Anchorage, AK – The North Pacific Fishery Management Council voted on Monday to nearly double the size of the Bering Sea yellowfin sole fishery, setting the catch limit for the species at 225,000 tons for 2008.

The move was intended to offset the shrinking quota for the Bering Sea pollock fishery, for which a total allowable catch (TAC) of 1 million tons was approved by the council on Monday. But the decision was opposed by an unusual alliance of environmental groups and the so-called "head and gut" fleet, the bottom-trawling boats that fish for sole and other flatfish. The two groups don't have much common ground, but both argue that the council is risking long-term consequences in order to bail out the pollock fleet in the short term.

"What we're seeing is a fishery running out of one kind of fish, which is pollock, and then just moving on down the line," said Jon Warrenchuck, oceans scientist with the conservation group Oceana.

A handful of catcher-processor boats in the pollock business also fish for yellowfin sole, and were given part of the sole quota by the North Pacific council last year in response to shrinking pollock quotas. Lori Swanson, the executive director of the Groundfish Forum, a head and gut fleet industry organization, said that's fine, to a point.

"[When] pollock goes down and yellowfin goes up, there is a mechanism to allow more yellowfin to go to the pollock boats--we don't dispute that at all," she said. "Our concern is that by setting the TAC so high this year, the increased effort could reduce the amount of yellowfin that's available for the fishery in the future."

Both Swanson and Warrenchuck said that if the yellowfin quota is going to increase, they'd like to see it happen more gradually. In testimony before the council on Monday, Warrenchuck mentioned concerns by Oceana's lawyers that approving a quota jump of this magnitude without an environmental impact statement could violate the National Environmental Policy Act.

Stephanie Madsen, the executive director of the At-Sea Processors Association, a mostly pollock-oriented industry group, downplayed the controversy over the measure, saying that in the long run the pollock and head and gut fleet would be able to fish without stepping on each others' toes.

"It looks like we're all fighting, only because it's uncertain," she said. "I don't think there are going to be long-term issues."

The yellowfin quota was larger than the one recommended to the council by its advisory panel, but below the level that the council's scientific advisors had said was reasonable. The council also approved an increase in the advisory panel's recommended arrowtooth flounder TAC for the Bering Sea, from 50,000 tons to 75,000 tons.