Saving Seafood

Hearing Set for Southern New England Lobster Plan

March 24, 2017 — Interstate fishing managers will hold a public hearing Thursday night in Buzzards Bay on a plan to try and save Southern New England Lobsters. The stock has dwindled as water temperatures have warmed, leading the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission to develop a number of proposals to improve the fishery’s health.

The plan includes changing the legal harvesting size limit, reducing the number of traps allowed in the water and implementing new seasonal closures. A public hearing on the matter begins at 6 p.m. at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at CapeCod.com 

Lobster exports to China boom

March 24, 2017 — ELLSWORTH, Maine — A trade war with China may be somewhere on the horizon, but the Maine lobster industry is hoping that the horizon is a distant one.

According to the figures published by the National Marine Fisheries Service, in 2016 China imported more than $108 million worth of lobsters from the United States. That’s a reported 14-fold jump from 2010, when lobster imports were about $7.4 million.

More than 80 percent of U.S. lobster imported to China comes from Maine.

The price of lobster was high last year, but so was demand. Published trade figures show that, in 2015, China imported about 13 million pounds of lobster from the United States. Last year, imports of American lobster topped 14 million pounds.

Read the full story at the Ellsworth American

Maine Fishermen Set Lobster Record for Seventh Straight Year

March 6, 2017 — For the seventh year in a row, Maine lobstermen have set a record for the value of their lobster catch.

Maine lobsters were worth a little more than $533 million at the docks in 2016, exceeding the previous year’s record by more than $30 million, Marine Resources Commissioner Patrick Keliher said Friday.

Interest in American lobsters has skyrocketed in Asia, especially China, in recent years, aiding the value of the crustaceans, which remain popular with Americans on summer vacation and Europeans at Christmas.

At the same time, U.S. lobster fishermen have been catching more lobsters. Maine also set a record for volume in 2016, with state fishermen catching nearly 131 million pounds of lobster last year. That surpassed the previous record of nearly 128 million in 2013.

Conservative management of the lobster fishery has allowed the fishery to thrive in recent years, regulators said. Scientists have said warming oceans might also play a role, as the center of the lobster population appears to be moving north as waters warm. The catch off of Rhode Island and Connecticut has plummeted as Maine’s has soared.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at U.S. News

Maine wants help from lobstermen affected by coral rules

March 6, 2017 — Maine marine authorities are looking for input from lobstermen about how they might be impacted by federal regulations designed to protect corals off New England.

The regulatory New England Fishery Management Council is considering protecting corals in the Gulf of Maine. Two of the proposed protection areas are Outer Schoodic Ridge and the area southwest of Mount Desert Rock.

The state Department of Marine Resources says one of the proposed management options is a complete ban on fishing. The department has proposed exempting the lobster and crab fisheries in the two areas.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Southern Business Journal 

Tred Barta: President Trump Should Stop the Obama Attack on New England Fisherman

February 28, 2017 — In the waning days of his administration, Barack Obama decided to seriously cripple the American fishing industry. By executive order, the former president designated a vast underwater expanse off the coast of New England as the nation’s first aquatic national monument. This decision, driven by evidence-free environmental concerns, effectively banned all commercial fishing in the area.

It’s well within President Trump’s powers to modify this decision, and he ought to do so immediately. Left alone, this designation will undermine the regional economy and deprive countless families of their livelihoods.

The monument, officially announced in September, covers about 5,000 square miles of ocean located 130 miles from Cape Cod. For over 40 years, commercial fishermen have harvested this area for crab, squid, swordfish, tuna, and other high-demand seafood. It’s particularly rich in lobster, of which some 800,000 pounds are caught every year.

This order ends all that activity. Some fishing companies had just 60 days to leave the area.

This exodus will bring economic ruin all along the coast. Bill Palombo, a Newport, Rhode Island lobsterman who runs three boats in the monument waters, says he expects to “just go out of business.” Jon Williams runs Atlantic Red Crab, which employs 150 workers in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and he says the drop in harvests will force him to “maybe sell my business”.

The central promise of the Trump White House is the protection of solid jobs for working families. This order kills exactly those positions: stable, well-paid, immune to outsourcing, and available to workers without a college degree. In the Maine lobster industry, which supports 6,300 local jobs, the average starting salary is over $50,000.

Read the full story at Breitbart

SEAN HORGAN: Swedes still fighting lobster imports

February 27, 2017 — Our travel budget here at FishOn is just about enough to get us over to McDonald’s on Maplewood Avenue for a vegan Happy Meal, but we don’t let that dilute our international sophistication or our global reach.

So, let’s go to Sweden, where the Swedes continue to pour their Nordic angst all over our American lobsters by trying to label them an invasive species and ban their importation by the entire European Union. 

The Swedish effort continues, but an interesting analysis by the Atlanta-based King & Spalding law firm specializing in international law says Sweden’s request to ban the lobsters most likely violates rules of the World Trade Organization.

“The EU ban on American lobster, based on the risk allegedly posed by 32 lobsters that escaped during transportation, would seem to require the WTO to look very carefully at the proportionality of the measure to determine whether it is maintained without sufficient scientific evidence, as well as examining the necessity of the measure in light of alternative measures, such as stricter controls on transportation and more effective enforcement of existing relevant laws and regulations,” the analysis stated.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

CONNECTICUT: Hearings Planned to Discuss Saving Southern New England Lobsters

February 17, 2017 — Interstate fishing managers have scheduled two of seven hearings on a plan to try to save southern New England lobsters in Connecticut.

Lobster fishing in places like Connecticut and Rhode Island dates back centuries, but the stock has dwindled as water temperature has warmed. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is working on a plan to slow decline.

The commission’s plan includes strategies such as changing the legal harvesting size limit for lobsters, reducing the number of traps allowed in the water and enforcing new seasonal closures.

Read the full story at NBC Connecticut 

Hearings on plan to save southern New England lobsters

February 16, 2017 — Interstate fishing managers have scheduled hearings on a plan to try to save southern New England lobsters.

Lobster fishing in places like Rhode Island and Connecticut dates back centuries, but the stock has dwindled as water temperature has warmed. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is working on a plan to slow decline.

The commission’s plan includes strategies such as changing the legal harvesting size limit for lobsters, reducing the number of traps allowed in the water and enforcing new seasonal closures.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the New Jersey Herald

States Schedule Hearings on American Lobster Draft Addendum XXV

February 14, 2017 — The following has been released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The states of Massachusetts through Delaware have scheduled their hearings to gather public comment on Draft Addendum XXV to Amendment 3 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for American Lobster. The details of the scheduled hearings follow.

Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries

March 23, 2017; 6 PM

MA Maritime Academy Admiral’s Hall

101 Academy Drive

Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts

Contact: Dan McKiernan at 617.626.1536 

Rhode Island Division of Fish and Wildlife

March 22, 2017; 6 PM

University of Rhode Island Bay Campus

Corless Auditorium, South Ferry Road

Narragansett, Rhode Island

Contact: Scott Olszewski at 401.423.1934 

Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection

March 21, 2017; 7PM

DEEP Marine Headquarters Boating Education Center

333 Ferry Road

Old Lyme, Connecticut

Contact: Mark Alexander at 860.447.4322

March 27, 2017; 7PM

DEEP Kellogg Environmental Center

500 Hawthorne Avenue

Derby, Connecticut

Contact: Mark Alexander at 860.447.4322

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation

March 20, 2017; 6 PM

NYSDEC Division of Marine Resources

205 N. Belle Mead Road

East Setauket, New York

Contact: Kim McKown at 631.444.0454

New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife

March 15, 2017; 6PM

Belmar Municipal Court

601 Main Street

Belmar, New Jersey

Contact: Tom Baum at 609.748.2020

Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control & Maryland Department of Natural Resources

March 16, 2017; 3 PM

Ocean Pines Library Branch

11107 Cathell Road

Ocean Pines, Maryland

Contact: Craig Weedon at 410.643.4601

The Draft Addendum seeks to address the depleted condition of the Southern New England (SNE) stock while preserving a functional portion of the SNE lobster fishery. The document presents a suite of management measures to increase egg production and lower fishing mortality through a combination of management tools including gauge size changes, season closures, and trap reductions.

The Draft Addendum responds to the results of the 2015 American Lobster Benchmark Stock Assessment which found the SNE stock is severely depleted and experiencing recruitment failure. Declines in population abundance were most pronounced in the inshore portion of the stock where environmental conditions have remained unfavorable to lobster since the late 1990s. These stock declines are largely in response to adverse environmental conditions, including increasing water temperatures over the last 15 years, combined with continued fishing mortality. 

Draft Addendum XXV focuses on increasing egg production so that, if environmental conditions become favorable, the SNE stock can benefit from a strong recruitment year. The Draft Addendum includes seven issues. The first proposes four targets to increase egg production, ranging from 20% to 60%, with an additional option for status quo. The second issue seeks input on proposed management tools to increase egg production and whether these tools should be used independently or in conjunction with one another. The third issue addresses the effects of proposed measures on the recreational fishery. The fourth issue explores the implementation of season closures and potential impacts to the Jonah crab fishery. The fifth issue examines whether management measures should be uniform across Lobster Conservation Management Areas (LCMA) in SNE. The sixth issue asks how management measures should be applied to the offshore waters of LCMA 3, which spans both the Gulf of Maine/Georges Bank and SNE stock units. The seventh issue asks whether de minimis states should be exempt from management action taken in the addendum.

Fishermen and interested stakeholders are encouraged to provide input on the Draft Addendum either by attending state public hearings or providing written comment. The Draft Addendum can be obtained at http://www.asmfc.org/files/PublicInput/AmLobsterDraftAddendumXXV_PublicComment.pdf or via the Commission’s website, www.asmfc.org, under Public Input. Public comment will be accepted until 5 PM (EST) on April 7, 2017 and should be forwarded to Megan Ware, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, 1050 N. Highland St, Suite 200 A-N, Arlington, VA 22201; 703.842.0741 (FAX) or at mware@asmfc.org (Subject line: Draft Addendum XXV).

The Board will review submitted public comment and consider action on the Addendum at the Commission’s Spring Meeting in May 2017.  For more information, please contact Megan Ware, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at mware@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.                                                                   

A PDF of the press release can be accessed at http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file/58a35e88pr09AmLobsterSNEdraftAddendum_Hearings.pdf.

Lobsterman cleared of unlicensed fishing

February 8, 2017 — Every once in a while, a case comes along that serves as a reminder that Maine courts, like the state’s many law enforcement agencies, are a part of what is loosely called the justice system and that most of the people who work in the courts and law enforcement agencies want to see justice done.

Last week, Trenton lobsterman Jacob White found himself before Superior Court Justice Robert E. Murray facing a civil violation of the state’s marine resources laws for fishing without a lobster license last October. Also before the court was the state’s seizure of 156 pounds of lobster White landed at the Seal Cove wharf on the day Marine Patrol Officer Jeff Turcotte issued the summons for unlicensed lobstering.

White decided to fight the case, and, perhaps a surprise, he won.

“I take pride in being a good fisherman and an honest fisherman,” White told the judge.

Murray evidently agreed, dismissing the unlicensed fishing charge and ordering the state to pay White for his seized lobsters. Neither Turcotte nor his supervisor, Sgt. Troy Dow, seemed dissatisfied with the result.

Read the full story at the Mount Desert Islander