Saving Seafood

With right whales at risk of extinction, regulators consider drastic action that could affect lobstermen

October 16, 2018 — With North Atlantic right whales increasingly at risk of extinction, federal regulators are considering drastic protection measures that could have sweeping consequences for the region’s lucrative lobster industry.

The species is in dangerous decline, with a record 17 right whale deaths and no recorded births last year, and entanglements in fishing gear are believed to be the leading cause of premature deaths. Three have died in US waters this year, including one 35-foot-long whale found Sunday about 100 miles east of Nantucket, federal officials said.

In an effort to protect the dwindling species, regulators last week hosted a series of often emotional meetings with fishermen, environmental advocates, and other federal and state officials about what to do.

The goal is to find a way to protect the whales while limiting the impact on lobstermen, who have hundreds of thousands of fishing lines that extend from their traps on the seafloor to their buoys on the surface of the Gulf of Maine.

Read the full story at the Boston Globe

Report ‘erodes trust’ for lobstermen

October 15, 2018 — A new federal report on right whales was intended to set the stage for a weeklong meeting of groups trying to save the endangered species, but a lack of documentation for one of its central claims left the fishing industry feeling unfairly targeted.

Lobstermen accused the Northeast Fisheries Science Center of incompetence after it claimed a 2015 rule requiring fishermen to reduce the number of surface-to-seabed ropes had prompted some fishermen to start using stronger rope, which poses a bigger threat to whales.

“While this reduced the number of lines, it also meant that lines had to be stronger to accommodate the increased load of multiple traps,” the report reads. “This natural adaptation … contributed to an increase in the severity of entanglements.”

The lobster industry jumped on this sentence in the 24-page report, saying the center had no data to back it up, and knew it. Its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, gave Maine a $700,000 grant to collect this kind of data in April.

“You have an agency who’s been managing you for over 20 years fundamentally not understanding your fishery, publishing a technical memo that, quite frankly, felt more like an opinion piece,” said Patrice McCarron, director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association.

Such mistakes make it difficult for industry leaders to persuade constituents to participate in surveys like the one Maine is conducting if they believe federal regulators already believe the Maine lobster industry is to blame for the decline of the right whale population.

Read the full story at the Sun Journal

New England Shrimp Population Still Depleted, Board Says

October 11, 2018 — A regulatory board says New England’s shrimp population remains depleted years after the fishery for the species was shut down.

Fishermen in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts used to harvest Northern shrimp in the winter, but regulators shut the fishery down in 2013 amid concerns about low population and warming waters.

An arm of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission says it has reviewed a new assessment of the shrimp population that says there are far fewer of the crustaceans off of New England than there used to be. The commission says the rising temperatures of the Gulf of Maine are a threat to the shrimp.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at U.S. News

Northern shrimp surveys point to another year of moratorium

October 10, 2018 — The shrimp section of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission met in Portland, Maine, last week and voted to accept the 2018 benchmark assessment for northern shrimp — a report that shows a bleak future for the fishery.

The assessment indicates the northern shrimp population remains severely depleted, spawning stock biomass remains at the same low levels that have kept the fishery shuttered since the 2013 season. The assessment also recorded historically low recruitment of new shrimp into the fishery.

“Warmer water temperatures are generally associated with lower recruitment indices and poorer survival during the first year of life,” the section said in a statement. “Ocean temperatures in the western Gulf of Maine shrimp habitat have increased over the past decade, and temperature is predicted to continue rising as a result of climate change. This suggests an increasingly inhospitable environment for northern shrimp in the Gulf of Maine.”

The decision on whether or not to close the fishery for the sixth year straight will be made during a Nov. 15-16 commission shrimp managers’ meeting with the advisory panel to discuss the 2019 season.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

 

MAINE: Groups Say There’s Little Evidence That Lobster Industry Is Harming Right Whales

October 9, 2018 — Maine Department of Marine Resources commissioner Patrick Keliher has sent a letter to NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, refuting a recent memo which suggests that the lobster industry may be playing a role in the decline of the North Atlantic Right Whale.

“This publication, this technical memo as written, really creates a challenge for folks who want to have a conversation that’s based on really sound science,” says Jeff Nichols, spokesperson for Maine DMR.

Nichols says, as an example, there’s little evidence to support the notion that lobstermen are using “tougher rope” than they did prior to 2015, contributing to entanglements. And he says the memo attempts to link whale entanglement risk to the amount of lobster being landed.

“To say that because Maine landings are on the increase, the risk is also on the increase is not borne out by the data,” Nichols says.

Executive Director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, Patrice McCarron, has also questioned the data and its relevance, as none of the 17 North Atlantic Right Whale deaths recorded last year occurred in Maine, where the bulk of lobstering takes place.

Nichols says the department does have “lingering questions” about what role an emerging Canadian snow crab industry may be playing.

The letter reiterates concerns that have emerged from the industry since the report was released.

Read the full story at Maine Public

MAINE: Gubernatorial candidates vow to back lobster industry in upcoming fight

October 9, 2018 — All four candidates for governor pledged to defend Maine’s $434 million-a-year lobster industry a week before regulators consider new rules that could severely affect the industry.

Specifically, the candidates addressed aggressive right whale protections that environmental groups are seeking in court from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, proposals such as moving from a rope-based industry to a ropeless fishery, seasonal closures of western Gulf of Maine lobster fishing in April, and cutting in half the number of traps or vertical lines that could entangle whales.

Independent Alan Caron, Democrat Janet Mills, Republican Shawn Moody and independent Terry Hayes took turns answering some questions, dodging others and hailing the importance of Maine fisheries on Thursday at a forum on the seafood industry in Rockland attended by about 150 people and watched live online by more than 1,000 others.

Moody, a self-made millionaire from Gorham, called the concept of ropeless fishing a joke, something “you can’t even say with a straight face,” which pleased all the lobstermen in the audience. Caron, a political strategist, said NOAA doesn’t understand the whale problem well enough yet to take drastic actions against the fishery that could hurt the Maine economy and put people out of work.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Mainers grapple with risk that a shrimp season this year could be the last one

October 5, 2018 — PORTLAND, Maine — Scientists and policymakers gathered Thursday in Portland to weigh their desire for a 2018 Maine shrimp season — the first in five years — against the very real possibility that allowing shrimp to be harvested this year could leave the species beyond the point of return.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission presented a draft of its Northern Shrimp 2018 Stock Assessment Report, which those assembled at the Maine Historical Society heard with resignation but not surprise.

The northern (Maine) shrimp stock is depleted and the biomass is at an all-time low due to high fishery removals and a less favorable environment, according to the draft.

The mortality rate in 2011-2012, the last years with shrimp seasons — was very high, and the number of juvenile shrimp has remained “unusually low” since 2010.

Furthermore, the environment in the Gulf of Maine is in flux, Margaret Hunter of the Maine Department of Marine Resources and chairwoman of the assessment subcommittee, said Thursday.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

 

Latest shrimp assessment points to closure of fishery

October 5, 2018 — The shrimp section of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission voted Thursday to accept the 2018 benchmark assessment for northern shrimp that continues to reflect a stock in free fall and facing a highly uncertain future.

The assessment seems to point to another closure for the fishery that has been shuttered since after the 2013 fishing season because of the dire and deteriorating state of the northern shrimp stock.

The final decision on whether to close the fishery for the sixth consecutive year will come in November, when the shrimp section and its advisory panel are scheduled to meet to set specifications for the 2019 fishing season.

It does not look good.

The assessment, according to the section, indicates the northern shrimp population remains severely depleted, spawning stock biomass remains at the same low levels that have existed since 2013 and recruitment of new shrimp into the fishery continues at historically low numbers.

It also underlines the negative impact of the Gulf of Maine’s warming waters on the northern shrimp stock.

“Warmer water temperatures are generally associated with lower recruitment indices and poorer survival during the first year of life,” the section said in a statement. “Ocean temperatures in the western Gulf of Maine shrimp habitat have increased over the past decade, and temperature is predicted to continue rising as a result of climate change. This suggests an increasingly inhospitable environment for northern shrimp in the Gulf of Maine.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Maine fishermen demand better science before canceling another shrimp season

October 4, 2018 — Members of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission will meet Thursday in Portland to review the most recent stock assessment and make recommendations on whether Maine will see a shrimp season next year for the first time since 2013.

Initial indications from both federal and state surveys are that the shrimp population is in no better shape than any of the past five years.

“Spawning stock biomass and total abundance remain low, with little sign of recovery,” Toni Kerns, an ASMFC fishery management plans coordinator, wrote in an email about the shrimp population in the Gulf of Maine.

Fifty years ago, fishermen caught 11,000 metric tons of Maine shrimp. But the numbers steadily decreased and, by 2012, the catch was down to 2,185 metric tons. Then, even that bottom dropped out, and in 2013 fishermen brought in only 255 metric tons, prompting complete closure of the fishery other than a small “research set-aside” that in 2018 totaled 13.3 tons, the Press Herald reported.

Trends include the lowest abundance and biomass numbers in more than three decades, ASMFC told the Gloucester Times last month.

And Maggie Hunter, lead shrimp scientist for the Maine Department of Marine Resources, said the inshore trawl survey conducted every spring and fall by the Maine DMR and New Hampshire Fish and Game found “very low” numbers as well.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

Findings from summer ’18 right whale study

October 4, 2018 — The Northeast Fisheries Science Center’s right whale aerial survey team was busy documenting whales off Cape Cod and in the Gulf of Maine during the spring. Once the season started to change and sightings got sparse in U.S. waters, the team packed up and headed to Canada, where they helped with whale survey efforts for a second year from June 1 through Aug. 12.

“Once we started seeing just a few right whales in Cape Cod and Massachusetts Bay in the late spring and few in the Gulf of Maine, we knew many had likely moved further north into Canadian waters and into the Gulf of St. Lawrence,” said Tim Cole from the NEFSC’s aerial survey team.

“Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans invited us to come help them conduct surveys over the summer. We focused in the area where most of the right whales were aggregated, while they surveyed throughout the Gulf and Maritimes regions to chart the distribution of right whales and the abundance of other marine mammal species.”

The NOAA Fisheries team and the NOAA Twin Otter were based for the summer in Moncton, New Brunswick. They worked in the western part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, making six-hour flights several times a week and as often as possible, weather permitting, at an altitude of 1,000 feet.

They looked primarily for right whales but also recorded sightings of other large whales. Over the nearly three months of survey effort, the NOAA team was joined by staff from the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies, Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Center, and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada.

Sightings included fin, humpback, blue, and North Atlantic right whales. In June, for example, the team recorded 79 fin whales, 4 blue whales, 21 humpback whales, and 301 right whales. Many of the right whale sightings are repeated sightings of the same whales.

Read the full story at Wicked Local Eastham