Gulf of Maine Archives - Page 82 of 99

Moratorium on Northern Shrimp Commercial Fishing Maintained for 2017 Season

November 11th, 2016 — The following was released by Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

In response to the depleted condition of the northern shrimp resource, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Northern Shrimp Section extended the moratorium on commercial fishing for the 2017 fishing season. The Section also approved a 53 metric ton (mt) research set aside (RSA) to allow for the continued collection of much needed biological data.

The 2016 Stock Status Report for Gulf of Maine (GOM) Northern Shrimp indicates abundance and biomass indices for 2012–2016 are the lowest on record of the thirty-three year time series. Recruitment indices for the 2010–2015 year classes are also poor and include the three smallest year classes on record. As a result, the 2012–2016 indices of harvestable biomass are the lowest on record. Current harvestable biomass is almost entirely composed of the 2013 year class.

“By increasing the 2017 RSA, which is above last year’s 22 mt quota and that recommended by the Technical Committee for 2017 (13.6 mt), the Section sought to strike a balance between providing limited fishing opportunities to the industry while collecting valuable data to allow for the continued monitoring of the northern shrimp resource,” stated Section Chair Dennis Abbott of New Hampshire.

Recruitment of northern shrimp is related to both spawning biomass and ocean temperatures, with higher spawning biomass and colder temperatures producing stronger recruitment. Ocean temperatures in western GOM shrimp habitat have increased over the past decade and reached unprecedented highs within the past several years. This suggests an increasingly inhospitable environment for northern shrimp and the need for strong conservation efforts to help restore and maintain a fishable stock. The Northern Shrimp Technical Committee considers the stock to be in poor condition with limited prospects for the near future. The 2016 Stock Status Report is available at http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file/5823782c2016NorthernShrimpAssessment.pdf.

To maintain the time series of data collected from northern shrimp commercial fishery catches, a cooperative winter sampling program was approved with a 53 mt RSA quota. This program allows for the continued collection of biological data (e.g. size composition, egg hatch timing) from GOM northern shrimp fishery catches in the absence of a directed fishery. The RSA will include the participation of 10 trawlers (8 Maine trawlers, 1 Massachusetts trawler, and 1 New Hampshire trawler) and 5 trap fishermen, fishing for 8 weeks from mid-January to mid-March. The trawlers will have a maximum trip limit of 1,200 pounds per trip, with 1 trip per week, while the trappers will have a maximum possession limit of 500 pounds per week, with a 40 trap limit per vessel. Preference will be given to individuals in the lottery with double Nordmore grates and having history prior to the June 7, 2011 control date.

For more information, please contact Max Appelman, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at mappelman@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.

###

———-

Tina Berger

Director of Communications

Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission

1050 N. Highland Street, Suite 200A-N

Arlington, VA 22201

Sound technology helping scientists assess health of Maine shrimp population

November 10th, 2016 — This winter, a small fleet of Maine fishermen will head out to hunt for northern shrimp, even though the fishery itself has been closed for three years.

They won’t be landing the New England delicacy so it can be eaten. The fishermen will use acoustic transducers, and a few nets and traps, to help the Gulf of Maine Research Institute learn where these small pink crustaceans congregate in our near-shore waters over the winter, where they lay their eggs. Using sound waves to survey a species as small as shrimp is a new challenge for scientists.

“We have found low-frequency sound waves are good at detecting big fish, like cod, and high frequencies are good at detecting small organisms like shrimp,” said research associate Adam Baukus of GMRI. “The technology allows us to cover a lot more of the ocean than we can with trawls or traps alone. With sound, we can do 40 miles at a time. … Traditional (trawl) surveys are lucky to cover a quarter mile.”

To collect the data, GMRI has outfitted 10 lobster boats with echosounders, high-tech fish finders, to conduct monthly surveys of near-shore waters from Kittery to Cutler in January, February and March, which is the height of what used to be a $70 million fishing season. The lobstermen, who receive small stipends to cover fuel costs, will survey the same 40-mile-long stretch of water each time.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission likely to keep Gulf of Maine shrimp fishery closed

November 8, 2016 — Maine shrimpers are all but resigned to another year of being unable to pursue their quarry in the Gulf of Maine, with a regulatory board set to decide this week whether to allow a season this winter.

Maine shrimp are fished in the Gulf of Maine and were a popular winter seafood for years, but regulators shut the fishery down after a collapse during the 2013 fishing season, and it has remained closed since. The shrimp have struggled to rebuild populations as waters have warmed.

A board of the regulatory Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is set to decide Thursday whether fishing will be allowed this year. A committee of scientists has advised the board it’s not a good idea, with temperatures off New England inhospitable to the shrimp.

Spencer Fuller, a shrimp and lobster buyer with Cozy Harbor Seafood in Portland, said his company was once the largest processor of Maine shrimp in the country, and it has suffered. He said that he is prepared for another year of closure, but that it will send residual troubles through Maine’s seafood industry.

“All you have to do is look back to the history of shrimp here in the state of Maine and the contributions it has made over the last 60 years,” Fuller said. “It’s a big deal not only for us, but for the wharfs we deal with, markets we deal with.”

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Cold-water shrimp industry poised for shutdown to continue

November 7, 2016 — PORTLAND, Maine — Maine shrimpers are all but resigned to another year of being unable to pursue their quarry in the Gulf of Maine, with a regulatory board set to decide this week whether to allow a season this winter.

Spencer Fuller, a shrimp and lobster buyer with Cozy Harbor Seafood in Portland, said his company was once the largest processor of Maine shrimp in the country and has suffered. He said that he is prepared for another year of closure, but that it will send residual troubles through Maine’s seafood industry.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Seattle Times

Gulf of Maine shrimp season likely to be canceled

October 28th, 2016 — The Gulf of Maine has been closed to shrimping for the past three seasons and it now appears regulators will continue the shutdown throughout the upcoming 2017 season.

When the Atlantic States Marine Fishery Commission’s shrimp section convenes Nov. 10 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, members will be greeted with a recommendation from its northern shrimp technical committee that the closure extend through a fourth consecutive season.

“Given the continued poor condition of the resource and poor prospects for the near future, the NSTC recommends that the Northern Shrimp Section extend the moratorium through 2017,” the technical committee wrote in the summary of its 2016 Gulf of Maine northern shrimp stock assessment.

According to the assessment, not much has changed since the ASMFC closed the shrimp fishery following the 2013 season in which harvesters landed only 55 percent (346 metric tons) of the total allowable catch of 625 metric tons set by ASMFC for that season.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

ASMFC Atlantic Herring Section Initiates Addendum to Improve Performance of Area 1A Fishery

October 27, 2016 — The following was released by the ASMFC:

Bar Harbor, ME – The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Section initiated Addendum I to Amendment 3 of the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Herring to improve the performance of the Area 1A (inshore Gulf of Maine) Atlantic herring fishery. The purpose of the addendum is to develop additional management alternatives for the days out program. It is in response to the accelerated pace of Area 1A Trimester 2 (June through September) landings in recent years and the increasingly dynamic nature of days out measures to control Trimester 2 effort that have varied across states.

The Section utilizes days out of the fishery to slow the rate of Area 1A catch so the seasonal quota can be distributed throughout each trimester. Currently, the days out program is specific to landing day restrictions. The increase in the number of larger carrier vessels in the area has rendered days out less effective in controlling effort because vessels can transfer catch to large carrier vessels at-sea, allowing harvesters additional days of fishing beyond the days that are open to landings.

In 2016, Maine’s Department of Marine Resources (DMR) implemented a series of emergency rules that were more restrictive than Commission measures in an attempt to extend the Trimester 2 quota into September. These rules included a weekly landing limit, restricted landing and fishing days, as well as at sea transfer restrictions. DMR’s measures only applied to vessels landing in Maine. New Hampshire and Massachusetts implemented one of these management measures – three consecutive landing days. The Draft Addendum will explore these measures and potentially others that could be uniformly applied by the Area 1A of Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts.

For more information on Area 1A fishery performance in the 2015 and 2016 fishing year that brought about the need for alternative management measures refer to a white paper, which is available on the Commission website at http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file/58124582AtlHerringArea1AFisheryPerformance_2015_2016.pdf.

ASMFC to Review Gulf of Maine Shrimp Stock Survey, Determine 2017 Season Status in November Meeting

October 20, 2016 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The Atlantic States Marine Fishery Commission will decide in November whether the Gulf of Maine shrimp fishery, which has been closed for the previous three seasons, will remain closed for the 2017 season.

The commission is scheduled to meet Nov. 10 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, first to review the most recent stock status report for northern shrimp and technical recommendations from the shrimp advisory panel. It will then set the specifications for the upcoming season.

Tina Berger, ASMFC spokeswoman, said the 2016 status report has not been finalized, but said she would be surprised if the stock status report revealed anything resembling an extraordinary comeback for the species.

“I haven’t seen the report, but I would be surprised if there was a season,” Berger said. “If there is one, it would probably be a very small one. But again, I haven’t seen the report.”

The stock status reports dating back to 2012 reveal a species in free fall, with record low levels of abundance and biomass and poor recruitment since 2012. Those assessments showed problems with overfishing, warming water temperatures and a dwindling number of spawning females.

The dire state of the fishery and the resulting closures also have given rise to a discussion among New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts about future fishery management options for the beleaguered fishery — including limiting access to what historically has been an open fishery.

Those discussions bogged down last year, and the ASMFC halted further development of the draft amendment addressing access to the collapsed fishery.

Berger said the states met again this summer to try to iron out differences, but came no closer to finding the common ground necessary to draft a workable amendment with limited entry at its core.

“It’s still in the development stages,” Berger said. “They figured that, given the state of the stock, there really was no reason to rush it at this point given the status of the stock.”

Maine harvesters dominated the fishery the last time it was open in 2013. Of the 207 vessels permitted to shrimp in the Gulf of Maine, 180 had hailing ports in Maine, while Massachusetts and New Hampshire each had 13. One vessel landed its shrimp in both Maine and New Hampshire.

Maine shrimpers in 2013 accounted for 83 percent, or 255.5 metric tons, of the total 307 metric tons of shrimp landed — which represented only 50.8 percent of the allowable catch and was the lowest seasonal harvest since the fishery was closed altogether in 1978.

New Hampshire was next with 10 percent (31.3 metric tons) and Massachusetts was third with 7 percent (20.3 metric tons).

This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

Atlantic States Marine Fishery Commission to debate 2017 shrimp moratorium

October 19, 2016 — The Atlantic States Marine Fishery Commission will decide in November whether the Gulf of Maine shrimp fishery, which has been closed for the previous three seasons, will remain closed for the 2017 season.

“I haven’t seen the report, but I would be surprised if there was a season,” Berger said. “If there is one, it would probably be a very small one. But again, I haven’t seen the report.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

Herring Fishing Shut Down Along New England Coast

October 18, 2016 — PORTLAND, Maine – Herring fishermen are nearing their quota along New England’s coast and the fishery will be shut down until further notice.

The National Marine Fisheries Service says fishermen in the inshore Gulf of Maine have caught about 90 percent of their quota and the fishery was shut down early Tuesday morning. The inshore fishing zone ranges from Cape Cod to the eastern edge of the Maine coast.

Herring are an important bait fish, especially in the lobster fishery. A shortage of the fish in offshore waters caused a bait shortage in New England during the summer.

Read the full story at Maine Public Radio

Fishing rule gives regional councils more flexibility on catch limits

October 14th, 2016 — Recreation anglers could see more fishing opportunities under a new rule issued by the Obama administration Thursday that gives regional management councils more flexibility to set catch limits.

The rule, already under fire from environmental groups in a rare conflict with the administration, could help mollify the recreational industry and its Republican allies in Congress. They’ve been critical of the administration for not relaxing restrictions given the dramatic rebound of many fish stocks over the past few years.

Officials with the Fisheries division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said the change, months in the crafting, strikes an appropriate balance between the needs of the economically vital recreational and commercial industry while not undermining the current law that has helped rescue dozens of once overfished stocks.

Re-authorization of Magnuson-Stevens a decade ago is credited with helping to rebuild 40 endangered stocks since 2000. Eight stocks came off the overfishing list in 2015 including greater amberjack in the Gulf of Mexico, thorny skate in the Gulf of Maine; and hogfish in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico.

Read the full story at USA Today