November 26, 2021 — A surge in the catch of a small species of fish called menhaden off the Maine coast has helped stabilize a bait crunch that’s plagued the state’s lobster industry for several years.
Maine’s lobster fishermen typically bait their traps with dead herring, but a scientific assessment in 2020 found that herring are overfished, and quotas for the fish were reduced dramatically. The loss of herring has increased the price of bait and made it harder for many fishermen to trap lobsters.
However, losing herring has been offset somewhat by swelling catches of menhaden. Maine’s catch of menhaden — also called pogies or bunker — grew from about 6 million pounds in 2016 to more than 24 million pounds last year.