BATON ROUGE - Louisiana's season for recreational harvest of gray triggerfish will remain closed in state waters for all of the 2017 season.

The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries says the season was originally scheduled to re-open Jan. 1, however the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries announced that accountability measures are being enacted which led to a closure of the entire 2017 season in federal waters of the Gulf of Mexico. They asked that Louisiana state waters also remain closed for that period.

NOAA Fisheries has estimated that the adjusted annual catch limit of 201,223 pounds for the Gulf in 2016 has been exceeded by 221,213 pounds. Federal accountability measures require a "payback" of previous season overharvest in the next fishing season for reef fish fisheries in the Gulf.