March 4, 2020 — West Coast salmon fishermen are facing another grim year, trollers heard last week at state meetings in Washington, Oregon and California.
In Washington, lower numbers of coho are projected to return to the Columbia River and to Washington’s coastal streams. The low numbers will likely constrain both sport and commercial fisheries.
February 25, 2020 — Three years ago, a cargo container purportedly transporting thousands of pounds of pickles from Panama was placed on a Hong Kong-bound ship that stopped at the Port of Oakland on a chilly February night. Hundreds of rectangular containers were stacked on the giant vessel like Lego blocks, but state and federal wildlife agents knew there was something fishy about this one.
Inside, the agents found nearly 52,000 pounds of frozen shark fins, cut from an estimated 9,500 sharks. A cursory inspection revealed that some of the fins were from protected species that require permits to be legally traded. So officials seized the shipment, valued at just under $1 million, making it one of the largest single shark fin seizures in U.S. history.
California may have banned the shark fin trade years ago, but the container is hardly the only one of its kind passing through the state’s bustling ports: A recent report from the Natural Resources Defense Council estimated that hundreds of thousands of pounds of shark fins from Latin America transit West Coast and other U.S. ports each year, destined to land in a bowl of shark fin soup in Hong Kong and other Asian cities.
“We think we’ve just found the tip of the iceberg, and it’s a little hard to say how big the iceberg is,” said the report’s author, Elizabeth Murdock, the San Francisco-based director of the environmental group’s Pacific Oceans Initiative.
The wildlife agents and scientists waiting for the container in Oakland on Feb. 10, 2017, had been tipped off by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, whose agents had cracked open the container at the Port of Long Beach. An agency spokesperson declined to comment on what led to the container’s initial inspection, but its contents were a far cry from the “cucumbers/gherkins” listed as the shipment’s tariff code.
The fin trade is driven by the high demand for shark fin soup, a Chinese delicacy that has caused the value of fins to skyrocket to as much as $500 a pound.
February 24, 2020 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:
Whales undertake some of the longest migrations on earth, often swimming many thousands of miles, over many months, to breed in the tropics. The question is why—is it to find food, or to give birth?
In a research paper in Marine Mammal Science, scientists propose that whales that forage in polar waters migrate to low latitudes to maintain healthy skin.
“I think people have not given skin molt due consideration when it comes to whales, but it is an important physiological need that could be met by migrating to warmer waters,” said Robert Pitman, lead author of the new paper and marine ecologist with Oregon State University’s Marine Mammal Institute. He was formerly with NOAA Fisheries’ Southwest Fisheries Science Center in La Jolla, California.
More than a century ago, whalers recognized that most whales that forage in high latitudes migrate to the tropics for calving. Scientists have never agreed on why. Because of their size, large whales should be able to successfully give birth in frigid polar waters. Due to reduced feeding opportunities in the tropics, most whales fast during their months-long migrations.
So why go to the trouble?
February 24, 2020 — Offshore wind developers are lining up to build the first wind turbines off the coast of California.
But they have a problem called the Department of Defense.
For years, the military has managed to block the establishment of offshore wind lease areas off of Southern and central California, effectively holding back development across the entire state.
Defense officials have said turbines would interrupt training exercises run by the Navy, the Air Force and other branches of the military out of a network of Southern and central California bases.
Wind could interfere with radar and other instruments of communication, and get in the way of low-altitude flights and live-fire operations, they say.
Now, a tentative compromise is being floated by Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-Calif.) with backing from the military and federal and state agencies: Let developers produce wind power in central California waters that the military had once ruled incompatible with its own operations, in exchange for a moratorium on turbines in other nearby waters. Details of the compromise were described to E&E News by the congressman and Defense and state officials involved in negotiations.
At stake could be the prospects for the first offshore wind farm on the West Coast and likely the country’s first to use floating turbines at large scale.
Offshore wind also could help California meet its 2045 goal of decarbonizing electricity, in part because offshore turbines would complement solar by producing more energy at night, helping getting around the “duck curve” challenge.
February 21, 2020 — California is suing the administration of President Donald Trump for what it calls the administration’s failure to protect endangered species in the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers.
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, the California Natural Resources Agency, and the California Environmental Protection Agency filed the lawsuit on Thursday against the Trump administration in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
The attorney general said the Trump administration was adopting “scientifically challenged biological opinions that push species to extinction” and harm natural resources and waterways.
The lawsuit stressed the Trump administration’s alleged failure to protect endangered fish species from federal water export operations.
In October, the Trump administration announced a plan to divert water to California farmers, fulfilling a campaign promise made by the president.
February 18, 2020 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:
The Pacific Fishery Management Council (Pacific Council) will convene a Stock Assessment Review (STAR) Panel meeting to review the 2020 Pacific sardine stock assessment. The meeting will be held Monday, February 24, 2020 through Thursday, February 27, 2020, in La Jolla, California. This meeting is open to the public.
Please see the Pacific Sardine STAR Panel February 24-27, 2020 meeting notice on the Council’s website for full details.
For further information:
February 18, 2020 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:
The Salmon Technical Team and staff of the Pacific Fishery Management Council (Council) have prepared this stock assessment and fishery evaluation document as a postseason review of the 2019 ocean salmon fisheries off the coasts of Washington, Oregon, and California to help assess Council salmon fishery management performance, the status of Council area salmon stocks, and the socioeconomic impacts of salmon fisheries. The Council will formally review this report at its March 2020 meeting prior to the development of management alternatives for the approaching fishing season.
Please visit the Council’s website to get the Review of 2019 Ocean Salmon Fisheries (Published February 2020).
For further information:
February 14, 2020 — The Dungeness crab fishery in California recently shut down months early after a 2017 lawsuit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) that required crab fishers to pull their gear out of the water with only 3 weeks notice. A settlement agreement was reached in March 2019, which included an early closure for the 2018-2019 Dungeness crab fishing season. Fishing gear is a serious threat to whales that live in, and migrate through, California waters. The California Dungeness Crab Fishing Gear Working Group, convened by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), informs regulators on ways in which to minimize entanglement risks and protect whales.
Why have there more whale entanglements recently?
According to a new paper published in the journal Nature Communications climate change could be responsible. According to lead researcher Jarrod Santora, warming events in recent years, combined with recovering whale populations cause whales to come in contact with crab fishing gear more regularly.
Crab season in California occurs between November and mid-July. Warming events in 2014-2016 caused an increase in the marine algae Pseudo-nitzschia which produce the neurotoxin domoic acid (the toxin causes shellfish poisoning in humans). In 2016, high levels of toxins delayed the crab season until March. In addition, the warmer waters changed feeding habits of humpback whales, steering them closer to shore where food was more prevalent. This perfect storm of events led to a sharp spike in observed whale entanglements in 2017. 70% of the whale entanglements reported in 2017 in the United States involved fishing gear.
February 13, 2020 — The following was released by The Office of Congressman Jared Huffman (D-CA):
Congressman Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael) Chair of the House Subcommittee on Water, Oceans, and Wildlife, and Congressman Ed Case (D-Honolulu) will be hosting the next stop on a nationwide fisheries listening tour Friday, February 21, at 10:00 a.m. HST in Honolulu, Hawaii. Congressman Case will moderate this discussion on federal fisheries policy in the context of the Western Pacific fishery management region, with Chairman Huffman joining remotely.
Members of the press interested in attending should submit their RSVP to Nestor Garcia with Congressman Case’s office at nestor.garcia@mail.house.gov.
WHO: Congressman Ed Case, Congressman Jared Huffman (will appear via video conference), fisheries and oceans experts
WHAT: Discussion on federal fisheries management
WHEN: Friday, February 21, 2020 @ 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. HST
WHERE: The Atherton Hālau in the Bishop Museum, 1525 Bernice Street, Honolulu, HI, 96817
This panel discussion with experts and stakeholders will include a detailed, technical examination of current and future challenges in federal fisheries management and will explore potential solutions. Guests will be able to ask questions during the roundtable and provide public comments at its conclusion.
The ideas Huffman receives from this listening tour, and from other stakeholder outreach that is already underway, will inform his introduction of a reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the primary law governing fisheries management in U.S. federal waters.
More detail on Huffman’s listening tour, which was first announced in July, can be found here.
February 10, 2020 — The International Pacific Halibut Commission adopted a total catch limit of 36.6 million pounds for the 2020 season, slightly less than last year. But the Total Constant Exploitation Yield (TCEY) includes non-commercial removals, so when those are subtracted, a commercial fishery catch limit of 27.48 million lbs remains. That amount includes charter sector allocations, and is about one million pounds less than what was caught last year.
The season will start on March 14 and close November 15, 2020.