Atlantic cod Archives - Page 9 of 11

Can Atlantic Cod Return to Canada’s East Coast?

December 8th, 2016 — According to the New England Fishery Management Council, the 2016 quotas for George’s Banks Cod are 1200 metric tonnes for 2016 and 500 metric tonnes for Cod in the Gulf of Maine.

In an article posted by the NOAA last month, optomism for the health of these stocks are low due to warming waters and bycatch concerns.

Many East Coast processors, however, feel that the fishery is in remission and hope for increased total allowable catches before re-building infrastructure from the moratorium in the early 1990s.

For now, fillet production has been predominately labour intensive hand cutting, tightening profit margins considerably.

Pricing last month on Canadian Atlantic Cod was around $3.25 per pound for 12-32oz skinless fillets caught in Newfoundland, and $3.15 per pound for shatterpacked bones 4-8oz fillets in Boston.

The Fishery is faced with adverse weather conditions at the moment – full fishing efforts should resume in Spring 2017 at which point we will have a clearer outlook on pricing.

— Another interesting note on this fishery – Scientists are now pushing for increased commercial Atlantic Cod quotas because of Snow Crab stocks in the Maritimes.

Read the full story at The Fish Site

Atlantic Cod: The Good, The Bad, and the Rebuilding – Part 2

November 3, 2016 — “Fishing pressures…or environmental pressures…are different from place to place even within what is considered to be a single management area, and that effect is multiplied when you consider going from one management area to another” says Coby Needle. This implies that there is no singular reason for the observed differences in stock status. However, there do seem to be general trends based on the latitudinal position of stocks.

In general, the northern stocks are doing better than the southern populations. “In the NE Atlantic, the more northerly stocks like Barents Sea and Icelandic cod are generally in much better shape than the ones further south…There is some long-term environmental trend affecting their recovery” says Robin Cook. However, “it’s not as simple as it was 2 or 3 years ago when we probably thought it was all related to global change; the southern stocks were suffering while the northern stocks were benefitting from a warming Arctic” says Chris Zimmermann. One example is the disappearance of North Sea cod from the southern spawning grounds, where there has been no spawning activity for the last 10-15 years. “Newspapers say ‘there’s no spawning of cod in the North Sea at all.’ That’s not the case – it’s just the southern spawning grounds. That’s certainly related to global change” says Chris Zimmermann. “Distributions are further north because the more southern populations are less successful” Robin Cook agrees.

Why do we see these differences among northern and southern populations on both sides of the basin? More specifically, why are northern stocks faring better than their southern counterparts? Factors contributing to these observed differences include variations in (1) environmental conditions and (2) management structures.

Environmental conditions

Northern stocks

On both sides of the basin, first order oceanographic factors tend to influence changes in productivity more strongly than the southern stocks. “Norwegians and Icelanders both agree with first order oceanographic factors playing a big role in changes in productivity they see in their stocks” says Jake Rice. In other words, northern stocks are more affected by fairly dramatic environmental conditions that we don’t see in the more southern areas; the most notable being shifting location and intensity of Arctic cold water that is absent in temperate southern stocks.

Stocks in the higher latitudes are very susceptible to the position of the polar front, which is the difference between colder Arctic water and warmer temperate water. “Cod really don’t do well when the water gets down below 0°C” says Jake Rice, implying that colder Arctic water leads to slower growth rates. Northern stocks “are therefore more vulnerable to environmental changes than in more temperature regions like the North Sea, where water is generally warmer and less variable” says Robin Cook.

If northern stocks are more vulnerable to environmental conditions, why are they doing better than southern populations? In short, global warming. Over the last 10-plus years, the northern stocks have been benefitting from a warming Arctic, which not only includes favorable environmental conditions (warmer water), but has also led to second order trophodynamic benefits. More specifically, the re-emergence of cod’s key food source: capelin. “Capelin is a key species in the Arctic and sub-Arctic ecosystem in the NE Atlantic, and there’s a clear connection between the availability of capelin and stock development of cod” says Chris Zimmermann. This has led to higher recruitment and thus the improvement of northern Atlantic stocks.

Southern stocks

The southern populations, conversely, are more heavily influenced by trophodynamics. Trophodynamics in the North Sea, Celtic Sea, and Irish Sea likely play a much larger role, particularly North Sea stock because it is a species-rich ecosystem. Unlike the northern populations, which are subject to cold Arctic water inflow, southern stocks are located in temperate waters. “The concern is that it might be getting too warm, and conditions are more favorable for some other species than they are for cod” says Jake Rice. In the western Atlantic, Georges Bank and Gulf of Maine stocks have declined in recent years through “a combination of historic overfishing and poor environmental conditions. Generally those stocks do well in cold winters and there hasn’t been a cold winter for a number of years…that has resulted in decline in recruitment success, etc.” says Steve Murawski. Increasing SST may be putting more stress on southern populations on both sides of the basin and may be altering their distribution. For instance, the center of spawning populations for European stocks are now further north than in past years because southern populations have not been as successful. “There’s a number of different possible drivers, temperature would be one…uneven fishing pressure…would be another one…Another potential driver keeping southern stock depressed could be multispecies effects” says Coby Needle.

Management

“Cod is extremely well-monitored…There are more than two dozen management stocks of Atlantic cod around the basin” says Steve Murawski. While these many programs each keep an eye on decreases in productivity, changes in recruitment, etc., “there’s a vast difference in the management approaches, certainly historically and even now” says Steve Murawski. These differences have lent a hand to the observed differences in stock status.

In general, poor environmental conditions combined with high fishing mortality rates contributed to the decline of many cod stocks in past years. One example is the Northern cod stock, where “a combination of overfishing and poor recruitment due to extremely cold weather conditions at Newfoundland conspired to result in a collapse in that stock from which it still is recovering” says Steve Murawski.

“I believe humans have the most important impact on the development stocks” says Chris Zimmermann. The number of participants in a fishery is an important factor, a stark example of which exists between the Barents Sea and North Sea stocks. The Barents Sea stock, which is in good shape, is harvested by 2 nations only (Norway and Russia) and includes a simple management system. In contrast, in the North Sea, which is low but rebuilding, there are several nations fishing on at least 2-3 different life stages. Five nations constitute the majority of the fishery targeting cod (Scotland, England, France, Denmark, and Norway) while minor impacts may come from bycatch of cod in fisheries targeting other species. “There are just too many participants, so it’s very difficult to reach an agreement, and it’s not only participants targeting the adult cod, but it’s also different fisheries catching juvenile cod as bycatch in the brown shrimp fishery, for example” says Chris Zimmermann. “What has happened is distribution of fishing effort hasn’t changed, but the distribution of the fish has changed dramatically, so they are much more distributed to the north” says Coby Needle. This means that nations fishing in northern areas are now catching a higher proportion of cod than their southern counterparts, which has interesting management implications. Despite these differences, the North Sea is now rebuilding, which, according to Steve Murawski, is because “managers have adopted a more conservation management approach. That, in combination with more effective management (actually meeting their targets), has resulted in improved prospects for that stock.”

Read the full story at CFOOD

Atlantic Cod: The Good, The Bad, and the Rebuilding

November 1, 2016 — Atlantic cod have been emblematic of fisheries problems, with the 1992 collapse of the Northern cod stock in Canada setting the stage for the last 25 years of concern surrounding status of cod stocks. Mark Kurlansky’s book “Cod” sold over a million copies, increasing awareness and concern over cod fisheries. Further, the two U.S. cod stocks continue to be at very low abundance; an article in the Houston Press released September of 2011 stated“Atlantic cod has been fished nearly to extinction.” However, over the entire Atlantic Ocean, the abundance of cod is high and increasing (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Abundance (in metric tons) of Atlantic cod from 1970 – 2010.

The purpose of this feature is to clarify the myriad of different claims recently released regarding the current status of Atlantic cod to highlight that not all is doom and gloom, but rather a mixed story of good and bad. In other words, not all stocks are low, failing to recover, and doomed to perish. In fact, what we actually see are three broad categories of stocks: those that are doing poorly, those that are low but rebuilding, and those that are large and doing well. In researching this story, we analyzed abundance data collected by scientific institutions and interviewed a range of scientists who have been involved in cod stock assessment and management over the last 15-35 years. These experts include: Chris Zimmermann, Director of the Institute of Baltic Sea Fisheries with 15 years of experience working on ICES stocks; Coby Needle, Head of the Sea Fisheries Programme at MSS Marine Laboratory in Aberdeen, Scotland and an active member of several ICES working groups for 20 years; Jake Rice, Chief Scientist Emeritus at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Canada (DFO) with 35 years of experience in cod stock assessment; Robin Cook, a Senior Research Fellow in the MASTS Population Modelling Group at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow who has been involved in ICES fisheries science since 1982; and Steve Murawski, a Professor of Biological Oceanography at University of South Florida (USF) with 7 years of experience as a Chief Scientist at the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).

The story of cod is complex; there are many different and unique stocks occupying distinct regions within the Atlantic basin that are subject to environmental factors and political influences that differ based on geographic location. “If you look at the whole picture, you see that there is no consistent whole picture…Every single stock develops differently” says Chris Zimmermann. “Stock dynamics are quite different from area to area, so a big picture is difficult to get a handle on because there isn’t one,” agrees Coby Needle. Further, “they all have very different management histories and scenarios in terms of their status” says Steve Murawski.

Status of Stocks

There are over two dozen cod stocks that are defined as management units, 6 of which are addressed in this feature: 2 on the western side and 4 on the eastern side of the Atlantic basin (see Figure 2). The two U.S. stocks are Georges Bank and Gulf of Maine, and the four European stocks occupy the shelves of Iceland, the Barents Sea, the North Sea, the Celtic Sea, and the Baltic Sea.

Figure 2. Map showing location of 6 different cod stocks addressed in this feature. The darker blue region represents Atlantic cod distribution, and the 6 circles represent stocks being examined in this feature. Red circles represent stocks that are doing poorly (Celtic Sea, Gulf of Maine, Georges Bank), yellow circles represent stocks that are low but recovering (North Sea), and green circles represent stocks that are doing well (Barents Sea, shelves of Iceland).

This feature focuses on the general trends among most of these stocks to demonstrate that rather than all stocks doing poorly, what we actually see are 3 broad categories of stocks: those that are (1) doing poorly, (2) low but rebuilding, and (3) doing well.

Read the full story at CFOOD

Scientists have found a way to predict whether fisheries are vulnerable to climate change

July 29, 2016 — World fisheries have steadily been declining over the past couple of decades, and the trend is continuing today.

Just this April, the United States banned most Pacific sardine fishing after the fish population declined by 90% over a nine year period.

And now, one of the United State’s fisheries that was once thought to be “indestructible” is in grave danger as well.

New England’s coastal Atlantic cod population used to be able to recover from short-term population drops, but since 2008, the cod fish have been unable to successfully rebound.

Overexploitation by humans is one of the leading causes of the drops in fish populations, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). But a new study places at least part of the blame on the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) as well.

The NAO is responsible for causing warmer water temperatures in the North Atlantic by creating basin-wide changes in the intensity and location of the North Atlantic jet stream and storm track. It also affects the normal patterns of heat and moisture, affecting temperature and precipitation patterns. This varying phenomenon is the reason for at least 17% of the New England population loss since 1980. The warmer water temperatures cycle hurt the reproductive processes in fish.

Read the full story from Business Insider

Cod and climate: North Atlantic Oscillation factor in decline

July 28, 2016 — In recent decades, the plight of Atlantic cod off the coast of New England has been front-page news. Since the 1980s in particular, the once-seemingly inexhaustible stocks of Gadus morhua — one of the most important fisheries in North America — have declined dramatically.

In 2008, a formal assessment forecasted that stocks would rebound, but by 2012, they were once again on the verge of collapse. Two years later, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration instituted an unprecedented six-month closure of the entire Gulf of Maine cod fishery to allow stocks to recover.

While overfishing is one known culprit, a new study co-authored by researchers at UC Santa Barbara and Columbia University finds that the climatological phenomenon known as the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is also a factor. And it contributes in a predictable way that may enable fishery managers to protect cod stocks from future collapse. The group’s findings appear in the journal PLOS ONE.

“In the 1980s, the North Atlantic was stuck in a positive phase of NAO,” said lead author Kyle Meng, an economist at UCSB’s Bren School of Environmental Science & Management. “We show not only that positive NAO conditions diminish a few consecutive cohorts of cod larvae but also that this effect follows a cohort as it matures.”

Read the full story at Science Daily

Overfishing Not Solely to Blame for New England Cod Collapse

July 28, 2016 — Overfishing is a known culprit of the decline of Atlantic cod off the coast of New England but now, a new study co-authored by researchers at UC Santa Barbara and Columbia University has found that the climatological phenomenon known as the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is also a factor. And it contributes in a predictable way that may enable fishery managers to protect cod stocks from future collapse.

“In the 1980s, the North Atlantic was stuck in a positive phase of NAO,” said lead author Kyle Meng, an economist at UCSB’s Bren School of Environmental Science & Management.

“We show not only that positive NAO conditions diminish a few consecutive cohorts of cod larvae but also that this effect follows a cohort as it matures.”

The NAO is a periodic climatic phenomenon that, like El Niño, causes changes in water temperatures, although the mechanism is different and the NAO affects the North Atlantic rather than the Pacific.

Also like El Niño, the NAO may be affected in terms of both strength and frequency by climate change. The researchers found that, since 1980, NAO conditions have accounted for up to 17 per cent of the decline in New England cod stocks.

“The Atlantic cod fishery has been the poster child of fishery science and challenges in the field,” said co-author Kimberly Oremus of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.

Read the full story at The Fish Site

How fisheries impact behavioural evolution in Atlantic cod

May 31, 2016 — As seen in other animal species, fish individuals tend to react differently to a new situation. In the case of human harvest, the boldest individuals are more likely to get caught, leaving only the fearful and cautious ones to breed. But does it mean that future generations of fish will become harder to catch? This is one of the questions the BE-FISH project tried to answer.

Fish personality—consistent individual behaviour which is maintained over time and across contexts—is known to result from adaptive processes involving life-history trade-offs or physiological constraints. Concretely, a population from a single species can include individuals of the same sex, size or age which feature different behavioural traits, these traits being grouped in five major categories: shyness-boldness, exploration-avoidance, activity, sociability and aggressiveness. Various studies have demonstrated that this personality variation is heritable.

Scientists in the BE-FISH (Pace of life syndromes in fish: harvesting effects and the role of marine reserves) project have long suspected that fisheries may contribute to such evolutionary impacts in marine resources by selectively removing specific life-history traits.

Dr David Villegas-Rios, Marie Curie Postdoctoral fellow at the Flødevigen Research Station (IMR) and coordinator of the project, discusses the project results. According to him, they provide a unique link between fisheries, behavioural ecology and evolutionary biology sciences, and as such will lead the way to various national and EU projects in the coming years.

Human harvesting is a non-random activity. It often removes individuals because they are more desirable (e.g. trophy hunting) or because they are more vulnerable, as is the case for fishing. For instance, bolder individuals will enter a fishing trap more easily than shier ones. Similarly, more active fish find the nets faster than less active individuals. This means that behaviour can determine fitness.

By consistently removing individuals with certain behavioural properties, fishing practices can entail evolutionary consequences in the harvested populations. For instance, by favouring evolution towards less active phenotypes. The ecological consequences of such practices are still largely unknown but they can be maladaptive, reducing the potential for future adaptations along with the productivity of the populations.

Read the full story at Phys.org

NEFSC, Canadian scientists critique study claiming overfishing of Gulf of Maine cod

April 26, 2016 — A study by a group of researchers led by Dr. Andrew J. Pershing from the Gulf of Maine Research Institute appeared in Science last November (“Slow adaptation in the face of rapid warming leads to collapse of the Gulf of Maine cod fishery”). The Pershing study concluded that fisheries managers overseeing Gulf of Maine cod failed to consider ocean temperature in their management strategies, leading to overfishing of the stock. This week’s issue of Science published comments from two groups of scientists critiquing the Pershing study and its conclusions. In the same issue, the Pershing team responded with a defense of their work. Summaries of the comments and response are provided below:

A group of researchers at the Population Dynamics Branch of the Northeast Fisheries Science Center, led by Dr. Michael C. Palmer, argues that the Pershing study’s claim that rising temperatures led to “extra mortality” is unsubstantiated by the overall mortality data. While Palmer’s group agrees that environmental factors affect fish stocks, they argue that the Pershing study failed to attribute additional mortality to temperature alone. Consequently, they conclude, “The analyses of Pershing et al. provide no evidence to support the hypothesis that failure to account for increases in temperature led to overfishing of the Gulf of Maine Atlantic cod stock.”

Read the full comment at Science

A group of Canadian fishery scientists led by Dr. Douglas P. Swain from Fisheries and Oceans Canada argues that the Pershing study is based on a flawed analysis of the population dynamics of Gulf of Maine cod. They write that the Pershing model made inappropriate assumptions, and that the model should undergo simulation before being used to make management decisions. They also argue that the Pershing study failed to take into account other factors that may have affected the mortality rates of Gulf of Maine cod. They conclude, “It is necessary to reserve judgment on the role of climate change…until more defensible analyses are conducted to address this issue.”

Read the full comment at Science

The Pershing group published a response to these comments. They argue that including temperature-dependent mortality improves abundance estimates. Further, using this metric shows that warming waters reduces growth rates of Gulf of Maine cod. They conclude, “Our report did not claim to have a definite answer to what is causing cod mortality to increase. Rather, we claimed that this increase is real, that it is likely related to temperature, and that failing to account for it led to catch advice that allowed for overfishing.”

Read the full response at Science

Scientists say more cod might survive fishing than thought

April 22, 2016 — BIDDEFORD, Maine — A group of scientists say more Atlantic cod might survive being thrown back in the water by fishermen than previously thought.

Scientists from several organizations, including the New England Aquarium in Boston and University of New England in Biddeford, conducted a study. It’s published in the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea’s Journal of Marine Science.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Washington Times

Why homemade gefilte fish is becoming an endangered species at Passover

April 19, 2016 — As if preparing for Passover wasn’t enough work and worry, now comes a gefilte fish crisis.

This might not be as consequential as, say, the Atlantic cod crisis. But for the diminishing few of us who still patshke (slave away) in the kitchen before Passover to make traditional gefilte fish from scratch, it’s definitely troubling.

What’s happened is that the freshwater fish used in making it — that tried-and-true trifecta of pike, carp, and whitefish — has become so hard to find and so expensive that homemade gefilte fish could someday soon be an endangered species. I worry we Jews are being priced out of our tradition.

“It’s all about supply and demand,” said Mike Machado, purchasing director of Boston Sword & Tuna, a fish wholesaler. “The species aren’t indigenous to this area. A lot of the whitefish nowadays, it goes to New York, which has the highest contingent of Jewish people.”

Read the full story at The Boston Globe