BANGOR (AP) – Herring fishing companies that operate off the Maine coast and Georges Bank are seeking official status in a federal lawsuit aimed at banning their trawlers from fish spawning grounds.

The Sustainable Fisheries Coalition filed a request Thursday in a lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Department of Justice.

Aided by a lawyer associated with Earthjustice, a national environmental group, the Midcoast Fishermen’s Association is suing to reverse a 1998 decision by the National Marine Fisheries Service that allowed herring boats to fish in closed ground-fish waters.

According to the Bangor Daily News, the herring fishery is allowed a haddock bycatch of 0.2 percent of the total allowable catch for the groundfish species.