Saving Seafood

Endangered giants at risk off Cape Cod. Why these animals die here more than anywhere else

October 13, 2025 — Leatherback sea turtles visiting the waters off Cape Cod each year face a higher risk of fatal boat strikes than in any region along the Atlantic or Gulf coasts, according to a new study that includes contributions from three Cape researchers.

Between 2010 and 2022, watercraft struck 88 leatherbacks in waters off the Cape and Nantucket — more than a quarter of the 337 recorded collisions nationwide during the same period.

The largest marine turtle species in the world, leatherbacks are listed as endangered by the state and federal government. Under the Massachusetts Wildlife Action Plan the turtles are a species of greatest conservation needs.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

A new trend has surfaced among sharks in Cape Cod waters. Here’s what one expert says

September 26, 2025 — Researchers have been studying white sharks on Cape Cod for nearly two decades, and they’ve been noticing some changing habits over the last couple of years following what seems like an explosion of sightings.

Greg Skomal and his team of researchers at the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife are in the thick of white shark research — on the water, studying and tagging several days a week — but they’ve been noticing a trend.

“The number of sharks would increase fairly dramatically through the month of July. And we have noticed that is not happening anymore. Our big months now, it starts in late August, but it’s September, October,” Skomal, of MassWildlife, said. “These animals are migrating past us and getting up to Canada, getting up into the Gulf of Maine a lot faster than they used to.”

Read the full article at NBC Boston

Right whale plane surveys in Gulf of Maine suspended with $200K budget cut

September 4, 2025 — Fall airplane surveys tracking North Atlantic right whales north of Cape Cod in the Gulf of Maine, run by the Provincetown-based Center for Coastal Studies, are off the table after federal funding was cut.

While the fall flights are grounded, the center’s leadership stressed that the winter and spring surveys over Cape Cod Bay remain unaffected and on schedule.

The center expanded its whale research program beyond the bay last year. The newer program was supported with funds from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, the federal agency that oversees ocean and wildlife programs.

North Atlantic right whales are among the world’s most endangered large whales species, and Cape Cod Bay is a key seasonal habitat, where a significant portion of the population gathers, especially in the spring.

Read the full article at Cape Cod Times

Lobstermen Seek Injunction to Fight a New Rule

August 14, 2025 — Since 1997, lobstermen along the Eastern seaboard have had to throw back lobsters with a “V-notch” — a triangular cut in the tail of an egg-bearing female that establishes it as uncatchable breed stock.

Until last month, the notch rules differed depending upon whether a fisherman had a federal permit or a state one. Federal permits allow lobstermen to fish farther offshore but have a tighter notch size restriction. Federal permit holders could harvest only lobsters with notches measuring 1/8-inch or less — the idea being that these lobsters had more time to grow, molt, and reproduce by the time they were taken. State permit holders could take lobsters with notches of up to ¼-inch.

As of July 1, an addendum to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) lobster management plan calls for the smaller notch size for all lobster permit holders.

The change is meant to expand protection of the spawning stock, according to the text of the addendum. The measure also seeks to “resolve discrepancies between the regulations for state and federal permit-holders,” the document says.

But the Outer Cape’s lobstermen who hold state permits say that the rollover to the federal permit holders’ rule should not apply to them. That’s the majority of lobstermen here: there are 64 commercial lobster permits issued to Outer Cape fishermen, and 41 are state-only permits, according to Julia Hopkins, a spokesperson for the Mass. Dept. of Fish & Game.

Outer Cape lobstermen say they worked out an exception years ago that promised them that V-notching would be optional for fishermen working in this area in exchange for their having a larger minimum size requirement. They say this was agreed with the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission because it made for better conservation in local waters.

Read the full article at The Provincetown Independent

Endangered fin whale and calf sighting is a “rare occurrence,” New England Aquarium scientist says

August 7, 2025 — New England Aquarium researchers recently documented what they say was a rare sighting of an endangered fin whale and its calf.

Scientists on a July 24 aerial survey flew over the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, about 130 miles southeast of Cape Cod. They observed more than 1,000 marine animals, including seven fin whales, one endangered sperm whale, one humpback whale, two minke whales and more than 900 dolphins.

“Seeing an endangered fin whale and its calf is a rare occurrence,” assistant research scientist Kate Laemmle said in a statement Wednesday.

Read the full article at CBS News

Offshore wind plans caught in federal headwinds, but sites east of Cape Cod unaffected

August 7, 2025 — State and local officials and regional advocacy groups are split over the federal government’s decision to back off on offshore wind projects, a shift that casts uncertainty over new projects nationwide but doesn’t affect leases east and south of Cape Cod.

State Rep. Steven Xiarhos, R-West Barnstable, welcomes the changes as “a necessary course correction.”

“It reflects what many of us on Cape Cod and across the commonwealth have been saying for some time: the rush to industrialize our oceans has gone too far, too fast, and without enough science, transparency, or respect for local communities,” he said.

He added that the action “gives us a critical opportunity to pause, reassess, and get this right.”

Read the full article at Cape Cod Times

 

MASSCHUSETTS: Cape Cod lobstermen fear loss of livelihood due to Massachusetts red tape

June 23, 2025 — Cape Cod lobstermen are trying to fend off state and federal regulations that they say could put them out of business in an effort that an attorney describes as a “misguided push for uniformity.”

Beginning July 1, lobstermen will face strict rules when harvesting certain female lobsters in state and federal waters around outer Cape Cod, extending from Chatham to Provincetown’s Race Point, including a part of upper Cape Cod Bay.

The Outer Cape Lobstermen’s Association, a group of roughly 70 Massachusetts-licensed lobster trap fishers, is fighting back against the state Division of Marine Fisheries and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, reopening a decades-old federal complaint.

The dispute will be heard in a status conference scheduled for Monday in Boston federal court.

Lobstermen in the Outer Cape Cod Conservation Management Area have been allowed to catch so-called V-notched lobsters under a 2000 settlement, but the rules set to go into effect next week will essentially ban that fishing, according to an attorney for the association.

In 2000, the association and the Commonwealth established a “regulatory regime” for outer Cape Cod distinct from other lobster conservation management areas in the state. The settlement permitted lobstermen in the region to fish for most V-notched lobsters in exchange for stricter gauge size requirements.

Read the full article at Boston Herald

MASSACHUSETTS: Cape Cod Bay targeted for a new artificial reef after success of previous reefs in Nantucket Sound

May 30, 2025 — The Dennis and Brewster Select Boards are in support of a new artificial reef in Cape Cod Bay that has been proposed by the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries.

The reef would cover about ten acres using 35,000 cubic yards of natural materials and clean concrete.

Historically, local reefs were naturally created by shipwrecks. Then in 1978, the DMF helped develop the first-ever artificial reef in Nantucket Sound, south of the Bass River in Yarmouth. That reef was constructed using tires filled with concrete.

Another reef was completed in 2016 south of Saquatucket Harbor in Harwich, using material from the demolished Harwich High School.

Read the full article at CapeCod.com

From “Jaws” to Jaw-Dropping Science: How Cape Cod Became a Hotbed for Great White Shark Research

May 23, 2025 — From fear to fascination: That’s how humans’ view of great white sharks has evolved, scientists say, since the movie “Jaws” took the world by storm in 1975.

On Cape Cod, this 50th anniversary summer will be filled with the latest in shark research.

State shark expert Greg Skomal, a senior biologist at the Division of Marine Fisheries, works closely with the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy in Chatham. He says technologies like acoustic detection and drone cameras are showing scientists more about shark behavior than ever before.

“What’s really cool is, at the time when ‘Jaws’ was made, we knew virtually nothing about the great white shark,” he said. “And in those 50 years, we’ve totally exploded — meaning the scientific community — what we know about this species. So it’s an exciting time, because the tools that we use now didn’t exist back then.”

One relatively new tool is the video tag. This year, Cape shark researchers plan to put video tags on white sharks to get a “shark’s-eye view” of shark activity inside Cape Cod Bay, rather than off the Outer Cape.

Read the full article at Rhode Island PBS

As New England waters warm, invasive sea squirts move in

April 22, 2025 — At a dock on Cape Cod’s Buzzards Bay, a group of researchers and marine biology students lie on their stomachs, peering over the wooden planks to examine what living things are stuck underneath.

Using fishing nets and kitchen spatulas, they scrape samples into plastic trays for a closer look. Kristin Osborne, a sea squirt expert and assistant professor at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy, likes to use her bare hands.

“I said I wasn’t gonna get down here and do this, but I can’t help myself,” Osborne said with a laugh while reaching into the chilly ocean. She has a sea squirt tattoo on her left middle finger.

Sea squirts are a type of filter feeding marine invertebrate officially known as tunicates. These colorful blobs can squirt water when removed from their aquatic homes, earning them the nickname.

Read the full story at WBUR