Snowy Grouper

Just after midnight on a brisk morning in early March, the Amy Marie idles up to the dock at Cherry Point Seafood on Wadmalaw Island. Owner and Captain Mark Marhefka and his crew, Charlie and Josh, have had a long, hard trip - nine days instead of the typical five. "This is a sorry load of fish," said Mark. "At first nothing was biting. In reality these are tropical fish. They just don't bite when it's cold."

Mark and his crew fish for snapper and grouper, of which there are over 70 species in the South Atlantic. The majority of the harvest is usually vermilion snapper, also known to fishermen as b-liners - the most plentiful snapper off the Lowcountry coast. But snapper-grouper fishermen will keep whatever they catch. "There really is no 'bycatch' in this fishery," Mark said, referring to species other than what the fisherman was targeting. "We bait a hook, put it down, and something bites. We keep everything unless, by law, we have to throw it back."

After a few unsuccessful days working close to shore, Mark heads farther offshore into deeper water where the fish are more accustomed to cold. The fish finally started biting but it isn't enough to make up for the slow start.

Nine days is a long time for a fisherman to be away from his family. Mark knows what he can look forward to as he comes home. Rebecca, rising before the sun, presses her face against the glass door because she knows Daddy is coming home today. Eager to become her father's first mate, the toddler will have to wait a little longer before venturing offshore. Mark's wife, Kerry, is also looking forward to his return. It's not easy to be a working mom with a two-year-old. And Kerry is also six months pregnant, this time with a boy.

Mark is following in the footsteps of his father, who became a commercial fisherman after retiring from the Air Force. After a few years of fishing in Florida, Mark decided to try his hand at a "real job" and moved to North Carolina to work for an engineering firm, collecting and testing soil at new construction sites. "Eventually I realized I didn't want to play in the dirt anymore, I wanted to play in the water." Mark returned to the coast, bought the Amy Marie and has been fishing here ever since.

He has weathered many changes and knows that times are getting tough for the Lowcountry's commercial fishermen. Coastal property is swiftly being covered by condominiums and vacation homes, pushing out the businesses that commercial fishermen rely on like ice houses, docks, and fish houses. In addition, the federal government is tightening regulations on many species including snapper and grouper. In an effort to make the fishery sustainable - ensuring that the fish populations are healthy enough to support active harvesting - the government may be making the commercial fisherman unsustainable.

Despite being lengthy and marginally successful, this trip was by no means uneventful. The Amy Marie was off the coast of Florida in 115 fathoms of water on a slick calm day when the crew spotted a pair of right whales, one of the most endangered species of whales in the Atlantic. The pair was remarkably close to the boat, and the crew soon realized the whales were mating. "In twenty years of fishing I'd never seen whales, until now. It was amazing," says Mark.

It's low tide and the Amy Marie rests six feet below the dock when Mark begins unloading his catch. The morning sun gleams across Bohicket Creek as the crew descends into the hold to unload their catch. The first fish to come off the boat are two large amberjacks, together weighing 153 pounds. After wrestling them up to the dock, the crew packs the rest of the catch into plastic bins and hoists them to dock level.

Cherry Point has been in the LaRoche family since the 1800s; Micah and Jane still make their home a stone's throw from the dock. In the 1920s Micah's Uncle Gussie built the packing house and dock - only the second in South Carolina to receive a permit from the Army Corp of Engineers. The original mission of Cherry Point was not packing seafood, but cabbage and potatoes from local farmers. It was not until the 1940s that seafood entered the scene with the advent of the shrimp fishery. In the 1970s Micah began to bring tilefish back to Cherry Point.

Now the LaRoche family handles a variety of seafood - from shrimp, to snapper and grouper, to the highly migratory swordfish and deep-dwelling wreckfish. Cherry Point Seafood provides a home for the boats, renting dock space and selling them fuel and ice. The boats sell their catch to the LaRoches, who handle the sale and delivery to seafood distributors and markets. It's a family business; the sign tells you so as it lists three generations of the LaRoche family: "Cherry Point Seafood, Micah, Jane, Daniel, Erin, Olivia, and Naomi LaRoche." The company sign will have to be revised soon with Daniel's fourth child on the way. He jokes, "I don't know why anyone thinks it could be anything but another daughter!"

With the boxed fish moved into the cooler, Mark and Micah meet in the office to discuss potential buyers and preferred prices. They are hopeful that most of this lot, which is unusually heavy on popular grouper, can stay in the local market. But most of the vermilion snapper, which usually dominates Mark's catch, will be shipped to a seafood wholesaler in Jessup, Maryland. Ironically, there is no local market for vermilion snapper, by far the predominate snapper in the area.

According to Mark, "People need to tell their favorite restaurants and retailers that they want local seafood. And by local, I mean seafood that comes from the Lowcountry. Too much of our seafood gets shipped out of state."

Two boxes of fish, 50 pounds of scamp grouper and 50 pounds of vermilion snapper are purchased by a young entrepreneur with a business entitled Wild Carolina Sustainable Seafood. These fish will join a load of local shrimp bound for Asheville, N.C.

Micah has been making phone calls all morning, letting local seafood wholesalers know what is coming in so they can stake a claim. After a bit of friendly haggling he's secured buyers for most of the fish, occasionally dipping below his ideal price. Crosby's Seafood, a retail market on Folly Road, will take some of the large snowy grouper, the silver snapper, some vermilion snapper, and the single red grouper, which will look great in the seafood case. Crosby's wholesale branch orders the majority of the snowy grouper and some of the vermilion snapper, destined for restaurants around Charleston. Lowcountry Lobsters, another distributor that sells to restaurants throughout the Carolinas, agrees to buy the remainder of the snowy grouper, all the gray triggerfish, black sea bass, and gray tilefish, and will see what they can do with the two large amberjack. The rest of the catch - the unwanted vermilion snapper - will head to Jessup, Maryland, as usual.

Someday Mark hopes to be able to market his own fish in the Charleston area. He dreams of establishing a retail and wholesale market where customers and chefs could stop by and handpick their fresh seafood. First he needs to find someone trustworthy to run his boat. Not only would he be able to sell his fish to Lowcountry residents and restaurants, he would be able to spend every day with his growing family.

When asked whether he'll encourage his children to carry on the commercial fishing tradition, Mark replies, "Definitely. In fact, this weekend Rebecca will come out here and help me work on the boat, and give Kerry a break."

She'll need it. Mark plans to head out to sea again on Monday. This time he's bound for warm waters right away, 70 or 75 miles south, to scout out some new territory. Hopefully the fish will bite.

Gray Triggerfish