Commercial fishing Archives - Page 4 of 38

ALASKA: Increasing quality, safety, and sustainability of Alaska seafood

October 30, 2026 — The seafood marketplace is a battleground, and the fight between wild and farmed salmon has raged since the early 2000s. “One industry spurs the other to make changes,” says Julie Decker, president of the Pacific Seafood Processors Association—the PSPA. Decker will be speaking on a panel titled: Value Starts on Deck: Creating a Culture of Food Safety, Quality, and Sustainability Onboard. Joining Decker on the panel are Seafood Consultant John Boyce of Cultivate SA and Lisa Goche, CEO of Seafood Collaborators LLC.

“We’re looking at a three-pronged approach,” says Boyce. “Safety, Quality, and Sustainability. I will talk about safety, Julie will talk about quality, and Lisa will talk about sustainability.”

Speaking with Decker and Boyce, both want to amplify the message that food safety and quality begin on deck. “We have to think of fish as food as soon as it comes out of the water,” says Decker, noting that other suppliers to the global salmon market such as the Russians and the aquaculture industry have certain advantages that force Alaska fishermen to up their game. “There was a crash in the early 2000s where we realized we had to do a lot of things differently, and one of those things was to increase quality.”

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

MAINE: Maine plans survey around offshore wind sites

October 30, 2026 — The Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR) is planning a winter bottom trawl survey around the state’s long-planned offshore wind energy research project, aiming to understand how floating wind turbines may affect the ocean ecosystem and commercial fishing.

After major offshore wind proposals succumbed to opposition from the Trump administration, the modest Maine Research Array Wind Energy Area – a lease area of almost 15,000 acres in the Gulf of Maine – remains in limbo, since a potential developer bowed out in March 2026 over that uncertainty about federal policy.

Maine researchers are still working to build a knowledge base around future wind power and fisheries.

The 55-foot dragger Northern Lights is scheduled to set out from Portland to work from around Jan. 11 through Feb. 28, with 37 sampling tows over nine days. The time frame is weather-dependent and could extend into March, according to an agency statement.

The sampling will help researchers examining fish and invertebrate populations “to establish baseline data that they will then compare with findings collected during the construction and operation” of a floating turbine array, according to the DMR.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Satellite Tags Reveal Red King Crab Migrations Are Linked to Environmental Conditions

October 30, 2026 — The Bristol Bay red king crab fishery was once one of the largest and most valuable crab fisheries in the world, but it collapsed in the early 1980s. Managers established closure areas to help the population rebound, but the boundaries of these closure areas are fixed and cannot adapt to changing environmental conditions and shifting crab distributions. Previous research has documented northward movements of the Bristol Bay red king crab population. Changes in their seasonal migration patterns may limit the effectiveness of static closure areas like the Red King Crab Savings Area.

In response to this pressing management need, a new satellite tagging study tracked and modeled movements of mature male red king crab in Bristol Bay from late spring through the fall during 2021–2024. The research team’s “movement models” predicted that red king crab generally moved to the west or southwest by the fall—into deeper and cooler areas in central Bristol Bay. In years with warmer bottom water temperatures, crab moved further west. The model’s predictions were validated by commercial catches from the fall Bristol Bay red king crab fishery and researchers are currently applying this approach to other seasons.

Future applications in the winter and spring may provide important insights about movements during mating and molting. These are the times of the year when the crab are more vulnerable. This information will help fishery managers evaluate current closure area boundaries and inform future boundary changes that may be needed to better align with present and projected seasonal migration patterns.

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries

Sea Grant invests $1.3 million in next generation of fishermen

October 30, 2026 — Sea Grant is investing $1.3 million in four projects aimed at helping young fishermen enter and advance in the commercial fishing industry, with programs planned in Maine, Virginia, Washington, and the Gulf of America.

The funding comes through the Young Fishermen’s Development Program, established under the Young Fishermen’s Development Act, which was signed into law in 2021. The program is designed to address barriers facing new entrants to commercial fishing, including high financial risks, limited training opportunities, and challenges building a viable career in the industry.

The four competitively selected projects will provide training, technical assistance, and career development opportunities. Award recipients are also required to provide a 25% non-federal funding match.

In Maine, the Maine Lobstermen’s Association received $399,677 for its Young Lobstermen Business and Leadership Advancement Project, led by principal investigator Patrice McCarron.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

How El Niño could threaten your favorite seafood for years to come

October 29, 2026 — Squid are shifting to cooler water, young salmon are struggling to find food sources, and concern is growing for Oregon’s $100 million Dungeness crab harvest as a powerful El Niño weather pattern heats up coastal ocean temperatures from California to the Pacific Northwest. Scientists expect the phenomenon to last for several months, leaving fishermen such as Phil Fogle scrambling.

Fogle, who owns two squid fishing boats based in the port of Anacortes, in Washington state, normally would keep fishing until foul weather sets in — his boats operate from Eureka, California, to Kodiak, Alaska. Instead, Fogle tied up his boats last week and furloughed his seven employees. The squid that normally inhabit coastal water have fled offshore for colder, deeper water that are harder to reach for smaller boats.

“Those little buggers are really affected by water temperature,” Fogle said about the squid. “It has been devastating to us.”

He said he’s losing about $50,000 a month.

Fogle said he’s waiting for the El Niño conditions to pass and hoping to get on the water again early next year.

This year’s El Niño, the strongest on record, has led temperatures off the Pacific Northwest coast to jump 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit above the average from 1991 to 2020, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. El Niño’s warmth has arrived on top of an existing marine heat wave in the Gulf of Alaska, according to Steven Bograd, senior climatologist at NOAA.

Read the full article at The Washington Post

Feds now question their own approval of New England Wind

October 29, 2026 — New England Wind is the latest offshore wind project in the federal government’s crosshairs.

In response to a lawsuit spearheaded by Nantucket-based nonprofit ACK for Whales, federal officials are asking a judge to allow them to reconsider their approval of the project about 24 miles southwest of Nantucket.

In an Oct. 20 court filing responding to the plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment, the Department of the Interior agreed with ACK for Whales saying that its previous approval did not adequately explain how the project would comply with requirements protecting the environment, fishing and navigation.

“This filing by DOI is significant in our efforts to protect the environment around Nantucket from the damaging impacts of large scale offshore wind development,” ACK for Whales member Veronica Bonnet said.

The government is asking the court to send the project’s construction and operations plan back for further review under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act.

Read the full article at The Inquirer and Mirror

CALIFORNIA: Bay Area conservationists team up to address crab-fishing entanglements

October 29,2026 — Bay Area conservationists are teaming up with commercial fishers to reduce whale-entanglement risks while supporting the local Dungeness crab industry.

The Marine Mammal Center and The Nature Conservancy this month formed a partnership with the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations to form the Dungeness Crab and Whale Conservation Collaborative.

The effort will develop a modern whale-monitoring system that allows California wildlife officials to make more informed decisions about when to open and close parts of the state’s coastline to commercial fishing.

Read the full article at the San Francisco Examiner

MASSACHUSETTS: Gloucester remembers the crew of the Andrea Gail, 35 years after they were lost during ‘Perfect Storm’

October 29, 2026 — This week marks 35 years since a Gloucester-based fishing vessel bound for home was lost at sea in a massive tempest that was later dubbed “The Perfect Storm.”

Six fishermen were lost aboard the Andrea Gail, a commercial fishing vessel, which had been out on the waters off of Canada, when a massive storm hit New England.

On board at the time were Captain Frank “Billy” Tyne, Robert “Bobby” Shatford, David “Sully” Sullivan, Michael “Bugsy” Moran, Dale “Murph” Murphy, and Alfred Pierre.

David Sullivan’s sister, Catherine Sullivan Mustone, still lives in Gloucester, and told NewsCenter 5 that the loss of her brother is a wound that will never be fully healed.

Read the full article at WCVB

War in the Middle East continuing to disrupt Iran’s fisheries sector, with estimated millions in losses

October 29, 2026 — According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), ongoing war in the Middle East has heavily disrupted Iran’s fisheries sector, especially in two of the nation’s top commercial fishing provinces.

OCHA estimated that direct and indirect losses to the fisheries sectors in the provinces of Hormozgan and Bushehr have totaled around USD 105.9 million (EUR 94.4 million). This comes as more than 60 percent of the fishing fleet in the two provinces remains inactive, directly impacting the income of an estimated 37,000 fishers and causing other adverse impacts on the livelihoods of an estimated 300,000 people.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

The Permitting Bill Fishermen Can’t Afford to Ignore

October 29, 2026 — On November 9, the Senate is scheduled to take up the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026, known as BAAJA (S. 5653). This legislation is not about Mexican sheep; instead, the dense 400-page bill rewrites how the federal government approves energy, mining, and infrastructure projects. Its sponsors, Senators Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Mike Lee (R-UT), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), and Martin Heinrich (D-NM), call it a historic compromise. I call it a historic risk for fishing communities.

The coalition behind BAAJA is unusual. The American Petroleum Institute (oil and gas), the American Clean Power Association (wind and other renewables), and major organized labor groups support it. Tribal nations, historic preservation groups, and ocean conservation organizations oppose it.

Commercial fishermen have been mostly absent from this fight, and that needs to change. BAAJA rewrites the rules for offshore wind farms, export cables, offshore oil and gas, and seabed mining. It changes how those projects are approved, how long the approvals last, and how hard they are to challenge. Nearly every change reduces the leverage fishermen have used to protect fishing grounds historically, and that’s not a coincidence.

The Senate outcome is close to being settled. The House is a different story, and that is where fishermen still have a real opening. But we must make our voices heard, and soon.

What this issue is about

Fishermen have spent more than a decade fighting for a real voice in offshore wind decisions. Lease areas have been granted on productive fishing grounds over industry objections, and project layouts have been set with little regard for how fleets actually fish or what they need for safe transit. Too often, fishermen’s concerns have been treated as a box to check rather than a reason to change course.

BAAJA would shrink what voice fishermen have left in the regulatory process for energy permitting. Its supporters pitch it as protection for clean energy, pointing to the 2025 federal stop-work orders that halted offshore wind projects already holding permits. The bill delivers that protection by making permits nearly impossible to revisit once they are issued, and much harder to challenge before then during the planning process.

The bill doesn’t stop at wind. Its “protections” for energy projects from public scrutiny and challenge cover any federally permitted project with a private sector sponsor, including offshore oil and gas wells and mines. The same rules that would wall off a wind farm from fishermen’s objections would wall off an offshore drilling lease or a seabed mining permit.