Saving Seafood

Sens. Blumenthal and Portman ask president to expand seafood traceability rule

May 17, 2016 — U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Rob Portman (R-OH), co-chairs of the Senate Caucus to End Human Trafficking, sent a letter to the president today asking that he expand a proposed rule on seafood traceability.

“We welcome the Administration’s proposed rule on seafood traceability as a further step in combatting illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing and seafood fraud,” the Senators wrote. “However, we remain concerned that the steps outlined will not adequately address these problems and do little to confront human trafficking within the seafood supply chain.”

The letter urged the Administration to ensure the final version of the rule enhances enforcement requirements on the high seas to prevent human trafficking on vessels, expands seafood traceability to all species, and strengthens tracking requirements beyond the first point of entry into U.S. commerce.

“As a world leader, the U.S. must do all within its power to provide adequate safeguards against illegal and exploitative seafood supply chains,” the Senators concluded.

Read the full letter here

 

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD: Warming Atlantic bodes poorly for lobster industry

May 13, 2016 — It doesn’t take a crystal ball to see one possible future for the Maine lobster industry. All it takes is a look south.

Warming water temperatures, the result of man-made climate change, have for decades been the primary factor in pushing the lobster population farther and farther north, first decimating the industry off the coasts of Rhode Island and Connecticut, then off Cape Cod.

And even though the industry has been booming in Maine, with record landings the last three years, the focal point of the catch has changed through the years, from Casco Bay to Penobscot Bay and, now, Down East, a signal of its vulnerability to change.

One of the state’s iconic industries, indispensable to and inseparable from so many communities, is being disrupted. The question is: How far will it go?

Fortunately, regulators are watching.

TAKING NOTICE

The Maine Department of Marine Resources will soon award contracts for studies exploring not only the full economic impact of the lobster industry, on which there is surprisingly little data, but also the impact of warming ocean temperatures on lobster biology and the ocean ecosystem in the Gulf of Maine.

Read the full editorial at the Portland Press Herald

Connecticut’s Commercial Fishermen Prepare for Dangers of the High Sea

May 11, 2016 — From floods to fires —  burst pipes to a man overboard, when something goes wrong on a commercial fishing vessel — crew members at sea need to act fast. But how do they prepare?

I recently visited an emergency training session to learn more.

As I stood on a dock in Groton with Alex Taylor, the captain of a fishing boat out of New London, he took a drag off a cigarette, looked out at the ocean, and recalled how his boat’s engine caught fire a few months back.

“I couldn’t get to the fire to put it out,” he said. “So I got everybody on the back deck. Got the life raft down. Tried to go back in to get our immersion suits, but the fire was too much. [I] couldn’t get to the radio to call a Mayday — so we used a cell phone, luckily we were close enough to shore.”

As the fire burned, Taylor said he tossed a life raft in the water, and had his two crew mates jump in. He did a few more things to secure the boat, then hopped into the life raft. All he could do then, he said, was wait.

Read the full story at WNPR

NEFMC April/May Newsletter

May 6, 2016 — The Council Report summarizes major actions approved at NEFMC meetings or highlights items of interest.

At its April 19-21 meeting in Mystic CT, the Council approved actions related to the development of its fishery management plans. The issues involved:

  • Development of a Deep Sea Coral Amendment
  • Atlantic Herring Amendment 8
  • The Industry-Funded Monitoring Amendment
  • Sea Scallops and the NGOM Area
  • EBFM
  • Spiny Dogfish
  • At-Sea Monitoring
  • Small Mesh Multispecies

Read the full newsletter as a PDF

ASMFC Atlantic Menhaden Board Approves Draft Addendum I for Public Comment

May 5, 2016 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Comission:

Alexandria, VA – The Atlantic Menhaden Management Board approved Draft Addendum I to Amendment 2 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan (FMP) for Atlantic Menhaden for public comment. The Draft Addendum proposes modifying the FMP’s bycatch allowance provision. Specifically, it considers allowing two licensed individuals to harvest up to 12,000 pounds of menhaden bycatch when working from the same vessel fishing stationary, multi-species gear – limited to one vessel trip per day. Bycatch represents less than 2% of the total coastwide landings.

The practice of two permitted fishermen working together from the same vessel to harvest Atlantic menhaden primarily occurs in the Chesapeake Bay pound net fishery.  This practice enables the fishermen to pool resources for fuel and crew.  However, the practice is currently constrained by the FMP’s bycatch allowance provision, which includes a 6,000 pound/vessel/day limit. The Draft Addendum seeks comment on whether the provision should be revised to accommodate the interests of fixed-gear fishermen who work together, as authorized by the states and jurisdictions in which they fish.

The intent of Draft Addendum I is to add flexibility to one element of the bycatch allowance provision while the Board prepares to address menhaden management more comprehensively through the development of Draft Amendment 3 to the FMP over the next two years. A subsequent press release on the public hearing schedule and Draft Addendum I availability will be distributed once state hearings have been scheduled.

In a separate action, the Board extended the episodic event set aside program until the finalization of Amendment 3. It also conditionally approved a request from New York to be added as an eligible state.  The program reserves 1% of the coastwide total allowable catch to be used by New England states in areas and times when menhaden occur in higher abundance than normal.  Rhode Island opted into the program in 2014 and 2015, and harvested a portion of the set aside each year.  As a result of the Board’s decision to extend the program, the states of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut remain eligible to participate in the program in 2016.

New York is currently reporting unusually large amounts of menhaden in the Peconic Bay estuary, raising the potential for more large fish kills, similar to last year, as the waters warm.  New York sought Board approval to participate in the episodic event set aside program so fishermen can harvest a portion of the large build-up of menhaden in the Peconic Bay estuary to mitigate the impacts of additional fish kills. The Board approved the request subject to a one million pound harvest cap under the episodic event set aside.

Long Island Sound is a fight worth the engagement

May 4, 2016 — U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., has launched a dramatic — if quixotic — drive in Congress for an $860 million-a-year program to protect Long Island Sound.

May his effort be successful. But even in pushing the issue into the news, Murphy does a service in keeping awareness of the Sound’s fragility in the public conversation.

The Sound, as noted here often, is a multi-million dollar economic asset and a major component in the state’s quality of life. It is never to be underestimated as an economic driver.

A Hearst Connecticut Media investigation last year of federal Environmental Protection Agency documents uncovered unsettling data on the threat to marine life from pollutants that continue to flow into the Sound.

Read the full story at Greenwich Time

Lobster fishing to be restricted in bid to save population

PORTLAND, Maine — May 3, 2016 — Southern New England’s fading lobster fishery will be the subject of a battery of new regulations to try to save the crustacean’s population locally.

The number of adult lobsters in New England south of Cape Cod was estimated in 2013 to be about 10 million, which is one-fifth the total from the late 1990s. Scientists issued a report last year that said the historic and economically important species is shifting northward in large part due to the warming of the ocean.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s lobster management board voted on Monday to use new measures to address the lobster decline, which has dramatically reduced lobster catches off Rhode Island and Connecticut.

The new regulations could include a combination of things like closed seasons, closed fishing areas, trapping cutbacks and stricter standards about the minimum and maximum size of harvestable lobsters.

“We’ve clearly got an overfished stock. We’ve got multiple problems that we actually need to fix,” said David Borden, chair of the lobster board. “The climate’s changing. When you do this, there is a cost to the industry.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at CBS Boston

Research supports blaming warmer waters for lobster decline

May 2, 2016 — HARTFORD, Conn. — Connecticut researchers found no pesticides in lobsters collected in Long Island Sound in late 2014, a new study has found, boosting evidence that warming water temperatures are the main culprit in a huge crustacean decline that has decimated the local lobster industry.

The findings raise questions about restrictions Connecticut passed in 2013, amid concern over declining lobster stocks, limiting coastal use of pesticides that can control mosquito populations that transmit diseases, including the West Nile and Zika viruses.

Lobstermen supported the restrictions, believing pesticides contributed to lobster die-offs. Some municipal and environmental officials were opposed, saying the rules would restrict the use of effective mosquito-controlling pesticides that can protect public health and there was no proven connection between pesticides and lobster die-offs.

The renewed debate about pesticides and lobsters comes as concern grows about the Zika virus spreading to the U.S. from Latin America and the Caribbean. The virus is mainly spread through mosquito bites and causes mild illness or no symptoms in most people. But it can cause microcephaly, a severe birth defect in which babies are born with abnormally small heads.

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

CONNECTICUT: Fishing limits are too onerous, fishermen tell Rep. Joe Courtney

April 25, 2016 — STONINGTON, Conn. — U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, spoke with local fishermen Friday who shared their ongoing concerns about federal fishing regulations that limit the numbers of fish they can haul.

The regulations, which are intended to restore fish stocks, have forced local fishermen to throw back thousands of fish that are usually dead already, they said.

Mike Gambardella, owner of Gambardella Wholesale Seafood, who called the gathering of area fishermen, said if catch limits don’t change, he’ll be forced to close his business.

At the moment, Gambardella’s operation is only allowed to bring in 10 black sea bass per day, which he said is absurd. And since 2010, the state’s quota for summer flounder has gone down more than 100,000 pounds.

Gambardella showed Courtney photos of a local fisherman who brought in thousands of sea bass in one tow. The fisherman was then forced to pick 10 of them to keep and had to throw the rest back.

“These federal regulations are really in bad shape,” he said. “Something has got to change, or I’ll have to close my doors.”

Read the full story at The Westerly Sun

CONNECTICUT: Murphy secures more federal funds for Milford fisheries lab

April 22, 2016 — MILFORD, Conn. — U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy said that a subcommittee’s appropriations bill approved Thursday includes more than $20 million in federal funds for Long Island Sound programs, and $200 million for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which has a research lab in Milford.

Murphy is a member of the appropriations subcommittee of the U.S. Senate committee on Commerce, Science, Justice, and Related Agencies. The funding, in the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, “would support critical aquaculture research and improve regulatory permitting that supports over 700 local jobs and helps to improve the health of Long Island Sound,” Murphy said.

The Milford Lab is one of just two NOAA labs nationwide supporting aquaculture research, he said. The subcommittee bill “includes language addressing concerns around staffing changes and funding cuts at Milford Lab,” Murphy said in a prepared statement.

Read the full story at the Stamford Advocate