BOSTON - Federal regulators are cutting back the amount that fishermen can harvest an economically important fish species on the East Coast. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says it's cutting commercial fishermen's possession limit of northern red hake from 3,000 to 400 pounds per day. Those rules will be in effect until April 30, 2020.
NOAA says the new limits are needed because the northern red hake fishery is projected to reach or exceed a quota limit this month.
Fishermen bring hundreds of thousands of pounds of red hake to the docks on the East Coast every year. Most of the fish come to land in Rhode Island, New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut. They are used as food.