Fish landings Archives - Saving Seafood

NOAA Fisheries Announces the 2016-2017 Recreational Fishing Season for Black Sea Bass in the South Atlantic Region

March 29, 2016 — The following was released by the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council:

NOAA Fisheries announces the 2016-2017 recreational fishing season for black sea bass in the South Atlantic Region will start on April 1, 2016, and end on March 31, 2017.

Landings in the past three fishing years have not come close to the 2016-2017 annual catch limit of 1,001,177 pounds whole weight; therefore, black sea bass will be open for the entire April 1, 2016 – March 31, 2017 recreational fishing season.

This announcement is in compliance with the final rule for Regulatory Amendment 14 to the Fishery Management Plan for the Snapper-Grouper Fishery of the South Atlantic Region, which published on November 7, 2014 (79 FR 66316). Regulations were effective on December 8, 2014.

For the black sea bass recreational sector, the final rule for Regulatory Amendment 14 revised: The recreational fishing year for black sea bass from June 1 through May 31, to April 1 through March 31.

The black sea bass recreational accountability measure to have NOAA Fisheries announce the length of the recreational season for black sea bass annually in the Federal Register prior to the April 1 recreational fishing year start date based on when NOAA Fisheries projects the recreational sector’s annual catch limit will be met.

For more information on the final rule for Regulatory Amendment 14, please follow this link to the Frequently Asked Questions:

http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/sustainable_fisheries/s_atl/sg/2014/reg_am14/index.html

Maine DMR to pay out last of $3 million in federal aid

March 8, 2016 — AUGUSTA — The Department of Marine Resources will soon be making the third and final payment of federal disaster relief funds to 32 eligible Maine-based fishermen who hold federal Northeast Multispecies (groundfish) permits. The payment will total $1.02 million.

To qualify, Maine groundfish permit holders must have landings of more than 5,000 pounds in any one fishing year from 2010-2013. In addition, permit holders must have landed a minimum of 5,000 pounds of groundfish in either fishing year 2013 or 2014. Fishing years run from May 1 to April 30.

“The intent of these criteria is to focus disaster relief efforts on permit holders who have historical dependence on groundfish and have had continued reliance on the groundfish fishery during the disaster years,” DMR Deputy Commissioner Meredith Mendelson said recently.

According to Meldelson, the department understands that the Maine groundfish industry saw declines in many years preceding the disaster declaration by the secretary of commerce. The declaration was made based on what were, at the time, prospective revenue losses from the major reduction in Gulf of Maine cod quota available for the 2013 fishing year. DMR’s allocation of relief funds reflects the impact of that specific reduction.

The payments allocated to eligible permit holders were based on a formula developed by DMR after several outreach meetings with industry. Those payments, ranging from approximately $9,100 to $44,044, will reflect landings in fishing years 2013 and 2014 individually and combined.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Maine’s 2015 Commercial Marine Resources Top $600 Million for the First Time

March 5, 2016 — The following was released by the Maine Department of Marine Resources:

Maine’s commercially harvested marine resources topped $600 million in overall value in 2015, according to preliminary data from the Maine Department of Marine Resources. The total,$631,768,531, reflects an all-time high and an increase of more than $33 million over the previous record set in 2014.

The largest single increase in value was in Maine’s lobster fishery. The fishery saw the overall landed value jump by more than $37 million and the average per pound value increase by more than 10 percent, going from $3.70 per pound in 2014 to $4.09 per pound in 2015.

The overall value of Maine’s lobster fishery was again by far the highest at $495,433,635. When factoring in bonuses paid to harvesters as reported by 11 of Maine’s 19 lobster co-ops, the overall landed value of Maine’s lobster fishery reached $510,680,048.

2015 marked the fourth year in a row and the fourth year ever in which Maine lobster harvesters landed over 120 million pounds, with landings totaling 121,083,418 pounds. “Maine’s lobster fishery continues to be a major engine for our coastal economy,” said Maine Department of Marine Resources Commissioner Patrick Keliher.

“This past year saw a continuation of steady and historic lobster landings throughout the season. The increase in value reflects growing demand for Maine lobster.

“While this year’s value and landings are great news for our coastal economy, we also recognize that lobster represents more than 81 percent of the overall value of our commercial fisheries,” said Commissioner Keliher. “It shows that we all must be working hard to build and sustain our commercial fisheries and to create more diverse opportunity, be it with traditional commercial fisheries or an expanding the role of aquaculture. This work is critical to ensure we can adapt to changes in landings and value in future years.”

Maine’s softshell clam industry retained its second place standing in overall value at $22,536,086, a record for the fishery. The jump in value came on the strength of a 47 cent per pound increase over 2014. At $2.46 per pound, 2015 landings netted harvesters a 23 percent increase in per pound value over 2014 despite a drop in landings of one million pounds.

At $2,171 per pound, Maine’s elver fishery was by-far the most lucrative of Maine’s commercial fisheries on a per pound basis. Despite a season in which landings were well below the state quota due to a cold, dry spring that slowed elver migration and challenged harvesting, overall value increased by nearly $3 million. At $11,422,381, the elver fishery was Maine’s fourth most lucrative behind herring at $13 million.

DMR officials consider 2015 a continuation of the successful rebuilding effort for Maine’s scallop fishery despite a decline in value and meat pounds landed. “We expected 2015 to be lean in terms of landings,” said Commissioner Keliher. “But considering that Maine scallop harvesters landed more than ten times the amount harvested in 2005, this fishery is on the right track.”

More landings data can be found at http://www.maine.gov/dmr/comfish.htm.

Scientists say ocean warming is driving lobsters northward

March 2, 2016 — It’s too early to know what Maine’s 2015 lobster landings will look like, but there’s no doubt that the number will be huge.

In 2014, the last year for which the Department of Marine Resources has figures, Maine’s fishermen landed more than 123 million pounds of lobster — the third year in a row that landings topped 120 pounds — worth a record $457 million.

While last year’s numbers aren’t in, fishermen and dealers talk about a bonanza fishery, and mild weather saw the fishery stay active into December.

In a sense, the landings are unsurprising.

According to a 2015 Atlantic States Fisheries Management Commission stock assessment, the abundance of lobsters in the Gulf of Maine and on Georges Bank showed a meteoric rise starting in 2008 and is now at an all-time high. In southern New England, though, the story is completely different.

From a peak in 1997, the southern New England stock fell swiftly to a point where, by 2004, it was well below what scientists consider the threshold of sustainability. Things leveled off briefly; then the resource began an ongoing plunge again in 2010.

According to last year’s assessment, the Gulf of Maine-Georges Bank stock is not depleted and is not being overfished. The estimated lobster population from 2011 to 2013 was 248 million lobsters, which is well above the abundance threshold — a red flag for fisheries managers — of 66 million lobsters.

In contrast, in the years 2011 to 2013, the southern New England stock was depleted at an estimated 10 million lobsters. The “red flag” abundance level is 24 million lobsters.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

ASMFC Releases 2015 Annual Report

March 2, 2015 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is pleased to provide you with our 2015 Annual Report, http://www.asmfc.org/files/pub/ASMFC_AnnualReport_2015.pdf. It describes the Commission’s activities and progress in carrying out our public trust responsibilities for the valuable marine fisheries under Commission stewardship. Included in this report are figures displaying the historical trends in stock status or landings for each species managed by the Commission. Also provided is a summary of the significant management actions Commissioners took in 2015 to maintain and restore the abundance of Commission managed species.

This report reflects our Commissioners’ commitment to accountability and transparency in all they do to manage and rebuild stocks under their care. We hope that you will find the information contained within this report useful and interesting.

Maine to pay for research in effort to keep lobster fishery healthy

February 4, 2016 — Maine’s lobsters are about to get new scrutiny.

The Department of Marine Resources has put out a call for proposals to gauge the impact of warming Gulf of Maine waters on lobster biology, populations and susceptibility to disease. A separate study will attempt to measure the economic impact of Maine’s most valuable fishery beyond what lobstermen are paid for their catch.

The department has earmarked up to $700,000 to pay for the studies, with the money coming out of the Lobster Research, Education and Development Fund. The money in that fund comes from sales of the lobster license plate.

Research proposals are due Thursday. The department’s request for proposals suggests the contracts will be awarded by early March, but department spokesman Jeff Nichols said the timing depends on how many proposals are received and how quickly a panel is formed to review them.

The department said it needs the research to determine how to help maintain the industry’s remarkable health over the past 20 or 30 years. Lobster landed in Maine was valued at a record $465.9 million in 2014, up more than fourfold in the past two decades. The catch by 5,818 commercial license holders made up 78 percent of the value of commercial fishery landings in the state.

Carl Wilson, director of the department’s Bureau of Marine Science, said “there are sufficient questions” about what’s happening with climate change and its impact on the Gulf of Maine to warrant more study.

Read the full story at Portland Press Herald

Nils E. Stolpe: After 39 years of NOAA/NMFS fisheries management, how are they doing?

January 27, 2016 — (FishNet USA – www.fishnet-usa.com/) — Back in June of 2012 I wrote After 35 years of NOAA/NMFS fisheries management, how are they doing? How are we doing because of their efforts? (http://www.fishnet-usa.com/) in which I looked at U.S. commercial landings on a regional basis. While there were some bright spots, overall the picture was somewhat dismal, with total landings minus Alaska’s swinging up slightly after a trending downward over the previous 5 years and being only 60% of what they were in 1979, the year that inflation corrected landings were at their highest value. Regionally, landings (minus scallops and lobster) in New England, in the Mid-Atlantic (minus scallops), in the Southeast and in the Gulf of Mexico were trending downwards with only Pacific landings heading up.

The latest available data from the NOAA/NMFS Commercial Landings website, for the years 2011 to 2014 (http://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/st1/commercial/landings/annual_landings.html) tell a different, and much more optimistic, story (But please bear in mind that any indicated “trends” since 2010 are for four years at most and at this point aren’t necessarily anything that people should hang their hats on).

(Note that in all of the following charts 2010, the last year in the original FishNet article for which data was available, is indicated by a red bar. The most current data are for 2014. Also note that all values reported were corrected for inflation, using federal government conversion tables and 2010 as the base year.)

Value of Total U.S. landings

Total U.S. landings reached a maximum of $6.8 billion in 1979. From a recent low of $3.9 billion in 2009 they increased to $5.2 billion in 2011 and are currently (as of 2014) at $5.0 billion.

The value of total U.S. landings has been increasing fairly steadily since 2002.

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A number of people had commented on the original article that it would have been interesting to see a listing of all of the commercial species and their individual contributions to the total value of domestic landings. With landings of 485 species reported in 2014, that would take up a prohibitive amount of space here, but following is a chart listing the top 50 fisheries in terms of value. At the bottom of the list were frigate mackerel ($39), shortbelly rockfish ($22), Chubs ($12), redstripe rockfish ($10) and spider crab (42 lbs landed, no value listed). The values are in 2014 dollars. For reference I’ve also included a chart of the top 50 species in 2005 (the values here are listed in 2004 dollars).

It shouldn’t surprise anyone at all familiar with our commercial fisheries that American lobster, sea scallops and walleye pollock are the three most valuable U.S. fisheries.

But that seven of the ten most valuable species being shellfish might be.

At this point NOAA/NMFS doesn’t differentiate between capture fisheries and aquaculture production in the commercial landings database. Tracking the growth – or not – of aquculture through actual production would be an effective way of determining how realistic the pronouncements of the “future of aquaculture” which have been periodically resurfacing for almost 50 years actually are and it would be most useful.

Other facts that you might find interesting – or that in emergencies can serve as conversation starters:

• Of the top fifty species, twenty-three were shellfish.

• In spite of all of the associated hand-wringing, Atlantic cod were #69 ($9.4 million).

• Ditto for American eels at #66 ($9.8 million).

• Ditto for swordfish at #51 ($18 million).

• Bloodworms were #86 ($6.0 million).

• Florida stone crab claws – the fishermen keep one, the crabs keep one and are then released – were #35 ($28 million).

The fifty highest value fisheries in the U.S. in 2005 (in 2005 dollars) and 2014 (in 2014 dollars)

Forty-five fisheries that were in the fifty most valuable in 2005 were still in the top fifty in 2014. When adjusted for inflation, in 2010 dollars, landings in the top 50 fisheries were valued at $3.9 billion in 2005 and at $4.5 billion in 2014.

(For anyone who is interested in exploring the reported landings of any species in any regions or states on a year-by-year basis, the above linked NOAA/NMFS database provides a wealth of information. With a basic knowledge of spreadsheets you can get an accurate picture of any commercial species (with limited exceptions) for the last 75 years, or for as long as that species supported a fishery. I’ve made one of my worksheets for this FishNet available at http://www.fishnet-usa.com/HowWeDoing_Update.xlsx to give you an idea of what’s possible. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me by replying to this email.)

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Ignoring Alaska, the value of U.S. landings appear to be increasing after a decline that began in 1979.

Correcting for inflation, total U.S. landings in 2014 were 74% of what they were at their highest point (1979). Minus Alaska, total U.S. landings were 71% of what they were in 1979.

The story region by region – New England first

Starting out in New England, home of our oldest and not so long ago some of our most valuable “traditional” fisheries, at first glance things appear to be rosy. Reaching a post-Magnuson plateau of just over $1 billion in 1987, the value of total landings declined from then until 2001, from there increasing until almost $1 billion in 2005 and then falling again. But in 2011 they topped $1 billion again, and have remained there ever since.

Unfortunately, the reality in many New England fisheries is not what is indicated by the total landings. Since 1950 about half of the value of New England landings (converted to 2010 dollars) has been in the lobster and sea scallop fisheries. In 2010 these two fisheries accounted for 41% of the value of New England’s total landings (in the previous FishNet I had erroneously reported “over 69%”). In 2014, driven by a large increase in lobster landings which wasn’t offset by smaller decrease in scallop landings, that increased to 47%.

Subtracting the value of sea scallop and lobster landings from the total New England landings, there ws a decline in value extending from the early 90s to 2009. This was offset by an increase beginning in 2010 that increased the value to levels last seen in 1995.

In 2010 dollars, the New England lobster fishery has increased in value from $73 million in 1950 to $518 million in 2014. That’s an increase of 700%. The sea scallop fishery has increased from $57 million to $273 million, an increase of 480% (“record” scallop landings were $370 million in 2012).

In 2014 the next three most valuable fisheries were oysters, soft clams and Atlantic herring. Together with sea scallops and lobsters, landings in these 5 most valuable fisheries were $941 million. This represented 85% of the total New England landings in 2014. In 2000, 2005 and 2010 the 5 most valuable New England fisheries represented respectively 57%, 68% and 77% of the total value of New England landings.

The Mid-Atlantic

With the exception of 2013-14 the total value of Mid-Atlantic landings appear to have been fluctuating pretty widely but staying mostly between $200,000 and $250,000 since the early 1980s. However, the dramatic increase in the value of sea scallop landings have been compensating for a pronounced and prolonged decrease in the value total of landings of the other fisheries.

The South Atlantic

The value of South Atlantic landings declined almost steadily from a peak at in 1979 to 2005 or so and has been fairly constant since then.

Commercial landings in the South Atlantic in 2014 were 38% of what they were at their highest point (1979).

The Gulf of Mexico

The value of commercial landings in the Gulf of Mexico declined until 2010, when it reached the level that it hadn’t been at since 1960. Since then the total value has increased significantly, in 2014 being at 67% of what it was in 1979, when they were at their highest value.

As in the South Atlantic, the value of shrimp landings has varied much as the value of the other species has.

West Coast

The value of total West Coast landings appears to be continuing a 10+ year upward trend which had been interrupted by a drop in 2009/10. The total value of West Coast landings in 2014 was 69% of the highest value, which was in 1988.

The value of Hawaii landings in 2012 almost equaled the highest level reported, which was in 1992 (Hawaii landings were only reported in the NMFS/NOAA commercial landings database beginning in 1981). The value of landings has dropped in the subsequent two years.

The total value of Alaska’s landings appears to have resumed the upward trend that had begun in 1985.

What’s it all mean?

Looking at the biggest picture – and accepting the NOAA/NMFS figures – the domestic commercial fishing industry is doing quite well, having been just under $4 billion in 2009 and in 2014 having topped $5 billion. Adjusted for inflation, landings of the most valuable 50 fisheries were worth $3.9 billion on 2005. The value of the top 50 species had increased to $4.5 billion in 2014.

However, as is almost always the case, the devil is in the details, and some of those details clearly demonstrate that all is not well in every pilot house of every boat fishing in our EEZ.

One of the clearest examples of that is seen in the traditional fisheries of the Mid-Atlantic. While the value of total landings were valued at $195 million in the Mid-Atlantic, 44% was from one fishery (sea scallops). When the value of total landings minus the sea scallops shows that a decline that started in 1997 in the Mid-Atlantic is still continuing.

New England is slightly more complicated. In 2014 the value of landings if two fisheries (lobster and sea scallops) made up 73% of the value of New England’s total landings. In 2000 they accounted for 53% of the total. While the value of landings minus lobster and scallops has increased over $100 million since 2010, the four species – herring, soft shelled clams, oysters and American eels – that have accounted for most of the increase are either caught by very large vessels, are mostly from a limited and highly regulated river fishery for elvers, or are harvested from either inshore fisheries or aquaculture operations.

The bright spot on the East coast is the South Atlantic region, if you consider having stable landings a bright spot.

The value of total U.S. landings in the Gulf of Mexico has increased dramatically since a post-Magnuson low point, not coincidentally the year when BP released 5 million barrels or so of oil and almost 2 million gallons of corexit (an oil dispersant) into the Gulf.

After a gradual increase from the early 90s, the value of West Coast landings (minus Hawaii and Alaska) has been fairly steady since 2010 with an upswing in 2014. The value of Alaska landings increased significantly post 2010 but in 2014 had fell back to the same level it was at then. The value of Hawaiian landings increased steadily from 2009 to 2012, when it reached a level it hadn’t been at since 1993, but it has decreased since then.

Obviously it’s impossible to generalize at the national level much more than that significantly more dollar’s worth of fish and shellfish crossed U.S. docks in 2014 than did in 2010, and that’s definitely a good thing. However, the benefits haven’t been spread out evenly. There are disparities from region to region, from state to state, from port to port, from fishery to fishery and from dock to dock. The situation on the New England groundfish fishery is an example of that (and I’ll note here that decreased landings of a particular species isn’t necessarily related to reduced numbers of that species). But what can’t b\e overemphasized is that in far too many instances fishing revenues are being increasingly concentrated in a decreasing number of fisheries. In the long term this could prove disastrous, not just to the participants in fisheries in which the landings are declining, but to the participants in the other fisheries as well. This is because it takes a certain minimum level of presence to maintain necessary infrastructure (docks, gear suppliers, ice houses, marine railways, etc.), and once that minimum level is reached those businesses that support the fishing industry will have no choices other than shutting down or relocating.

View a PDF of the opinion piece here

Daniel Pauly Feeds Media the Wrong Story About Global Fisheries Decline; Other Scientists Object

SEAFOODNEWS.COM by John Sackton – January 25, 2016 — Last week the media was full of a new round of global fishery disaster stories, prompted by an article in Nature Communications by Daniel Pauly & Dirk Zeller affiliated with the Sea Around Us project.

Pauly and Zeller state that FAO global fisheries data has underestimated prior catch, and that therefore if this is taken into account, the decline in fish catch from the peak in the late 1990’s is not 400,000 tons per year, but 1.2 million tons per year.

“Our results indicate that the decline is very strong and is not due to countries fishing less. It is due to countries having fished too much and having exhausted one fishery after another,” said Pauly to the Guardian newspaper. As a result, a new round of handwringing ensued about global overfishing.

But, the facts don’t support Pauly’s interpretation. Catch rates are simply not a suitable measure of fisheries abundance. In fact, declines in catch rates often are due to improvement in fisheries management, not declines in abundance.

Over at cfood, a number of scientists specifically rebutted the premise of Pauly’s article.

Ray Hilborn of the University of Washington says:

This paper tells us nothing fundamentally new about world catch, and absolutely nothing new about the status of fish stocks.

It has long been recognized that by-catch, illegal catch and artisanal catch were underrepresented in the FAO catch database, and that by-catch has declined dramatically.

What the authors claim, and the numerous media have taken up, is the cry that their results show that world fish stocks are in worse shape than we thought. This is absolutely wrong. We know that fish stocks are stable in some places, increasing in others and declining in yet others.

Most of the major fish stocks of the world, constituting 40% of the total catch are scientifically assessed using a mixture of data sources including data on the trends in abundance of the fish stocks, size and age data of the fish caught and other information as available. This paper really adds nothing to our understanding of these major fish stocks.

Another group of stocks, constituting about 20% of global catch, are assessed using expert knowledge by the FAO. These experts use their personal knowledge of these fish stocks to provide an assessment of their status. Estimating the historical unreported catch for these stocks adds nothing to our understanding of these stocks.

For many of the most important stocks that are not assessed by scientific organizations or by expert opinion, we often know a lot about their status. For example; abundance of fish throughout almost all of South and Southeast Asia has declined significantly. This is based on the catch per unit of fishing effort and the size of the individuals being caught. Estimating the amount of other unreported catches does not change our perspective on the status of these stocks.

In the remaining fisheries where we know little about their status, does the fact that catches have declined at a faster rate than reported in the FAO catch data tell us that global fisheries are in worse shape than we thought? The answer is not really. We would have to believe that the catch is a good index of the abundance.

Figure 1 of the Pauly and Zeller paper shows that a number of major fishing regions have not seen declines in catch in the last 10 years. These areas include the Mediterranean and Black Sea, the Eastern Central Atlantic, the Eastern Indian Ocean, the Northwest Pacific and the Western Indian Ocean. Does this mean that the stocks in these areas are in good shape, while areas that have seen significant declines in catch like the Northeast Atlantic, and the Northeast Pacific are in worse shape?

We know from scientific assessments that stocks in the Mediterranean and Eastern Central Atlantic are often heavily overfished – yet catches have not declined.

We know that stocks in the Northeast Pacific are abundant, stable and not overfished, and in the Northeast Atlantic are increasing in abundance. Yet their catch has declined.

Total catch, and declines in catch, are not a good index of the trends in fish stock abundance.

Michael Kaiser of Bangor University commented:

Catch and stock status are two distinct measurement tools for evaluating a fishery, and suggesting inconsistent catch data is a definitive gauge of fishery health is an unreasonable indictment of the stock assessment process. Pauly and Zeller surmise that declining catches since 1996 could be a sign of fishery collapse. While they do acknowledge management changes as another possible factor, the context is misleading and important management efforts are not represented. The moratorium on cod landings is a good example – zero cod landings in the Northwest Atlantic does not mean there are zero cod in the water. Such distinctions are not apparent in the analysis.

Also David Agnew, director of standards for the Marine Stewardship Council, said:

It is noteworthy that the peak of the industrial catches – in the late 1990s/early 2000s – coincidentally aligns with the start of the recovery of many well managed stocks. This point of recovery has been documented previously and particularly relates to the recovery of large numbers of stocks in the north Pacific, the north Atlantic and around Australia and New Zealand, and mostly to stocks that are assessed by analytical models. For stocks that need to begin recovery plans to achieve sustainability, this most often entails an overall reduction in fishing effort, which would be reflected in the reductions in catches seen here. So, one could attribute some of the decline in industrial catch in these regions to a correct management response to rebuild stocks to a sustainable status, although I have not directly analyzed the evidence for this. This is therefore a positive outcome worth reporting.

This opinion piece originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It has been reprinted with permission.

Maine issues emergency closure to scalloping around Vinalhaven, Fox Island Thorofare

January 14, 2016 — AUGUSTA, Maine — The Department of Marine Resources in-season surveys conducted on Jan. 7 and 8, in specific scallop-fishing regions observed significant declines in scallop biomass densities, according to a Jan. 14 news release.They also determined that seed scallops were being illegally taken.

“An immediate conservation closure is necessary to reduce the risk of unusual damage and imminent depletion of the scallop resource in the Vinalhaven and Fox Island Thorofare and the Whiting and Dennys Bays,” said the DMR.

Therefore, DMR is adopting emergency regulations to close these areas Saturday, Jan. 16. In addition, a correction to the South Portland Harbor Targeted Closure will also be included to ensure enforceability of this area.

Vinalhaven and Fox Island Thorofare

In the Lower Penobscot Bay and Outer Islands Rotational Area, Marine Patrol, sea sampling, in-season surveys and direct industry reports indicate that the majority of fishing activity has been focused in the Fox Island Thorofare and around the inshore islands (Leadbetter, Hurricane, and Greens Islands) west and southwest of Vinalhaven.

Strong catches were reported during the first three weeks of the season, with upward of 20 vessels fishing and easily able to reach their daily landings limit by as early as 10 a.m. However, over the following weeks, Catch per unit effort decreased with vessels taking the majority of the day to reach their daily landings limit and the fleet began working in more exposed areas outside of the sheltered islands, indicating that the majority of legal sized scallops had been harvested from these areas.

Read the full story at Penobscot Bay Pilot

Operators Gear Up to Present Innovative, Flavorful Fried Fish During Lent

SEAFOODNEWS.COM by Michael Ramsingh — January 13, 2016 — Foodservice operators will infuse more flavor into the traditional fried fish staples during this year’s Lenten season. Fish dishes are expected to feature more Mediterranean, Asian, Middle Eastern and Mexican concepts and flavors. “Fish is the perfect canvas for any flavor, ” says Arlene Spiegel, of Arlene Spiegel & Associates, a restaurant consulting company in New York. “And people love fried food. A fried fish sandwich or fish and chips can be stellar. And it shouldn’t be just for Lent. It can be promoted all year round. It can be something important.”

Ocean Choice International said they are pleased with the decision by the Supreme Court of Newfoundland that dismissed a challenge to the company from Landvis Canada, the minority partner owned by an Icelandic Fishing Firm. Landvis sought to oust Martin and Blaine Sullivan, the two brothers who control the company. “It was a clear and unambiguous decision and we are very pleased that Justice Orsborn completely accepted our position,” said Martin Sullivan, Chief Executive Officer with OCI.

In other news the PEI Fishermen’s Association (PEIFA) wants changes made to the temporary foreign workers program to allow seafood processing plants to hire more workers. “It gets back to being able to process all the product that’s coming in. We’ve got a short term strategy, let us adopt it and we’ll work towards a bigger longer-term solution,” said PEIFA Executive Director Ian MacPherson.

Meanwhile, Ecuador and Peru are reporting lower mahi catches since the season began in Mid-November. It appears El Nino may be impacting mahi landings since warmer waters have increased the supply of bait fish. “One of the effects of El Niño is a bountiful supply of natural prey which the mahi are inclined to eat. Because of this they are preferentially feeding on natural bait and are less inclined to feed on fishing bait, resulting in lower catches,” said Jeff Azari, at Pacific Coral.

Finally, Alaskan Senator Lisa Murkowski said she would stall the final vote approving Dr. Robert Califf as the next FDA Commissioner if she does not get assurances that mandatory labeling laws will be written for genetically modified salmon. “I want to make sure, be very, very certain, that when we are talking about these genetically engineered fish for human consumption, voluntary labeling is not adequate,” said Sen. Murkowski.

This story originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It has been reprinted with permission.