In an age of relentless cynicism about government, talking with the fishermen, scientists, politicians and regulators who manage South Carolina’s fisheries feels like a bracing splash of cold water on a hazy summer day.
Words you hear a lot in those conversations? “Competent,” “caring,” “collaborative” and “successful.” Words you don’t hear so much? “Big government” and “pointy-headed bureaucrat.”
Put simply, there’s almost universal agreement that Palmetto State fisheries — a vital part of the state’s $4.2 billion-a-year wildlife economy — are well-managed and mostly healthy.
But that consensus comes with a critical caveat: for now. Why? Because increasingly, it’s not the relatively healthy fisheries on which managers are focused. It’s the storm clouds on the horizon.
And that’s when you start hearing a different, less popular vocabulary — words like “climate change,” “explosive growth,” “budget cuts” and “inflection point.”
In short, South Carolina’s fisheries are facing rough waters ahead. And to see what’s at stake, it helps to spend a few minutes with a man who starts his workday on the docks of Shem Creek when most of us are still asleep.
A life on the water
The town of Mount Pleasant unveiled a life-sized bronze statue April 17 of legendary Shem Creek shrimper Wayne Magwood, a legendary captain who died in a 2020 auto-pedestrian collision.
The statue, officials say, pays tribute to the man and the shrimping trade his family helped bring to the shores of Shem Creek more than 100 years ago.
It’s a briny, hard-working way of life that four generations of Magwoods chose to make their own — and one that Magwood’s nephew and S.C. Shrimpers Association President Rocky Magwood says is constantly under threat.
“It’s always one thing or another all the time,” he said, checking off a series of challenges, including and especially the cheap foreign shrimp that have flooded the S.C. market. “It’s driven the price of shrimp down so far, you can hardly make a living. That’s why the boats are disappearing.”
Still, not all the news is grim. One bright spot, Magwood said, is the close partnership his industry has built with the S.C. Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) to keep shrimp fisheries healthy.
“We’ve got good people we’re dealing with,” he said of DNR, which is still often called the Wildlife Department by longtime sportsmen. “It used to be a lot different back in the day, but we’re changing. I actually had a director from Wildlife on the boat the other day.”
And that partnership, he said, is essential to protecting the way of life he hopes to pass on to his 6-year-old son.
How good management works
Fisheries management is designed to keep tragedies happening that would wipe out any marine wildlife that commercial and recreational fishermen take out of the ocean every day. And to accomplish that goal, managers use the best available data to place catch limits on various species, particularly those that are threatened by overfishing at any given moment.
On the federal level, which covers waters more than three miles from the coast, that work is primarily done by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in cooperation with regional councils made up of fishing industry stakeholders. On the state side, within the three-mile limit, it’s handled by SCDNR and the state legislature.
And according to S.C. Sen. Chip Campsen (R-Charleston), an avid angler and longtime leader on conservation issues in the Statehouse, the system works — and in no small part, thanks to the fishermen themselves.
“It’s fishermen who’ve really adopted and promoted a conservation ethic that has worked for most fisheries and species,” Campsen said. “Take the spottail bass, which was in real trouble in the early 2000s. We’ve had [to work with fishermen] to change the limit on that three or four times since I’ve been in the legislature, but now they’re having a great comeback.”
Campsen says his work these days is focused on species like flounder and blue crab — a much-loved Lowcountry delicacy that will be subject to catch limits for the first time starting July 1.
“That was the first blue crab regulation in 83 years,” Campsen said of the bill he pushed through the state legislature last year. “Before that, it was the wild, wild West.”
Of course, real collaboration is never all sweetness and light. For instance, Campsen said, federal officials have strict limits in place for red snapper, which local fishermen believe are plentiful.
“Any offshore fisherman who bottom fishes can tell you we have loads of red snapper,” Campsen said. “You can’t catch any other bottom fish without going through five or six red snapper before you catch a grouper or something you can keep.”
And perhaps indicating the level of cooperation involved, NOAA’s Allison Garrett tells the Charleston City Paper that the agency is actively listening and reevaluating the data, though no final decisions have been made yet regarding modifications to the current rules.
“The stock assessment is showing that the red snapper abundance is at its highest levels in recent years, and this coincides with the information that many fishermen are reporting,” Garrett said in a statement. “Unfortunately, the stock is still undergoing overfishing, primarily due to the high level of discards by recreational fishermen off northeast Florida.”
A ‘holistic’ approach: Limits plus habitat restoration
SCDNR officials say they are optimistic about the work they do to preserve S.C. fisheries, but realistic about the challenges.
“There are always challenges with some of the species we manage,” said SCDNR Director of Fisheries Management Ben Dyar, noting current concerns about southern flounder and other species. “[But] because we have our research and monitoring experts together here with us on one campus, that helps us get a really good understanding of how to manage those resources in a sustainable way.”
An example of that collaboration can be found in SCDNR’s creative management of the state’s oyster population, according to shellfish section manager Andrew Hollis.
“Oyster larvae prefer to land on other oyster shells, so when you harvest oysters, you take away habitat for future oysters to settle on,” Hollis explained. “That’s why we’ve focused our resources on our oyster shell recycling program, which is now the largest in the United States.”
Under the program, S.C. recycles more than 40,000 bushels a year, allowing teams of state officials and volunteers to replant the shells on intertidal banks, where recently spawned larvae are looking to settle.
And it’s that combination of data-driven catch limits and habitat restoration that’s kept the state’s oyster population sustainable in recent years.
“For every bushel that’s taken out, we’re trying to put one back, so our oysters can continue to thrive,” Hollis said.
Troubles ahead?
National and international studies consistently show that more than 80% of U.S. fish stocks are neither overfished nor in danger of overfishing. Despite unqualified successes, experts and environmentalists say S.C. fisheries are facing a perfect storm of troubles in the years ahead.
First, they say, indiscriminate federal budget cuts under President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiative are wiping out the expertise and data collection programs that state fisheries rely on to make good decisions.
“The states just don’t have the capacity to take over the work that’s under federal jurisdiction right now,” said Jeff Kopaska, executive director of the American Fisheries Society. “And that could be a major challenge for the people who use and enjoy our natural resources.”
Or as one federally-connected source told the City Paper: “People don’t understand how extreme this is yet. But we literally aren’t going to have the data we need to set limits next year. And that’s when the whole system starts to fall apart.”
Another major threat, officials say, is South Carolina’s exploding population, which in turn is putting more recreational fishermen in the water.
“People are moving to the coast,” SCDNR’s Dyar noted. “And we’re definitely seeing more [fishing] effort as a result.”
Finally, and many say most serious of all, is the danger posed by rising seas and warming waters, which has the capacity to destroy ecosystems that S.C. fishermen have relied on for centuries.
“My sense is that we generally do a good job with fisheries,” said Dana Beach, founder of the S.C.-based Coastal Conservation League. “But this existential threat of climate change is likely to diminish or even eliminate whole fisheries if we don’t act.”
And the only way to prevent it, Beach argues, is by attacking the fossil fuel problem directly — which is why he was so disappointed by the state legislature’s recent decision to allow a new natural gas plant to move forward in rural Orangeburg County.
“What’s going on right now is not just unsustainable, but potentially tragic,” Beach said. “And the stakes couldn’t be any higher, because the best in-state fisheries management on the planet isn’t going to save fisheries unless we do the right thing with energy.”
Meanwhile, several miles away on Shem Creek, Rocky Magwood, who’s watched his father’s fleet of nine boats come down to his single trawler, describes the stakes in the most human terms possible.
“If you’re good at this, you’re never gonna get rich, but you can survive and live comfortably and raise a family,” Magwood said. “And that’s the American Dream, right?”
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