Saving Seafood

Legal sizes for lobsters could change to protect population

February 7, 2023 — The rules about the minimum and maximum sizes of lobsters that can be trapped off New England could soon become stricter, potentially bringing big changes to one of the most valuable seafood industries in the country.

Fishers are required to measure lobsters from eyes to tail and must throw back the crustaceans if they’re too large or too small. The rules, which can vary slightly based on fishing grounds, are intended to maintain a breeding population of the lobsters in key areas such as the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank.

The regulatory Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is considering changing the standards by a fraction of an inch in some of the fishing grounds. The commission said it’s considering the changes because of a worrisome lack of baby lobsters growing off New England.

The changes would arrive at a time when the lobster industry is experiencing record highs in both catch and value, and consumers are paying more for lobsters — already a premium product — than they were just a few years ago. The industry is also challenged by warming oceans and new fishing rules designed to protect rare whales.

Read the full article at ABC News

Green groups targeting blue-collar lobstermen are largely funded by dark money

February 6, 2023 — Environmental groups that have led litigation targeting the lobster fishing industry have been heavily funded by various liberal dark money groups that don’t disclose their individual donors, a Fox News Digital review of tax filings found.

The organizations — the Center For Biological Diversity, Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) and Defenders Of Wildlife — first filed a joint federal lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) in 2018, arguing a rule issued by the agency years earlier failed to properly protect the endangered North Atlantic right whales from lobster fishing equipment. In April 2020, a federal judge ruled in favor of the groups, ordering the NMFS to issue tighter restrictions.

“Right whales have been getting tangled up and killed in lobster gear for far too long,” Kristen Monsell, the oceans program litigation director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said at the time. “This decision sends a clear signal that federal officials must protect these desperately endangered animals from more painful and deadly entanglements before it’s too late.”

Read the full article at Fox News

MAINE: Maine lobster fishery withdraws from Marine Stewardship Council recertification process

February 6, 2023 — The Gulf of Maine lobster fishery has temporarily withdrawn its effort to pursue recertification under the Marine Stewardship Council sustainability standard.

The Maine Certified Sustainable Lobster Association (MCSLA), an industry group that has served as the fishery’s client group for the MSC certification process since it was first certified in 2016, decided not to continue to seek recertification, after it lost its certificate in November 2022.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Fishing Restricted Off Mass. to Protect Right Whales

February 1, 2023 — Citing threats to the endangered North Atlantic right whale, federal officials are invoking an emergency rule to ban lobster and crab trap and pot fishermen from working in a vast area of Massachusetts Bay over the next three months.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on Tuesday said the emergency rule, which was also deployed in 2022, means that trap and pot fishermen fishing federal waters in an area known as the Massachusetts Restricted Area Wedge “must remove all trap/pot gear from this area, and may not reset trawls being actively fished, or set new trawls in this area for the period from February 1 – April 30, 2023.”

Read the full article at NECN

Third entangled right whale of 2023 found; Biden declines petition calling for measures to reduce ship strikes

January 30, 2023 — NOAA Fisheries announced a North Atlantic right whale was spotted entangled by ropes off the coast of Georgia, marking the third right whale entanglement discovered in 2023.

The whale, nicknamed “Nimbus,” was spotted entangled 13 miles off the coast of Jekyll Island, Georgia, U.S.A. According to NOAA, a team of authorized responders and experts managed to remove 375 feet of rope from the whale, leaving a “short segment” in its mouth that the responders are “optimistic” will dislodge over time.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

MAINE: Maine Fishermen’s Forum is back and bigger than ever

January 18, 2023 — For the first time in three years, the Maine Fishermen’s Forum is holding a live event at the Samoset Resort March 2-4. This event is a one-of-a-kind event created for Maine’s fishermen and provides educational seminars covering topics from Management Actions Affecting Gillnet Fisheries, Plastic Aquaculture Gear, Economics of the Lobster Fleet, Eastern Maine Skippers Program, DMR Lobster Science Update, Gulf of Maine Scallop Fishery, and a Seafood Cooking Demonstration, to name a few. A tentative seminar schedule will be available on the website. Attendance is free, and families are encouraged to attend with children’s activities available.

This year’s event also features the largest trade show in the history of the Forum – exhibitors showing lobster traps, marine gear, new fishing gear, boatbuilders and dozens of others as well. They will be displaying their wares for fishermen, scientists and the managers who attend the show annually.

Read the full article at Boothbay Register

MAINE: New rule for Maine lobstermen to report catch

January 17, 2023 — Lobstermen in Maine have a new rule to abide by this new year that’s separate from the battle over right whale regulations that recently caused a lot of controversy for the industry.

The new regulation requires all commercial lobstermen to make monthly, electronic reports to the state including details on where, when, and how many lobsters are caught, and how many traps are in the water.

Read the full article at News Center Maine

MAINE: And now the work begins

January 9, 2023 — President Joe Biden on December 29 signed into law the $1.7 trillion spending bill that delays new whale rules for six years and allocates about $55 million to develop ropeless fishing gear. That money will also pay for research to figure out where, when and if the endangered Atlantic right whale is in the Gulf of Maine.

The delay comes as a big relief to Maine fishermen. They had been anticipating new rules aimed at reducing the risk to the right whale by 98 percent. Many predicted the end of lobster fishing in Maine, the loss of businesses that depend on the fishery, and the transformation of coastal Maine into a touristy collection of condos and marinas. Some Maine lobstermen have already left fishing.

Once the bill became law, the clock started ticking for lobster fishing groups, Maine’s Department of Marine Resources and congressional delegation staff. They have 180 days to come up with a plan to use real-time whale sightings to trigger temporary protections for the animals, also known as dynamic area management, according to Ginny Olsen, political liaison for the Maine Lobstering Union.

“If there’s a sighting of a whale, [the fishery] will be closed,” Olsen said.

Read the full article at Penobscot Bay Press

MASSACHUSETTS: State official criticizes lobster red-listing as ‘counterproductive’

January 4, 2022 — Months after Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch, a sustainable seafood advisory list, red-listed American lobster fisheries in the U.S. and Canada due to the risks they pose to the endangered North Atlantic right whales, Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF) director Dan McKiernan struck back by calling the decision “counterproductive.” The Times reached out to McKiernan in September but he did not provide comments after initial email correspondence.

Seafood Watch advises consumers on what seafood should be avoided or purchased based on whether procurement practices posed a risk to endangered marine life. For right whales, a species with an estimated 340 individuals left and fewer than 100 breeding females, a concern related to fishing includes entanglements from ropes.

However, McKiernan wrote that advising consumers not to buy lobsters, crabs, and fish caught with buoyed fixed fishing gears is “a colossal mistake.”

Read the full article at MV Times