News Conservation & Environment Oceana Commends Decision to Require Turtle Deflector Dredges in Atlantic Scallop Fishery |
Oceana Commends Decision to Require Turtle Deflector Dredges in Atlantic Scallop Fishery |
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Oceana, the largest international advocacy group working solely to protect the world’s oceans, commends the New England Fishery Management Council today for approving new regulations for the Atlantic scallop fishery that will require modified fishing gear in specified areas and during times when sea turtles are known to be present. The new fishing gear, called a Turtle Deflector Dredge (TDD), works by pushing sea turtles out of harm’s way. In fact, TDDs are expected to reduce sea turtle mortality by at least 56 percent when compared to former dredges that forced them under the heavy fishing gear where they were often crushed or dragged until they drowned.
Read the full Oceana press release here...
Ron Smolowitz, of the Fisheires Survival Fund and Coonamesset Farms who designed and engineered new Turtle Deflector Dredges (TDD), explains in the below linked release, why TDDs are a crucial innovation, and why he helped the commerical scallop industry make it happen.
Read Ron Smolowitz's press release here...
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Monterey Bay's historic "wetfish" industry is under attack by extremist groups who claim overfishing is occurring. Touting studies with faulty calculations, activists are lobbying federal regulators to massively limit fishing, if not ban these fisheries outright. Apparently the facts don’t matter to groups with an anti-fishing agenda
