Announcing TBF’s 2023 Tag & Release Awards Winners!

Interested in attending TBF’s International Tag & Release Awards Ceremony? Here’s everything you need to know! A special thanks to our ceremony sponsors, King Sailfish Mounts and Costa Sunglasses, who together with Boaters List, Casa Vieja Lodge, Garmin Marine, IGFTO, and Yeti Coolers have made this night possible. Click here to get your tickets! If […]

Billfish Magazine V3 for 2023 being delivered!

Our latest edition of Billfish Magazine’s 2023 is being shipped this week to our members! This issue is packed with a variety of topics, including our roundup of all of our tournament travel, the annual gala, and coverage of the Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute conference, as well as offering an update on domestic issues […]

Swordfish Driftnets Gone off CA – Will Longlines Follow?

West Coast highly migratory species (HMS) issues now focus on what fisheries will follow the large mesh drift gillnet fishery for swordfish. The process has begun by the Pacific Fishery Management Council to decide, with public input, what fisheries can essentially replace the driftnet fishery to provide fresh swordfish to local markets. The search for […]

76th Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute Recap

TBF back presenting at GCFI In November of this year, three members of TBF traveled to Nassau, The Bahamas for the Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute’s (GCFI) 76th Annual Conference. Peter Chaibongsai, Addie Spain, and Racine Prinzo attended the conference to present their research findings and to share ideas and perspectives on emerging fisheries science […]

Tag & Release Competition Deadline Approaching

Fast approaching, the deadline for The Billfish Foundation’s 2022-2023 Annual Tag & Release Competition is October 31st, 2023. All records must be received by TBF by the end of the day on November 15th, 2023. Do not miss your chance to submit your cards before the deadline! At this point, we would highly recommend submitting […]

Our New Conservation Record is out!

  TBF’s 2021 Conservation Record has officially been completed and the results are in! Sometimes it can be hard to summarize all the hard work done in a year’s time, but this report acts as a really good start. In total, there were 11,822 new data entries added to The Billfish Foundation’s database in 2021, […]

TBF Gatsby, Glitz, and Glamour Gala Wrap Up

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NOAA Fisheries Denies Petition to Establish a Mandatory Speed Limit in Gulf of Mexico

A huge win for the recreational community occurred on Friday, October 27th, 2023 when the petition to establish a mandatory, 10.5-knot speed limit in the Gulf of Mexico was denied by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The speed limit, among other vessel-related mitigation measures, was proposed in an attempt to reduce vessel collisions with […]

TBF Welcomes New Employee, Addie Spain

My name is Addie Spain and I am thrilled to be continuing my time with The Billfish Foundation. I recently graduated from the University of Miami with majors in Marine Affairs and Classical History and a minor in Corporate Sustainability.

Proposed Rule to Designate Critical Habitat for Endangered Rice’s Whales

NOAA announced a proposed rule to designate critical habitat for the endangered Rice’s whale under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) even though a decision on the vessel speed in the Gulf of Mexico has not been finalized. The proposed critical habitat designation and the Rice’s whale vessel speed petition are unrelated actions. Critical habitat is designated under the ESA, and the requirement to designate critical habitat for the Rice’s whale was triggered by its 2019 listing as an endangered species. The proposed critical habitat includes Gulf of Mexico waters between 100 and 400 meters depth and this critical habitat would guide federal agencies