March 13, 2017 — The Gulf of Maine Research Institute (GMRI) in Portland, Maine, has developed an ultra low opening trawl (ULOT) net designed to prevent cod from being caught while allowing the targeting of more plentiful groundfish.
Commercial fishers in New England’s Gulf of Maine are assigned catch quotas, in pounds or metric tons, for Atlantic cod. Violating current cod restrictions results in fishers being shut down for the rest of the season. Because of this, fishers pursuing other groundfish (such as grey sole, flounder, monkfish, whiting, and pollock) need to be vigilant about how many cod make it into their nets—an impossible task until now. The net was designed, built, and tested by a collaboration of New England fishers, scientists, and Rhode Island-based net maker, Superior Trawl.
Traditional trawl nets feature a 6-foot (1.83-meter) opening into which groundfish get trapped. The new ULOT trawl has a 2-foot (0.61-meter) opening which allows cod to swim up and over the net while trapping species that swim lower to the ocean floor. It was initially tested at the Marine Institute in Newfoundland in a simulated ocean environment and was later tested on a commercial trawling vessel. On the commercial trawler, the net reduced cod catch by 45 percent with no impact on the catch levels of other species. Additionally, the ULOT net also created a nearly seven percent reduction in the vessel’s fuel use because it has less drag than traditional nets.