Independent experts say mistake in fish counting methods likely had little effect

BOSTON – Two independent experts have backed federal researchers’ findings that a mistake in the way fish populations were measured probably had little effect on fish counts.

Researchers have acknowledged unevenly setting cables on a survey vessel that collected fish samples between winter 2000 and spring 2002. Fishermen said that the uneven cables allowed fish to escape the trawls and led to undercounted populations.

John Helge Volstead and Chris Darby from the University of Miami’s Center for Independent Experts were part of the research team that studied the effects of the error.

After analyzing federal scientists’ methodology and results, both said the findings, based on numerous statistical analyses, were sound. “Based on all available results, I firmly believe that the warp offset has had minimal effects on the stock assessment conducted in recent years,” Volstead wrote in a report posted on the National Marine Fisheries Service Web site Friday.

Barbara Stevenson, a Portland, Maine, fishing boat owner, said federal scientists rushed their analysis of the problem and was unimpressed with the independent experts’ conclusions.

“Like a fisherman I know said, ‘No skunk is going to say another skunk stinks,”‘ she said.

Federal scientists are still looking at the mistake in an ongoing experiment that measures how the error affected fish catch.