Saving Seafood

Senate committee OKs bills on whales, marine debris

November 14, 2019 — During a busy day on Capitol Hill the U.S. Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee approved nearly two dozen bills, including legislation that would lead to significant steps to protect North Atlantic right whales and work to combat marine debris pollution.

U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J. and one of the candidates for president, introduced S. 2453, the SAVE Right Whales Act, in September with U.S. Sens. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., and Tom Carper, D-Del. U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., introduced the substitute bill that passed the committee Wednesday.

“The North Atlantic right whale was named the official Georgia state marine mammal when I served as minority leader in the Georgia State House, and I am proud that my state’s coast is still home to one of the few known calving grounds for this magnificent animal,” Isakson said in a statement in September. “I’m glad to introduce the Scientific Assistance for Very Endangered Right Whales Act to help learn about how we can better protect this important animal whose numbers continue to dwindle.”

The legislation drew widespread support from environmental organizations.

Natural Resources Defense Council deputy director Nora Apter wrote Sunday, “If the SAVE Right Whales Act becomes law, it would establish a new grant program to fund projects between states, members of the fishing and shipping industries, and nongovernmental organizations to reduce the impacts of human activities on right whales.

Read the full story at The Brunswick News

New funding to study microplastic pollution effect on Delaware Bay blue crabs

November 6, 2019 — The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is often held up as the poster child for ocean pollution. And while the collection of trash collecting in the Pacific Ocean certainly deserves attention, researchers at the University of Delaware are concerned about a smaller source of pollution, much smaller.

Through its marine debris program, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is giving the university a $325,000 grant to study the impact of microplastics on blue crab populations near the Delaware Bay. Microplastics are defined as pieces of plastic less than five millimeters in length, or smaller than a pencil eraser. According to NOAA, some microplastics are microbeads, fibers or pellets that come from cosmetics or personal care products, for instance. They can also come from larger pieces of plastic that split apart and break down after exposure to the sun.

It’s estimated that there’s about five trillion tons of marine debris in our oceans and plastics are 90% of that, said UD College of Earth, Ocean and Environment Dean Estella Atekwana. “This grant is really timely so we can advance our understanding of what plastics do to our marine ecosystems,” she said.

Read the full story at WHYY

UD gets NOAA grant to study microplastics in blue crabs

November 5, 2019 — A federal grant will help two University of Delaware researchers look at the impact of microplastics on blue crabs.

The researchers will use the $327,000 grant to examine crab larvae exposure to microplastics in the Delaware Bay.

Microplastics are the size of sesame seeds. Microbeads, a type of microplastics, can easily pass through water filtration systems and end up in lakes and oceans.

Estella Atekwana is dean of the College of Earth, Ocean and Environment. She says they hope to determine how microplastics enter the larvae.

“For us to understand the different exposure pathways where this plastics get into the seafood or marine life and within the food chain and how does this eventually get to humans,” she said. “It’s really early on, I’m not so sure that we truly understand the different pathways.”

Read the full story at Delaware Public Media

ASMFC Horseshoe Crab Board Sets 2020 Specifications for Horseshoe Crabs of Delaware Bay Origin

October 30, 2019 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Horseshoe Crab Management Board approved the harvest specifications for horseshoe crabs of Delaware Bay origin. Under the Adaptive Resource Management (ARM) Framework, the Board set a harvest limit of 500,000 Delaware Bay male horseshoe crabs and zero female horseshoe crabs for the 2020 season. Based on the allocation mechanism established in Addendum VII, the following quotas were set for the States of New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland and the Commonwealth of Virginia, which harvest horseshoe crabs of Delaware Bay origin:

The Board chose a harvest package based on the Delaware Bay Ecosystem Technical Committee’s and ARM Subcommittee’s recommendation. The ARM Framework, established through Addendum VII, incorporates both shorebird and horseshoe crab abundance levels to set optimized harvest levels for horseshoe crabs of Delaware Bay origin. The horseshoe crab abundance estimate was based on data from the Benthic Trawl Survey conducted by Virginia Polytechnic Institute (Virginia Tech). This survey, which is the primary data source for assessing Delaware Bay horseshoe crab abundance for the past two years, as well as the ongoing benchmark stock assessment, does not have a consistent funding source. However, due to the efforts of three Senators and six Representatives – namely, Senators Chris Coons (D-DE), Tom Carper (D-DE), Cory Booker (D-NJ); and Representatives Frank Pallone (D-NJ), Frank LoBiondo (R-NJ), Lisa Blunt-Rochester (D-DE), Donald Norcross (D-NJ), Chris Smith (R-NJ), and Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) – and the support of NOAA Fisheries, annual funding for the survey has been provided since 2016. They have also requested that NOAA Fisheries incorporate the survey into the agency’s annual budget.

For more information, please contact Dr. Michael Schmidtke, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at 703.842.0740 or mschmidtke@asmfc.org.

Offshore wind farms could “destroy” Delaware’s coastal tourism, Caesar Rodney Institute claims

October 28, 2019 — The Caesar Rodney Institute’s Center for Energy Competitiveness has petitioned Governor John Carney to take action, arguing that a wind farm off the coast of Delaware would “destroy” the state’s coastal tourism.

“In a few years the world’s largest industrial wind turbines will fill the horizon from Rehoboth Beach to Fenwick Island at six times the height of typical cell phone towers,” the institute wrote in a letter sent to the Governor.

“My research is showing offshore wind projects could destroy our beach economy,” Dave Stevenson, Director for the Center for Energy Competitiveness with the Caesar Rodney explained. “Tourists visit Eastern Sussex for the ocean, and a pristine view to the horizon is critical to that beach enjoyment.”

Ørsted, an energy company based in Denmark, is the company pushing the project and partnering with Delaware’s Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC), who’s allowing the project to move forward after the company promised to invest as much as $18 million in Fenwick Island State Park.

Read the full story at WGMD

Skyscrapers in the sea: Massive wind turbines planned off Delaware coast

October 3, 2019 — The latest plans to harness the power of the wind will feature 853-foot-tall turbines installed east of Delaware’s beaches.

The Danish company Ørsted announced last month that it would install the world’s largest offshore wind turbines in federal water 15 to 20 miles off Delaware’s coast. Built by GE, the Haliade X-12 turbines would stand 853 feet tall in the Skipjack Wind Farm east of the state’s southern beaches. The turbine’s three blades are each longer than a football field.

“We look forward to introducing the next-generation offshore wind turbine to the market,” Ørsted Offshore CEO Martin Neubert said in a statement. Pending full regulatory approval, the turbines are set to be up and running by 2022. The 10 turbines are expected to generate 120 MW of power. Even though the turbines will be built off the Delaware coast, Ørsted has an agreement to sell the power they produce to Maryland.

Read the full story at WHYY

Commission eyes restrictions on striped bass harvest

August 27, 2019 — Officials with a regional fisheries management group are holding a public hearing in Delaware this week on a proposal to restrict the harvest of striped bass along the Atlantic coast.

Thursday’s meeting in Dover concerns proposed changes to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s management plan for striped bass, also known as rockfish.

The addendum to the plan proposes to reduce fishing-related mortality by 18% in response to an assessment last year that indicated that the population was overfished.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Washington Post

New RAS proposal entered for former Garbo Lobster facility in Connecticut

July 9, 2019 — Officials in Groton, Connecticut, U.S.A. announced recently a private company is interested in buying a recently shuttered lobster facility in the city and turning it into a land-based fish farm.

East Coast Seafood’s Garbo Lobster facility caught the eye of Deaderick SSB, a Delaware-based limited liability company, according to The Day.

The 34,700-square-foot former facility at 415 Thames Street, built in 2002, is located along the Thames River and is owned by Just in Case LLC under East Coast Seafood Group of Topsfield, Massachusetts, U.S.A., according to land and business records. East Coast, which owns Garbo Lobster, shuttered the lobster facility in January. The company said at the time it planned to shift Groton’s operations to a Prospect Harbor, Maine, facility that East Coast Seafood and Garbo Lobster acquired in 2012, as well as to its facility in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

Mark Branse, a lawyer hired by Deaderick SSB to work on local land-use issues, told The Day the company plans to purchase the property and raise fish in the facility.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Dead dolphins keep washing up in Delaware. But why?

May 30, 2019 — Twelve dead dolphins have washed up on bay and ocean breaches in Delaware over the last two months.

Among the most recent: A decomposed bottlenose dolphin calf showed up on Memorial Day at Cape Henlopen State Park, and another was found Saturday on the coast in Rehoboth Beach.

What caused many of those deaths remains unclear: Most of the dolphins that washed ashore were largely decomposed by the time officials arrived from the Marine Education, Research and Rehabilitation Institute (MERR) in Lewes.

In an ocean filled with predators and scavengers, as well as the sun beating down on hot days, it can often be a challenge to get good enough tissue and fluid samples to figure out what happened.

“I’m not seeing anything out of the ordinary whatsoever at this point,” said Suzanne Thurman, executive director of MERR. “It’s always note-worthy, but it’s not a spike.”

Read the full story at USA Today

ASMFC Horseshoe Crab Board Approves Benchmark Stock Assessment for Management Use

May 3, 2019 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The 2019 Horseshoe Crab Benchmark Stock Assessment evaluated the stock status of the resource by region, finding populations within the Delaware Bay and Southeast regions remaining consistently neutral and good, respectively, through time. The Northeast region population has changed from poor to neutral, while the status of the New York region population has trended downward from good, to neutral, and now to poor. The Benchmark Assessment was endorsed by the Peer Review Panel and accepted by the Horseshoe Crab Management Board (Board) for management use.

To date, no overfishing or overfished definitions have been adopted for management use. For the assessment, biological reference points were developed for the Delaware Bay region horseshoe crab population although not endorsed by the Peer Review Panel for use in management. However, given the assessment results of low fishing mortality and relatively high abundance, overfishing and an overfished status are unlikely for female horseshoe crabs in the Delaware Bay region.

Read the full release here