Fisheries off West Coast States and in the Western Pacific; Pacific Coast Groundfish Fishery; Trip Limit Changes

NMFS announces changes to the trip limits in the Pacific Coast groundfish limited entry fishery for widow rockfish, the Sebastes complex, canary rockfish, Dover sole, longspine thornyheads, shortspine thornyheads, trawl-caught sablefish, and sablefish caught with nontrawl gear. NMFS announces changes to the trip limits in the Pacific Coast groundfish open access fishery for sablefish. NMFS also announces closures of open access fisheries: For all rockfish north of Cape Blanco, including all Sebastes complex species (which includes yellowtail rockfish and black rockfish); for canary rockfish coastwide; and for widow rockfish coastwide. These actions, which are authorized by the Pacific Coast Groundfish Fishery Management Plan (FMP), are intended to keep landings within the 1998 harvest guidelines and allocations for these species. In addition to these inseason trip limit changes and closures, NMFS updates the general definitions and provisions of the 1998 annual specifications to reflect regulatory amendments made in 1998.