Saving Seafood

Right Whales Congregate in Cape Cod Bay Earlier than Usual

April 1, 2016 — BARNSTABLE, Mass.  – The Division of Marine Fisheries is urging boaters to use caution and be on the lookout for endangered North Atlantic right whales in Cape Cod Bay.

The whales have congregated in large numbers in the Bay earlier than normal. The endangered whales usually do not arrive in the bay until late April.

An aerial survey by the Center of Coastal Studies in Provincetown on Sunday spotted 85 of the whales, which is almost 20 percent of the entire world population.

“If they are there it is definitely food related,” said Erin Burke, a protected species biologist for the state’s Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs. “And they are feeding right now.”

The whales are feeding at or just below the surface which puts them at risk of being struck by boats. The Division of Maine Fisheries is asking vessel operators in the bay area to reduce speeds to less than 10 knots and to post lookouts to avoid collisions.

Federal and state law also prohibits boats from approaching within 500 yards of a right whale. Operators that find themselves within 500 feet of a right whale should slowly and cautiously leave the area.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

NORTH CAROLINA: Tighter cobia regs may hit charter boats

MOREHEAD CITY, N.C. (March 28, 2016) — Local recreational fishing experts say recent federal and state regulation changes for cobia may deal a blow to charter fishing this year.

The National Marine Fisheries Service announced March 11 that the cobia fishery will close on Monday, June 20, for the Atlantic migratory group, which includes North Carolina.

In addition, late this February, the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries announced the Marine Fisheries Commission reduced the recreational creel limit for cobia from two per person, per day to one.

According to a Feb. 24 DMF press release, the reduction in the creel limit was to try to extend the recreational cobia season by a few days and avoid a closure next summer.

Read the full story at the Carteret County News-Times

North Carolina Fisheries Association Releases Catch Summit info

March 2, 2016 — One final reminder about the NC Catch Summit coming up next week! This appeal is for all fishermen and interested folks. The Secretary of DEQ, the Deputy Secretary and the Acting Director of the Division of Marine Fisheries will be in attendance at the Clambake on Monday night!!

Please try to attend the Clambake and/or the event during the day on Tuesday in Beaufort. There is no charge for attending!

The Dinner & the Summit are completely free but you have to register (for the head count) at: email: 

rjohnson@hydecountync.gov

or call Rosemary Johnson at 252.926.4474.

Monday * March 7 * Core Sound Waterfowl Museum & Heritage Center; Harkers Island

5:30-8:30 Carteret Catch Down East Clambake & Frogmore Stew Dinner

Speaker: Wes Stepp, owner of Red Sky Cafe & author of “Tastefully Fit”

*Free trolley service will be available from the Beaufort Inn to the Museum

Tuesday * March 8 * Auditorium, NC Maritime Museum, 315 Front Street; Beaufort

8:30-9:00 Registration * Coffee & pastries

9:00-9:15 Host Welcome * Pam Morris, President, Carteret Catch

Conference Welcome * Jimmy Johnson, President, NC Catch

9:15-10:00 NC Commercial Fisheries: Economic Values, Trends, & Growth Potential

Presenter: Dr. Jane Harrison, Coastal Economics Specialist, North Carolina Sea Grant

10:00-10:15 Break

10:15-11:00 Sett ing Seafood Trends: How Chefs Do It

Moderator: Libby Eaton, Bistro-By-The-Sea

Panelists: Jeff Barney, Saxapahaw General Store; Wes Stepp, Red Sky Cafe; and Sandy Howard, Amos Mosquitos

11:00-11:45 Ocracoke Island: A Case Study of Successful Seafood Tourism

Moderator: Alton Ballance, NCCAT

Panelists: Hardy & Patt y Plyler, Ocracoke Fish Company; Vince O’ Neal, Pony Island Restaurant; TBA

11:45-12:30 Diamonds in the Rough: Local Success Stories

Moderator: Jess Hawkins, Carolina Eco-Tours

Panelists: Eddie & Alison Willis, Mr. Big/Core Sound Seafood; Fabian Botta, Ruddy Duck Tavern; and Mark Hooper, Hooper Family Seafood

12:30-2:00 Lunch – Generously sponsored by Carteret-Craven Electric Cooperative

2:00-2:45 Cultivating Customers: Insights from Retail Seafood Markets

Moderator: John Day, Center for Environmental Farming Systems, NC State University

Panelists: Haag & Son’s Seafood; Fishtowne Seafood; TBA

2:45-3:00 Break

3:00-3:45 NC Seafood: It Tastes Great & It’s Good for You Too!

Presenters: Dr. David Green, NCSU; Candace Morris, ECU graduate student; and Sue Way, East Carteret High School

3:45:4:00 2016 NC Catch Summit Conclusion: Pam Morris and Jimmy Johnson

4:00-4:30 Networking and information tables available

Fishermen, restaurant, retail & wholesale folks who are able are encouraged to take advantage of this opportunity and attend part or all of it. There are accommodations available at Beaufort Inn (1.800.726.0321) at a very reasonable rate, if needed. 

View a PDF of the Catch Summit poster

Charter Boat Captains Seek Leniency on Sea Bass Limits

February 27, 2016 — HYANNIS — To fishermen, black sea bass appear to be everywhere.

“There are more sea bass around than forever,” said Bob DeCosta, owner of Albacore Charters and chairman of the Nantucket Board of Selectmen, during a public hearing Friday on quotas for the species. “We didn’t catch any sea bass when my father was fishing.”

In part the increased numbers are because black sea bass, a staple in Mid-Atlantic states, are now moving north as the rapidly warming ocean becomes more hospitable to the species. At the same time, the population has recovered from historic low population levels in 1999 to historic high amounts of spawning fish by 2004, the date of the last comprehensive stock assessment.

But fishermen are being penalized with a 23 percent cut this year because they exceeded their quota last year by 33 percent, or 762,000 pounds. The state Division of Marine Fisheries aired 14 different options on how to accomplish that at Friday’s hearing at the Double Tree by Hilton Hotel. Combinations of a shortened season with higher daily trip limits or longer seasons with a smaller daily limit, and other permutations were intended to address the concerns of various ports, fishing operations and the individual recreational fisherman.

State regulators said they are constrained by what the Atlantic State Marine Fisheries Commission will allow.

Because the majority of the fish were caught in the early portion of the season, in May and June, state officials want to apply the brakes from the start with measures that allow between two and eight fish per person per trip. Still, no one in the room of about 70 fishermen was happy with a reduction far below the eight to 20 fish allowed in 2014 and as many as 20 per trip in 2013.

“We’re trying to stay in business,” said Gov Allen, captain of the Hyannis-based charter boat Lori-Ann. “Right now, we are on the precipice. We are losing everything.”

Allen has seen 50 percent of his business eroded this year as charter boat customers — who would normally spend thousands apiece to travel from New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and as far away as South Carolina and Florida to board his boat and catch and freeze dozens of sea bass a day — informed him it wasn’t worth the trip if they could only keep a handful.

“The stocks are in a healthy condition,” said Jimmy Koutalakis of the charter boat On Time.
He held up a sheaf of letters from clients who were canceling, reading one from a Canadian client who said it was too far to travel and too much money to spend for a handful of fish a day.

NORTH CAROLINA: Proposed closure of Cobia fishing season has many concerned

February 17, 2016 — WILMINGTON, NC – Fisherman packed into the Blockade Runner on Wednesday night to voice their concerns and frustrations about the possibility of closing the recreational Cobia fishing season in June.

Louis Daniel, the director of the Division of Marine Fisheries, said the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council is responsible for managing Cobia from the Florida Keys up through New York.

The Fishery Management Plan for Cobia sets an allowable recreational catch limit and if that limit is exceeded, then the council has to shorten the season to keep the harvest rates below the catch limit. Daniel said that is a federal law that they have to follow.

“We don’t really have a choice in whether or not there is a closure,” said Daniel. “Their only option would be to go against the federal regulation.”

The federal proposal is to close the season on June 15. The National Marine Fisheries Service, however, is waiting to see if North Carolina drops the Cobia bag limit from two fish to one fish.

If the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries votes to drop the bag limit, Daniel is hopeful the National Marine Fisheries Service will do some more calculations and be able to extend the season a little longer.

Read the full story at WECT

Massachusetts fishermen fear new rules smothering industry

January 16, 2016 — GLOUCESTER, Mass. (AP) — Gerry O’Neill looks at the water world spinning around him, a world of regulation and re-regulation and over-regulation— in other words, the modern world of commercial fishing —and thinks that he’s seen this movie before.

Two days removed from the public comment hearing at the state Division of Marine Fisheries offices on Emerson Street on potential changes to rules governing the scope and the schedule of the herring season, O’Neill sits in his office on Jodrey State Fish Pier and wonders if his two 141-foot mid-water trawlers Challenger and Endeavour and the Cape Seafood fish processing and sales operations that collectively employ almost 40 full-time workers— and even more when the product is flowing —will survive the future any better than the nearly decimated Gloucester groundfish fleet.

‘‘At the end of the day, the groundfishermen are struggling and everybody knows that and it’s because of over-regulation as well,’’ O’Neill said. ‘‘We’re not dying yet. But if they keep doing what they’re doing, we’re going to go the same way as the groundfishermen.’’

Given the state of the groundfish fleet, that is a chilling phrase, made even more-so by his matter-of-fact delivery in the soft brogue of his native Ireland and his admission that he favors regulations that will sustain the fishery even when they cost him fish and money.

His voice was steady and calm, just as it was at last week’s session in which David Pierce, the executive director of DMF and the state’s representative on the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission which governs the Northeast herring fishery, conceded the fishery remains robust.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Boston Globe

MASSACHUSETTS: ‘We’re not dying yet. But …’

January 8, 2016 —  Gerry O’Neill looks at the water world spinning around him, a world of regulation and re-regulation and over-regulation — in other words, the modern world of commercial fishing — and thinks that he’s seen this movie before.

Two days removed from the public comment hearing at the state Division of Marine Fisheries offices on Emerson Street on potential changes to rules governing the scope and the schedule of the herring season, O’Neill sits in his office on Jodrey State Fish Pier and wonders if his two 141-foot mid-water trawlers Challenger and Endeavour and the Cape Seafood fish processing and sales operations that collectively employ almost 40 full-time workers — and even more when the product is flowing — will survive the future any better than the nearly decimated Gloucester groundfish fleet.

“At the end of the day, the groundfishermen are struggling and everybody knows that and it’s because of over-regulation as well,” O’Neill said. “We’re not dying yet. But if they keep doing what they’re doing, we’re going to go the same way as the groundfishermen.”

Given the state of the groundfish fleet, that is a chilling phrase, made even more-so by his matter-of-fact delivery in the soft brogue of his native Ireland and his admission that he favors regulations that will sustain the fishery even when they cost him fish and money.

Fishery not broken

His voice was steady and calm, just as it was at Tuesday’s session in which David Pierce, the executive director of DMF and the state’s representative on the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission which governs the Northeast herring fishery, conceded the fishery remains robust.

“The stock remains rebuilt and over-fishing is not occurring,” Pierce told the approximately 20 stakeholders that attended. “The mortality seems to be under control and the stock appears to be in a good shape.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

 

More absurdness from the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries

December 31, 2015 — On January 1 we will have imposed on commercial fishermen (those who fish with nets) and people who like fresh seafood bought either from the local fish market or prepared in a local restaurant an example of the worst kind of government. That is, the imposition of regulations for the sake of regulation, without valid or reliable science or even common sense. The Division of Marine Fisheries will impose absurd regulations on the catching of flounder in North Carolina’s coastal waters.

The purpose of the regulations, plus the mission of the DMF in general in recent years, could be said to extinguish commercial fishing in the state’s waters.

Here’s how WECT-TV reports it:

The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission voted in late November to put new restrictions on catching Southern Flounder into place beginning Jan. 1, 2016.

Marine Fisheries Commission voting on new southern flounder regulations Thursday

Marine Fisheries Commission voting on new southern flounder regulations Thursday

Living on the Coast many of you enjoy catching and eating fresh southern flounder, but soon that fish might be harder to get. For almost a year, the Division of Marine Fisheries has been talking about changing the regulations on Southern Flounder.

Read the full opinion piece at Beaufort Observer

 

MASSACHUSETTS: Chatham, state officials contest federal right to control fishery

December 9, 2015 — CHATHAM — The state, town and federal governments are fighting over ownership of the ocean within the Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge.

Unless something changes dramatically in the next few months, a court will have to decide who can manage fisheries in the area, according to Chatham officials and Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service claimed ownership and management of the 3,000 acres of water and ocean bottom west of North and South Monomoy islands in its final draft of a new plan meant to guide management of the wildlife refuge for the next decade or more. The comment period on the draft expired Monday and the state attorney general’s office, the state Department of Fish and Game, and the town of Chatham all filed comments, along with an additional two dozen or more letters and emails submitted as of early Monday, according to Elizabeth Herland, Fish and Wildlife project director.

In the comments, the town and attorney general disputed the service’s claim that it was granted ownership and control over the disputed area in a 1944 court decision that established the refuge through a land taking. In her comments, Healey called the assertion erroneous and threatened legal action unless the federal agency revises its stance.

The town is also contemplating legal action, said Jeffrey Dykens, chairman of the selectmen.

“We would like to avoid litigation but we are keeping all our options open,” Dykens said.

Read the full story at Cape Cod Times

 

NEFMC proposal would limit access to hake fishery

December 8, 2015 — The New England Fishery Management Council is hosting a public meeting tonight in Gloucester as an initial step in possibly drafting an amendment that would modify the small-mesh multispecies fishery into a limited access fishery.

The meeting, to solicit public comment and gather information that ultimately would be used in the drafting of an environmental impact statement, is scheduled for 7 p.m. at the state Division of Marine Fisheries office at 30 Emerson Ave.

Currently, the small-mesh multispecies fishery, which includes whiting (silver hake), red hake and offshore hake, is an open fishery, accessible to any fisherman with the appropriate permit.

The proposal to limit access to the fishery is based in concerns “over unrestrained increases in fishing effort” in the small-mesh fishery, the council said.

“The need for the amendment is to reduce the potential for a rapid escalation of the small-mesh multispecies fishery, possibly causing overfishing and having a negative impact on red hake and whiting markets, both outcomes having negative effects on fishery participants,” council said.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times