Saving Seafood

ASMFC February/March issue of Fisheries Focus Now Available

April 3, 2018 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The February/March 2018 issue of Fisheries Focus is now available at http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file//5ac2a81dFishFocusFebMarch2018.pdf.

Inside this issue:

Upcoming Meetings

page 2

From the Executive Director’s Desk

Adapting Fisheries Management to Changes in Species Abundance and Distribution Resulting from Climate Change

page 3

Species Profile

Cobia

page 4

Comings & Goings 

page 7

2017 Annual Report Now Available

page 7

Fishery Management Actions 

American Lobster & Jonah Crab

page 8

Science Highlight

Cooperative Research Seeks to Fill In Data Gaps to Support Fisheries Science and Management Efforts

page 9

Proposed Management Action

American Eel

page 11

ACCSP

ACCSP Announces FY2018 Funding Awards

page 11

On the Legislative Front

page 12 

Past issues of Fisheries Focus can be found at http://www.asmfc.org/search/%20/%20/Fishery-Focus.

 

John Bullard: Lobster industry must lead on right whales

April 2, 2018 — A number of events over the past two weeks have probably gotten the full attention of the US lobster industry and increased pressure for it to take the lead in fighting the potential extinction of the North Atlantic right whale.

In response to the deaths of the endangered whale, including 12 in Canada last year, Canada has imposed new restrictions on ship speeds and snow crab fishing, as well as earmarked $1 million more annually to help free marine mammals from fishing gear.

In addition, survey teams on Saturday ended their aerial search for right whale calves off the southeastern US coast. For the first time since the spotters began their survey, in 1989, they recorded zero births this calving season. Last year only five births were recorded, well below what used to be the average of 15 per year. Last year there were 17 confirmed right whale deaths. Already this year, a 10-year-old female, who was just entering her breeding years, died after becoming entangled in fishing gear. She was discovered off Virginia.

There are only about 450 North Atlantic right whales, including about 100 breeding females. Females used to give birth every three to four years. Now they give birth only every eight years, if at all. Photographic evidence suggests that about 85 percent of right whales show signs of entanglement in fishing gear, which affects the whale’s fitness and is likely one of the reasons for the longer breeding cycle.

The $669 million lobster industry must assume a leadership role in solving a problem that it bears significant responsibility for creating. Entanglements occur in other fixed-gear fisheries, but the number of lobster trawls in the ocean swamps the other fisheries.

Read the full opinion piece at the Boston Globe

 

Right whale survival may be dependent on snow crab fishery’s flexibility

March 22, 2018 — The future of the North Atlantic right whale is looking more and more bleak, and with their fate inextricably tied to the lobster and crab fishing grounds off the coast of Northern New England and Eastern Canada, pressure is mounting on the fisheries and their regulators to take more drastic action.

No right whale calves have been spotted so far this year – the latest in a string of bad news for the species, which lost 17 members in 2017. That total represented about four percent of its remaining population, and was around six times the normal mortality of the whales.  An eighteenth dead whale was found entangled in fishing gear off the coast of Virginia in January. Gear entanglement, followed by blunt force trauma caused by collisions with ships, have been identified as the main causes of these deaths.

Philip Hamilton, a research scientist at the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium, who studies the mammals, said there’s slim hope remaining that researchers have missed spotting any new calves.

“The calving season isn’t considered completely over – the folks who are doing the surveys on the calving grounds off of Florida and Georgia will be going for another month, but we’ve never gone this long and not found a calf,” Hamilton said. “And there are only a few whales that have not been seen, so we’re not particularly optimistic that a calf will be seen down there.”

With only an estimated 100 breeding females left in the entire North Atlantic right whale population, scientists are closely monitoring the changing reproductive cycle of the whales.

“We have had drops in reproduction in the past. We had a dip in the early 1990s and then a pretty dramatic downturn in the late 1990s that culminated with just a single right whale calf born in 2000. So we have seen this before, but we’ve never seen it in conjunction with such extremely high mortality,” Hamilton said.

In addition to the premature deaths and low birth rate, the right whale species faces the new and additional challenge of a lengthier gestation period. According to Hamilton,  their inter-birth interval has been increasing over the last five or six years, going from the standard of three to four years to 6.6 years in 2016, and jumping to an average of 10.2 years in 2017.

“There is a lot going on for them. We do know that females will forego reproduction if they aren’t in adequate body condition, meaning they have to have substantial fat reserves to support a calf. They end up losing up to a third of their body weight nursing a calf, so they have be able to handle that,” Hamilton said. “And there are a couple of factors which may be impacting female body condition. One would be food availability.”

The whales have been shifting where they feed in recent years and largely not going to some of their standard, historically productive feeding grounds like the Bay of Fundy and Roseway Basin and Great South channel east of Cape Cod. Instead, last year many ended up in Canada’s Gulf of St. Lawrence, where they are in much greater danger of entanglement with fishing gear, Hamilton said.

 

Read the full story at Seafood Source

 

NOAA Fisheries Seeks Comments for an Application for an Exempted Fishing Permit to Test Trap Targeting of Lionfish in the Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic Federal Waters

March 16, 2018 — The following was release by NOAA Fisheries:

KEY MESSAGE:

NOAA Fisheries is accepting comments on an application for an exempted fishing permit (EFP) from Salty Bones Fisheries. The applicant proposes to test various spiny lobster traps and a fish aggregation device based, non-containment purse trap to harvest lionfish from in Gulf of Mexico (Gulf) and South Atlantic federal waters. Sampling is proposed to occur during the spiny lobster closed season (April 1 through July 31). This study intends to examine the efficiency and effectiveness of the various trap designs for targeting lionfish while limiting bycatch, and adverse effects to protected species and habitat. The research would also derive biological life history information to improve lionfish control. In addition, the project would provide information on potential ecological and economic benefits of a lionfish fishery. These results provide the opportunity to gain industry support and provide management information on the use of traps as a viable lionfish harvest gear in the Gulf and South Atlantic. Only lionfish would be harvested under this EFP.

HOW TO COMMENT ON THE APPLICATIONS:
The comment period is open now through April 2, 2018. You may submit comments by electronic submission or by postal mail. Comments sent by any other method (such as e-mail), to any other address or individual, or received after the end of the comment period, may not be considered by NOAA Fisheries.

Application information: 

http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/sustainable_fisheries/gulf_fisheries/LOA_and_EFP/index.html

Electronic Submissions: Submit all electronic public comments via the Federal e-Rulemaking Portal.

  1. Go to  https://www.regulations.gov/docket?D=NOAA-NMFS-2018-0013 
  2. Click the “Comment Now!” icon, complete the required fields.
  3. Enter or attach your comments.

Mail: Submit written comments to Kelli O’Donnell, NOAA Fisheries, Southeast Regional Office, 263 13th Avenue South, St. Petersburg, FL 33701.

Program Concepts

  • Sampling would occur in two regions off the lower Florida Keys in the Gulf and South Atlantic, up to four times per month in each region during the Florida spiny lobster closed season, April 1 through July 31.
  • Spiny lobster trap designs would include all wire traps, in addition to wood and wire traps.  In year 1 and 2 1,000 of each design in the Gulf and 500 of each design in the South Atlantic, would be deployed for a total of up to 3,000 total traps. All traps would have modified funnel dimensions and would be deployed at depths from 65-300 ft.
  • Vessels would also deploy up to 15 purse traps in year 1 (all 15 could be fished in Gulf or South Atlantic or the 15 could be divided between the two regions) and up to 120 total in year 2 (80 in Gulf and 40 in South Atlantic). All traps would be deployed at depths from 65-300 ft.
  • Data to be collected per trip would include: gear configuration and fishing effort data (e.g., date and time of deployment and retrieval, latitude, longitude, and water depth of each deployed trawl, bait type used); soak time per area for each trawl; alternative weight and trawl configurations used in different sea states and conditions; trap loss and movement from original set position; protected species interactions; bycatch species, amount, and disposition; and lionfish catch data for each trap type.
  • Only lionfish would be harvested.

NOAA Fisheries finds this application warrants further consideration, and is seeking public comment on the application. A final decision on issuance of the EFP will depend on NOAA Fisheries’ review of public comments received, the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council’s and the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s recommendations, consultations with the affected states, and the U.S. Coast Guard, as well as a determination that it is consistent with all applicable laws.

Access this and other Fishery Bulletins from NOAA Fisheries Southeast Regional Office by clicking here.

 

Premium scallop line, rebranding effort part of the next chapter for Northern Wind

March 15, 2018 — New Bedford, Massachusetts-based seafood supplier Northern Wind, celebrated a milestone 30-year anniversary at the 2018 Seafood Expo North America event in Boston, Massachusetts. Company founders Ken Melanson and Michael Fernandes, along with Northern Wind’s co-CEO George S. Kouri, said they look forward to blossoming the success of Northern Wind even further in the years to come.

“We’re looking forward to the next chapter, because the first 30 years have been so robust and fruitful for the company,” Kouri said. “The next chapter for this company brings a lot of different opportunities for us – it brings opportunity for change; it brings opportunity to increase channels of distribution; it brings opportunities for new product sourcing; it brings opportunity for our re-branding efforts in packaging, re-facing the company in the image we want to project. It goes on and on, including Fair Trade.”

Besides scallops, the supplier has established a wide-ranging portfolio including ahi tuna, Atlantic salmon, North American lobster, monkfish, headfish, skate, and value-added seafood offerings. But the business has made its name with scallops.

“We have strict and strong historical relationships with vessels. We have state-of-the-art facilities with very well-financed capital improvements that enable us to process and produce probably more scallops than anyone in this industry,” Kouri said. “We’re very much known for our quality, our credibility, our loyalty to our supply side, and our customer service.”

A year ago, the company was the first scallop producer in the nation to receive Fair Trade certification. Building off demand from the foodservice sector for premium scallops, the company has launched its Captain’s Call Five-Star Premium Scallops.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

 

Low Numbers of Endangered Whales Sparks Debate About Whether Lobster Industry Threatens Species

March 9, 2018 — The population of the endangered North Atlantic right whale took a big hit last year with a record number found dead in Canadian waters from ship strikes and entanglements. With this year’s calving season ending and no new births observed, an ongoing debate over whether Maine’s lobster industry poses a mortal threat to the species is gaining new urgency.

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist Mark Baumgartner says that to help the whales survive much longer, the ropes Maine lobstermen use to tend their traps have to be modified or even eliminated. And it’s not just for the whales’ sake.

“I feel the industry is in jeopardy,” Baumgartner says.

Baumgartner was at the Fishermen’s Forum in Rockland late last week to detail the whale’s plight. If the lobster industry doesn’t respond effectively, he says, the federal government will step in.

“As the population continues to decline and pressure is put on the government to do something about it, then they’re going to turn to closures, because that’s all they’ll have,” he says.

There were about 450 North Atlantic right whales estimated to be alive in 2016. There were only five calves born last year, and a record 17 deaths caused by entanglement or ship strikes.

Read the full story at Maine Public

 

MASSACHUSETTS: Lobster catch declines, boat prices rise

State industry doing better than Maine’s

March 9, 2018 — As the summer of 2017 wore on, the word from local lobstermen was that the behavior of their prized catch had grown more unpredictable and landings were down.

Well, they were right: Landings and the value of the catch declined slightly across coastal Massachusetts in 2017, but a late fall run and higher off-the-boat prices helped mitigate the damage and keep declines well below those suffered by their lobstering contemporaries in Maine.

According to data supplied by the state Division of Marine Fisheries, Bay State lobstermen landed 16,565,126 pounds of lobster in 2017 with a total value of $81.54 million — for an average boat price of $4.92 per pound.

The amount of Massachusetts landings and their overall value are based on preliminary data complied by DMF from state lobster dealers. Even if the final numbers show a steeper decline, it’s highly unlikely they will approach what Maine lobstermen encountered in 2017.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

 

National Fisherman: No privacy, please

March 8, 2018 — As the north coast of California finally opened its Dungeness crab season this year, we saw yet again that diversity in fisheries is the key to sustaining infrastructure.

About 3,000 miles away from Crescent City, Calif., where buyers put crab boats on 3,000- to 6,000-pound limits when the season opened, Maine fishermen know exactly what it’s like to lose fishery landings and value prospects to a loss of infrastructure.

The California processors were claiming they couldn’t move product quickly enough because the season has been hindered for several years running. That has led them to consolidate, cut staff and trim the fat on trucking infrastructure. In Maine, the boom and bust winter shrimp fishery is mostly busted. Decades of quota extremes led the dwindling number of onshore processors to cut back on their commitment to the fleet (when it was running).

Some communities and individuals developed programs around direct marketing the catch in Maine. But just as they were getting established, the fishery went bust again and hasn’t been back since. When it does come back, who will be able to take the shrimp? And beyond the processors, what will the market be?

Lucky for Maine fishermen, local shrimp carries a certain mystique. When it comes in, coastal communities gather round to buoy the fleet and enjoy the fruits of the sea. But California’s Dungeness is a premium product, closer to Maine’s lobster in quality, flavor and demand. It is also sold live. What would Maine look like if its lobster fleet suffered a similar fate to that of California crabbers? It would not be pretty.

Read the full opinion piece at National Fisherman

 

US suppliers in love with ‘seafood speed dating’

March 8, 2018 — The meeting Steve Costas had with a South Korean buyer at Food Export-Northeast’s 2017 “seafood speed dating” event, in Boston, Massachusetts, lasted just 20 minutes, scarcely more than a brief flirtation.

But less than a year later Marder Trawling, the New Bedford, Massachusetts-based supplier for which Costas is an account executive, wound up selling the Korean company a container filled with a mix of its wild-caught fish products.

Of course at seafood speed dating, there’s also the chance that the object of your affection will be swept away by another suitor.

“It’s always a friendly event and I believe there is a camaraderie amongst the suppliers even though you know in 30 minutes your customer or a potential customer will be meeting with a competitor who in most cases will be offering them the same species,” Costas told Undercurrent News.

Costas is back again in Boston, Massachusetts, this week along with representatives for no less than 17 seafood suppliers from the northeastern US, all hoping to move containers of fish and, fingers crossed, establish long-term relationships with one or more of the 15 buyers from no less than 13 countries also there.

South Korea will be represented again, as will China, Japan, Colombia, Spain and the United Arab Emirate to name a few. Almost all of the buyers are looking to acquire scallops and lobsters, though some also come from countries where dogfish, monkfish and skate are in demand, all products sold by Marder Trawling using its recently acquired dock in Chatham, Massachusetts.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

 

Maine fleet keeps an even keel despite lower lobster landings

March 7, 2018 — As expected, Maine lobster landings dropped in 2017. The fleet landed 110.8 million pounds, a 16 percent decline in volume from 2016’s 132.5 million pounds, according to preliminary data released my the Maine Department of Marine Resources.

Value was down as well, by $106 million from 2016’s all-time record value of $540.4 million to $433.8 million (the average price per pound dropped from $4.08 to $3.91).

Despite marking the largest single-year decline in the fishery’s history, the 2017 season still ranks as the sixth highest volume and fourth highest value in the state’s history.

The season also marks the seventh year in a row with landings over 100 million pounds, which had never happened prior to 2011.

“The past year has underscored what I’ve been saying for years now — that change is inevitable and we must be prepared,” DMR Commissioner Patrick Keliher said in a press release. “This year’s decline in lobster landings is by no means a signal that the sky is falling. But it does highlight the need to make sure our management measures adapt to change. This is true for all fisheries. It is the best way to ensure resilience of our marine resources and opportunity for future generations.”

Zooming in on Maine’s lobster zones, the most significant landings decline came in Zone F, where lobstermen caught 25 percent less than the previous year, catching 10.95 million pounds compared to 2016’s haul of 14.67 million pounds. Landings dropped about 17 percent in Zones C, D and G; 15 percent in Zone E; 13 percent in Zone A; and 12 percent in Zone B.

Read the full story at the National Fisherman