lobsters Archives - Page 15 of 30

Red Lobster Expands Sustainability Efforts with Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch Program Partners

May 17, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Red Lobster announced on Tuesday that they have formed a partnership with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program.

The Seafood Watch program is part of an initiative to “improve the sustainability of global fisheries and aquaculture, through policy leadership, scientific research, industry partnerships and consumer engagement.” Red Lobster’s partnership with the program is part of the seafood restaurant’s mission to help “make better seafood choices for healthier oceans, now and for future generations.”

The partnership comes just a few months after the restaurant chain launched their Seafood with Standards platform, which focuses on sourcing high quality seafood in a manner that is traceable, sustainable and responsible.

This story was originally published on Seafood News, it is republished here with permission.

Massachusetts: South Shore lobstermen finally put traps in water

May 17, 2018 — MARSHFIELD, Mass. — A dozen lobstermen hauled traps onto boats, tinkered with on-board computer systems and chatted, as they waited for the high tide they needed to clear the channel out of Green Harbor and get to work.

South Shore lobstermen are back on the water this week after more than a three month ban on lobster fishing, aimed at protecting endangered whales. The ban was supposed to be from Feb. 1 to April 30, but an additional two weeks was added because whales were spotted close to the shore last month. In all, local lobstermen have gone 15 weeks without pulling a trap or making a sale.

“We’re going into the season broke, let’s put it that way,” fisherman Dana Blackman said Wednesday morning, the day after lobster fishing resumed.

Lobster fishing on the South Shore used to be a year-round industry, but in 2014 federal regulators made it illegal to use lobstering equipment off the southern Massachusetts coast in February, March and April when the endangered North Atlantic right whales are in the area and could be injured or killed by fishing gear and boats.

The ban affects about 75 lobster boats in Marshfield and Scituate alone.

Read the full story at the Patriot Ledger

ASMFC: Report Tagged Lobsters

May 16, 2018 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

If you find a lobster with a green “SNECVTS” t-bar tag behind the carapace or a black acoustic tag on the carapace, please contact: Michael Long at (401) 515-4892 or mlong@cfrfoundation.org. This tagging program is part of the Southern New England Cooperative Ventless Trap Survey (SNECVTS) being conducted from May – November 2018 by the Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation and University of Rhode Island. SNECVTS will collect baseline data on lobster and Jonah crab abundance and distribution in the RI/MA Wind Energy Area, which is centered on Cox’s Ledge. For more information on SNECVTS see attached flyer or visit: www.cfrfoundation.org/snecvts/.

Learn more about the ASMFC by visiting their site here.

Scallop RSA Program: NEFMC and NOAA Announce 15 Awards Selected for 2018-2019 funding

May 16, 2018 — The following was released by New England Fishery Management Council:

The New England Fishery Management Council and NOAA Fisheries’ Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC) are pleased to announce that 15 projects have been selected for 2018-2019 funding through the Sea Scallop Research Set-Aside (RSA) Program.

“The Scallop RSA Program truly has become one of the flagships of the scallop fishery,” said New England Council Chairman Dr. John Quinn. “The collaborative efforts that take place at sea between fishermen and researchers go a long way toward enhancing our understanding of what’s happening with the resource. The results of this RSA work funnel back to the Council and support stock assessments. Without a doubt, the RSA program helps us better manage our – Virginia Institute of Marine Science photo extremely valuable scallop fishery.”

Projects will address research priorities established by the Council, with a particular focus on resource surveys. The awards are expected to generate more than $12 million: $3 million to fund research; and $9 million to compensate industry partners who harvest set-aside quota

“We are excited to be able to work with the New England Fishery Management Council, industry, and scientists to fund sea scallop science through the Research Set-Aside Program,” said NEFSC Science and Research Director Dr. Jon Hare. “The projects funded support surveys, bycatch mitigation, and biological studies, all with the purpose of improving the information used in the management of the sea scallop resource.”

The New England Council established the Sea Scallop RSA Program to address research questions that support management of the scallop resource. The Council sets the research priorities and researchers compete for funding through a federal grant competition managed by NOAA Fisheries.

No federal funds are provided to support the research. Instead, projects are awarded pounds of scallops, which have been “set aside” from the annual fishery quota for this purpose. Successful applicants partner with the fishing industry to harvest their set-aside award to generate funds for the research. There are active research set-aside programs for Atlantic sea scallops, Atlantic herring, and monkfish.

2018-2019 Scallop RSA Award Summary

The awards fall into three categories: scallop surveys (dredge, drop camera, and HabCam); bycatch mitigation; and sea scallop biology.

Scallop Surveys

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) received new awards to conduct dredge surveys in Closed Area I, Closed Area II, and the Nantucket Lightship. Under an existing award from last year, VIMS also will conduct a dredge survey of the Mid-Atlantic Bight. As part of ongoing efforts to better understand scallop survey dredge performance, VIMS investigators received an award to evaluate the hydrodynamic characteristics of both lined and unlined survey dredges in the largest flume tank in the world, located in St. John’s, Newfoundland at Memorial University’s Marine Institute.

The University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth School for Marine Science and Technology (SMAST) received three awards to conduct surveys using a drop-camera array. Through these awards, researchers plan to conduct high-resolution surveys of the Nantucket Lightship, Closed Area I, Great South Channel, and select portions of the Northern Gulf of Maine Scallop Management Area.

The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) will conduct Habitat Camera Mapping System (HabCam) optical surveys throughout the Mid-Atlantic Bight and on the northern flank of Georges Bank. In addition to these surveys, researchers will continue to evaluate dredge effects on habitat and habitat recovery in the Closed Area II Habitat Area of Particular Concern. Coonamessett Farm Foundation will conduct a HabCam survey of the Nantucket Lightship and Southern Flank of Georges Bank.

Bycatch Mitigation

Coonamessett Farm Foundation will continue its seasonal survey on Georges Bank, collecting information on bycatch rates for yellowtail flounder and other species relative to scallop meat yield. These data also will be used to evaluate sea scallop health and meat quality, biological questions about several flounder species, and to examine lobsters for shell disease.

Coonamessett Farm Foundation will continue its loggerhead sea turtle tagging program, receiving funds to tag up to 20 loggerheads with water activated tags. Tag data will be used to evaluate spatial and temporal overlap between loggerhead sea turtles and the scallop fishery.

Coonamessett Farm Foundation also will be testing a dredge twine-top cover net in an attempt to quantify dredge selectivity characteristics.

Sea Scallop Biology

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science will investigate sea scallop density-dependence factors that may be affecting growth, mortality, and reproduction of scallops in the Nantucket Lightship and Elephant Trunk areas. In addition, VIMS will conduct a pilot study to extend the current stock assessment model to better account for sea scallop ages with a particular focus on the Mid-Atlantic Bight and Nantucket Lightship areas.

WHOI will receive support to determine if a gonadosomatic index (GSI) can be calculated from Light Field 3D images of shucked scallops collected during fishing operations. The GSI is used to assess maturity and spawning events in many species of fish and shellfish, including scallops. If successful, this could improve the ability to collect and quantify scallop maturation and spawning data during the course of routine fishery sampling procedures.

The 2018-2019 award listings can be found on the Northeast Fisheries Science Center website at: https://www.nefsc.noaa.gov/coopresearch/news/scallop-rsa-2018-2019/.

RSA award announcements and answers to “frequently asked questions” also are available at https://www.nefsc.noaa.gov/coopresearch/rsa_program.html.

Visit the New England Council’s scallop webpage: https://www.nefmc.org/management-plans/scallops.

View the release in its entirety here.

As Gulf of Maine warms, will black sea bass make up for declines in lobster?

May 15, 2018 — The Gulf of Maine’s warming waters could mean that new fisheries are coming to Maine.

The Bangor Daily News reported that many lobster fishermen, concerned about a possible drop-off in the lobster resource, are looking at other species like Jonah crab and black sea bass. In 2016, fishermen in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island together earned $2.38 million from their black sea bass fishery.

If Maine were to develop a black sea bass fishery, she said, fishermen could use techniques and equipment that are very similar to what they use now to catch lobster, which would help with the transition, Marissa McMahan, a senior fisheries scientist for the environmental science nonprofit Manomet, told the BDN.

Read the full story at MaineBiz

Lobster industry fears weaker shells, but evidence is mixed

May 14, 2018 — PORTLAND, Maine — More people outside the U.S. are enjoying the New England tradition of cracking open a freshly cooked American lobster, and that experience hinges on one thing — the lobster getting there alive.

That’s a looming problem, according to some members of the American lobster industry, who are concerned that lobsters’ shells are getting weaker. Scientific evidence about the issue paints a complicated picture.

U.S. lobster exports to Asian countries have increased exponentially this decade, and American shippers prefer lobsters with hard, sturdy shells to survive the long journey to places such as Beijing and Seoul.

But some members of U.S. industry have complained in recent years of poor shell quality among lobsters, most of which are plucked from the ocean off Canada and New England. They’ve raised concerns about warming ocean waters or acidification of the ocean having a negative effect on lobster shells.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

Scientists say Maine’s lobster boom won’t last. Here are the fisheries coming next.

May 14, 2018 — For the past two decades Maine’s lobster industry, which had $433 million worth of landings in 2017, has been lauded and envied as a model for how conservation practices can help a fishery thrive.

But if, as some have predicted, Maine’s lobster boom since 1990 reverses itself, lobstermen might find themselves having to catch something else in order to maintain their livelihoods out on the water. With an eye toward the future, many in Maine have been looking south to see what kind of emerging species other fishermen are catching as climate change disrupts the environment.

In southern New England, many fishermen have turned their attention to species such as Jonah crab and black sea bass, the numbers of which have increased as ocean temperatures warm and as lobster in the region have become more scarce. Maine’s lobster landings remain near historic highs, but some say the changes that have occurred south of Cape Cod are inevitable in the Gulf of Maine.

“I know it’s a hard concept to get around, but it’s going to happen,” Norbert Stamps, a Rhode Island fisherman, told a roomful of other fishermen at the Maine Fishermen’s Forum in Rockport in March.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

The Future of Lobstering May Mean Fishing by Computer

May 9, 2018 — The endangered North Atlantic right whale is facing extinction, with fewer than 450 left. The cause of the highest mortality is entanglement in fishing gear, including lobster trap lines. A lawsuit forcing the government to protect the whales may bring about a change in the way lobster fishermen have worked for more than a hundred years.

Lobster fishing used to be pretty straightforward. But there may be big changes ahead for fishermen in New England.

“First thing you have to remember is, you’re taking the lobster industry and flipping it around on its head and shaking it,” Mike Lane said, sitting on his lobster boat in Cohassett Lane. Lane is a life-long fisherman. His dad fished for lobster before him. He’s concerned about the proposals. “How are you going to teach 60-year old men that don’t use computers to use a computer?”

Pretty soon, Lobstermen may be asked to find their traps using computers, instead of buoys. New fishing technology is being developed to protect the endangered North Atlantic right whale—it’s called ropeless fishing.

Read the full story at WCAI

Maine: Marine cleanup team tangles with 2 tons of ‘ghost gear’ off Cape Elizabeth

May 9, 2018 — A two-ton, decades-old ball of underwater marine debris measuring 15 feet in diameter was pulled from Dyer Cove off Cape Elizabeth on Tuesday, the biggest example of derelict fishing gear recovered from the Gulf of Maine in at least a decade, according to the lobster industry group that removed it.

“Look at it, it’s huge,” said Jim Buxton of Scarborough, the lobsterman and diver who helped raise it. “It has a little of everything. I see gill nets, trawl nets, lobster traps. Every fishery we’ve ever had here and more. Look there at the size of the mesh. That hasn’t been used in decades.”

The Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation has been ridding local waters of so-called “ghost gear” for a decade, culling state waters of more than 5,000 traps during that time, but it is usually done trap by trap, said Executive Director Erin Pelletier. This ball will likely top out at between 4,000 and 5,000 pounds.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Massachusetts extends ban on lobstering over right whales

May 8, 2018 — MARSHFIELD, Mass. — Massachusetts officials have extended a ban on lobster fishing along Cape Cod Bay because critically endangered right whales are feeding in the area.

The state Division of Marine Fisheries announced lobstermen won’t be able to set their traps until May 16, two weeks later than usual, the The Patriot Ledger reports.

The state says surveys have found up to 100 right whales are still in western Cape Cod Bay.

Lobstermen have faced a three-month ban on setting their traps since 2015 as part of an effort to lower the amount of whales that get caught in fishing gear during their migration.

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