New York · Anadromous river herring (alewife and blueback herring)
Anadromous river herring (alewife and blueback herring) size limit in New York
Closed to harvest today
Hudson River north of the George Washington Bridge
Closed today| Size limit | No size limit stated | total length |
|---|---|---|
| Daily bag | 10 | per person per day, or 50 per boat per day |
Closed June 16 through March 14 — the season runs March 15 to June 15 Reopens after March 14. The numbers above are what applies when it is open.
The one part of New York where river herring may be kept at all: 10 a day per angler or 50 per boat, March 15 through June 15, in the Hudson River north of the George Washington Bridge.
all other New York waters
Closed to harvest| Size limit | No size limit stated | total length |
|---|---|---|
| Daily bag | — | per person per day |
No possession allowed anywhere else in New York's marine and coastal district or connecting waters. The numbers above are what applies when it is open.
Closed outright everywhere except the Hudson River window listed above.
What we left out on purpose
- dec.ny.gov itself could not be reached for this state — every path we tried (direct fetch, browser render, the 2026 PDF at a different path) hit the same Cloudflare Managed Challenge. Everything here comes from two older official documents plus dated press coverage, cross-checked against each other rather than against the live page.
- Summer flounder, Atlantic cod, cobia and the boat-based tier of scup are left unsettled: the 2023 DEC summary PDF and the codified 6 NYCRR §40.1 table describe structurally different rules for each, not just different numbers, and neither could be confirmed as the newer one without reaching dec.ny.gov directly.
- Everything else on this page matched exactly between the 2023 DEC summary and the codified NYCRR table, or — for striped bass specifically — was confirmed through two dated DEC press releases (2023 for the marine slot, 2024 for the Hudson River slot) that postdate both documents.
- NYSDEC regulates fish differently depending on how an angler is fishing (shore, private boat, or licensed party/charter boat) more often than most states on this site. Where that split changes the number, it is carried here as separate regions rather than folded into one line.
- This page covers New York's marine and coastal district only. New York also publishes an entirely separate freshwater fishing guide (bass, trout, walleye, pike and panfish in lakes, ponds and inland streams) that is not carried here.
Other species limits in New York
- Striped bass
- Summer flounder (fluke)
- Scup (porgy)
- Black sea bass
- Tautog (blackfish)
- Winter flounder
- Weakfish
- Bluefish
- American eel
- Oyster toadfish
- Atlantic cod
- Cobia
- Red drum
- American shad
- Atlantic sturgeon
- Yellowtail flounder
- Haddock
- Pollock
- Monkfish (goosefish)
- King mackerel
- Spanish mackerel
- Atlantic menhaden (bunker)
- Hickory shad
Where to try today
- Montauk 6/10 · Biting
- Salmon River 5/10 · Picky