E. Ferry Slip Road, Newport, OR 97365, has applied in due form for a permit to import up to eight non-releasable harbor seals (Phoca vitulina) for the purposes of public display.

The ONMS is seeking applications for the following vacant seats on the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary Advisory Council: Agriculture, At-Large (2), Business/Industry, Commercial Fishing, Recreation (Non extractive), Recreational Fishing, Research, and Conservation. Applicants are chosen based upon their particular expertise and experience in relation to the seat for which they are applying; community and professional affiliations; philosophy regarding the protection and management of marine resources; and possibly the length of residence in the area affected by the sanctuary. Applicants who are chosen should expect to serve until February 2013.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) announces availability for public review and comment of the Draft Central Valley Salmon and Steelhead Recovery Plan (Draft Plan). The Draft Plan

NMFS issues regulations to provide harvesting cooperatives, crab processing quota share holders, and Western Alaska Community Development Quota (CDQ) groups with the option to make intercooperative transfers, crab individual processing quota transfers, and inter-group transfers through an automated, web-based process. To facilitate web- based transfers, NMFS removes the requirement for notarized signatures for all crab non-permanent leases of individual fishing quota and individual processor quota and removes unnecessary quota share price- related questions. The purpose of this action is to reduce paperwork burdens on the fishing industry by providing the option of electronic transfer through the Internet. This action allows cooperatives, processors, and CDQ groups to shorten response time to management, market, weather, and other fishery and operational conditions and to increase harvesting and processing efficiency. This action also removes detailed description of information required on application forms from regulatory text; removes detailed NMFS mail, fax, and delivery

NMFS announces the closure of the scup commercial coastwide fishery from Maine through North Carolina for the remainder of the Summer Period. Regulations governing the scup fishery require publication of this notification to advise the coastal states from Maine through North Carolina that this quota has been harvested and to advise Federal vessel permit holders and Federal dealer permit holders that no commercial quota is available for landing scup in these states. Federally permitted commercial vessels may not land scup in these states for the remainder of the 2009 Summer quota period (through October 31, 2009).

NMFS apportions amounts of the non-specified reserve to the initial total allowable catch (ITAC) of Greenland turbot in the Aleutian Islands subarea. This action is necessary to allow the fisheries to continue operating. It is intended to promote the goals and objectives of the fishery management plan for the BSAI.

NMFS is closing the commercial sandbar shark research fishery. This action is necessary because NMFS estimated that landings in this fishery have exceeded 80 percent of the available quota.

NMFS is implementing, through this emergency rule, a closure of the recreational black sea bass fishery in the Federal waters of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) from 3 to 200 nautical miles offshore, north of Cape Hatteras, NC. This action is necessary because the best available information for black sea bass recreational landings indicates that the 2009 recreational harvest limit established for the black sea bass fishery is projected to have been exceeded. NMFS is effecting this closure to mitigate the magnitude of the recreational overage because the established mortality objective for 2009 has been exceeded.

The Estuarine Reserves Division, Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management, National Ocean Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), U.S. Department of Commerce has approved the Hudson River National Estuarine Research Reserve Management Plan Revision.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Ocean Service publishes this notice of exception to the Final Guidelines for the Coastal and Estuarine Land Conservation Program (CELCP). For those grants issued in fiscal year 2006 that are due to expire on September 30, 2009, NOAA may extend the financial assistance award period for up to 6 additional months, providing for a potential maximum award duration of three years and six months.

The Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council (Council) will convene public meetings.

NMFS issues this final rule to implement Amendment 7 to the Fishery Management Plan for the Shrimp Fishery of the South Atlantic Region (FMP), as prepared and submitted by the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council (Council). For South Atlantic rock shrimp, this final rule renames the rock shrimp permit and endorsement; requires all South Atlantic shrimp permit holders to provide economic data if selected; reinstates all limited access rock shrimp endorsements for those vessel owners who renewed their open access permit in the year in which they failed to renew their limited access endorsement; removes the 15,000-lb (6,804-kg) rock shrimp landing requirement; and reinstates all limited access rock shrimp endorsements lost due to not meeting the landing requirement. NMFS also implements several non- substantive changes in codified text through this final rule. NMFS also informs the public of the approval by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) of the collection-of-information requirement contained in this final rule and publishes the OMB control number for that collection. The intended effect of this final rule is to improve data collection, reduce permit confusion, and maintain a viable rock shrimp fishery in the South Atlantic region.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is proposing to revise its regulations on the introduction of introduced species into the Gulf of the Farallones and Monterey Bay national marine sanctuaries (GFNMS and MBNMS, respectively). This action is being taken in response to a letter received by the Governor of California on December 23, 2008. The Governor certified that the terms of designation to regulate introduced species in these sanctuaries were unacceptable in State waters of the sanctuaries. In response to the Governor's letter, NOAA is proposing to modify its regulations to except all State-permitted aquaculture activities in the two sanctuaries.