Saving Seafood

Retiring NOAA exec has impossible to-do list: whale deaths, Rafael decision, more

September 29, 2017 — GLOUCESTER, Mass. — John Bullard knows he has a daunting list of tasks to complete before he walks away, in about three months, from his position as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA’s) top decision maker for the northeastern part of the US.

It’s urgent for NOAA to determine why so many right whales have recently died, take action to protect scallop populations in the northern Gulf of Maine and advance the Omnibus Habitat Amendment, a six-volume document that’s been in the works for 10 years and would address essential fish habitat as well as permanent and seasonal closed areas, he believes. But that’s just a few of the jobs he told Undercurrent News he wants to see to completion before leaving.

The announcement, made in July, that Bullard will retire as the administrator of NOAA Fisheries’ Greater Atlantic Region on Jan. 5 puts a cap on a recent five-year stint at the agency, which he told Undercurrent during a break at the New England Fishery Management Council meeting, is three years longer than he said he told his wife he would stay in the job. He said he has not yet decided what he will spend his time on after that.

“I’m retiring,” he reiterated when pressed. “I’m retiring.”

Neither will NOAA, which advertised Bullard’s job for a month starting on Aug. 7, say how many candidates it’s now considering to fill his post or suggest when a successor might be named. It’s the agency’s policy to “not comment on ongoing hiring actions,” a spokesperson said.

Whoever is awarded the position – one of five regional leadership positions for NOAA — will have the daunting job of working with the fishery councils to manage 44 fish stocks, including two in New England (scallops and lobster) that are worth more than $500 million per year each, according to the agency.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Caribbean fishers count the cost in wake of Irma

September 27, 2017 — Several Caribbean island nations unfortunate enough to find themselves in the path of Hurricane Irma in early September are now assessing the vast toll the storm took on their economies, with Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, and the Turks and Caicos reporting severe damage to their fishing industries.

The hurricane is estimated to have cost the Caribbean more than EUR 8.4 billion (USD10 billion) in damage overall, along with dozens of lives.

Barbuda recorded the first three fatalities of Hurricane Irma, including a two-year-old boy. The island also suffered most severely in regard to its fishing fleet, with at least 44 percent of its fishing vessels suffering serious damage when the hurricane made landfall on the island on 6 September. Of those vessels, only about 10 percent were insured, according to information shared with SeafoodSource by Antigua and Barbuda Senior Fisheries Officer Ian Horsford. He cited a 2005 survey that indicated just 9.6 percent of Barbuda’s fishing vessels were insured up to then.

Prior to Hurricane Irma, which resulted in the total evacuation of this island’s inhabitants to neighboring Antigua, there were 96 active fishers operating there on 54 vessels – mainly modern fibreglass pirogues powered by outboard engines, most of which were less than 10 meters long.

Horsford estimated 26 percent of Barbuda’s population of 1,600 were dependent on the fishing industry for a living, including dependants of the fishermen. The fishing industry on that island targets mainly spiny lobster and conch, with production of lobster over the past five years ranging from 12 to 35 metric tons and bringing in revenue to the island ranging from approximately EUR 125,000 to 312,000 (USD USD148,000 to 370,000).

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Debate Over Opening U.S. Atlantic Marine Monument To Fishing

September 22, 2017 — A leaked memo draft indicates that current Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is considering allowing fishing in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument.

The monument covers about 5,000 square miles off Cape Cod and it’s the first national monument in the U.S.’s Atlantic waters, designated last year by the Obama Administration.

When President Obama first created the monument, he said he was doing it in a way that “respects the fishing industry’s unique role in New England’s economy.” However many commercial fishing groups disagreed, as the monument designation banned most commercial fishing in the area, with red crab and lobster fishermen given seven additional years to fish there.

Read and listen to the full story at WBUR

FLORIDA: Trap fishermen industry suffers record loses from Irma

September 20, 2017 — Conch Key commercial fisherman Gary Nichols scoured the Atlantic Ocean for seven hours on Monday and only found 15 of his 5,000 spiny lobster traps.

Fellow Conch Key fishermen Jeff Kramer was only able to locate a handful of his 2,000 traps he had placed in the Atlantic. Both are hoping that ones in the Gulf of Mexico fared better.

Nichols’ daughter Kelly Cordova Nichols was able to locate 160 of the family’s 1,500 traps in the bay.

Nichols and his daughter are also working with two boats that were damaged by Hurricane Irma and are “not properly operating.”

“I feel a little bit defeated,” Nichols said. “It’s hard to keep focused and have a firm belief in God and happiness right now. … We are just spinning our wheels out here right now. Everything in 100 feet of water is just destroyed. This was the storm of the century for us.”

Read the full story at KeysNews.com

MAINE: Lobstermen plagued by low catch, low prices

September 1, 2017 — As the shedder, or soft shell, season winds down with higher value hard shell lobsters on the horizon, local lobstermen are hoping to turn what has so far been a dismal season around.

Lobsters are in hiding, or so it seems to lobstermen.

“I’d say we’ve caught about half the lobsters [than in recent years],” Stonington lobsterman Tony Bray said of the 2017 season.

The Stonington Lobster Co-op, which buys a large proportion of the local catch, reported a 25 to 30 percent drop in volume over last year.

“The lobsters are out there, so this is not likely reflective of a resource decline,” said Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries scientist Carla Guenther, who follows Department of Marine Resources data monitoring. “It may be reflective of a habitat shift as to where the lobsters are, and a behavior shift as a reaction to the colder water.”

For lobstermen, low volume doesn’t equal higher prices. At the dock, price per pound has dropped about 20 percent, with the Co-op paying $2.65 per pound, compared to $3.25 this time last year.

Read the full story at the Castine Patriot

Maine Coast Fishermen’s Association recognizes the other fish in the sea

Hook, Line & Dinner raised money to support Maine fishermen who catch scallops, shrimp, clams and groundfish.

August 14, 2017 — Imagine the sun setting on a cool summer night with fresh lobsters and steamers and all the fixings, local beer and Maine-grown folk tunes by The Ghost of Paul Revere – and no crowds, because, well, there’s only so much room for vehicles at Cook’s Lobster & Ale House on Bailey Island.

If that wasn’t perfect enough, this July 15 event dubbed Hook, Line & Dinner raised $11,000 to support the Maine Coast Fishermen’s Association (MCFA).

“MCFA is a nonprofit run by commercial fishermen,” said Executive Director Ben Martens, explaining that the organization tries to balance the concerns of the industry and those of the environment.

Two hundred MCFA supporters made the winding drive from as far away as Port Clyde to the north and Kennebunkport to the south and, in a few instances, arrived by boat.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Richard Nelson: Maine’s balking at new greenhouse gas cap threatens seafood industry

A stellar regional program limiting emissions needs support for stronger goals that will save our fisheries.

August 14, 2017 — As a lobsterman for more than 30 years, I have a direct connection to the ocean and its abundance. It’s how I make my living, and I’ve seen it shape my way of life and the people around me. Fishing and seafood are an inextricable part of Maine’s heritage and culture, and it’s thanks to good conservation practices in the lobster fishery that we enjoy the bounty reflected in our record landings of late.

But keeping this way of life requires a continuation of good decision-making now — not only for the health of our ocean, but also for the health of Mainers and our economy. Cutting carbon emissions is an imperative element of that, and we can’t settle for either the status quo or a return to the times and policies that paid little heed to the environment around us.

One program on the state and regional level that has shown great success already, but now faces an imminent decision on its future, is the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. After a 20-month review, a choice must be made on the amount of carbon reduction required — which directly translates into protecting Maine’s people and resources.

Read the full opinion piece at Central Maine

RI And MA Lobstermen At Odds With Regulators Over Conservation Efforts

August 4, 2017 — Some Rhode Island and Massachusetts lobstermen say they’re frustrated that interstate regulators rejected new catch limits at a meeting Tuesday. The lobstermen say new rules are needed to stem dwindling lobster populations in New England.

Regulators rejected a proposal that would have allowed lobstermen to choose from a menu of conservation options, providing flexibility for different harvest regions.

Closing off certain fishing areas or reducing the number of lobster traps by 50 percent were among the options the proposal would have provided, options the lobstermen helped craft.

Beth Casoni, director of the Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association, represents members from both the Bay and Ocean States. She said lobstermen in the south coast of Massachusetts were in favor of passing the rules and giving regions autonomy over how they deal with conservation.

“The fishing industry, you know, they’re hopeful that managers will listen with them and work with them,” Casoni explained. “And when stuff like this happens they want to throw their hands up and walk away because they don’t get paid to go to these meetings.”

Read the full story at RIPR

Gulf of Maine lobster conservation efforts to be reviewed

August 4, 2017 — ROCKLAND, Maine — This is peak season for eating Maine lobster. The proof is in the pots, or the cookers, at the 70th annual Maine Lobster Festival in Rockland. Crowds eagerly gobbled up plates of hot lobster ton Thursday, and many went back for seconds.

Ellen Robinson came to Maine from  Tennessee, and said her goal was, “to eat lobster as much as I can hold, which I’m doing, and I will eat more.”

The lobster industry likes to hear those comments, as they show there are plenty of customers waiting for what Maine fishermen catch. The industry has seen record catches and income in recent years. But researchers have said there appear to be fewer small, juvenile lobsters growing on the bottom of the inshore areas of the Gulf of Maine.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has decided to study the conservation efforts in the three states of the Gulf to determine what works best, and whether any changes are needed to keep the population healthy.

Read and watch the full story at WCSH

U.S. Senate passes resolution designating Sept. 25, 2017, as ‘National Lobster Day’

August 4, 2017 — In recognition of the historic and economic importance of the lobster industry to Rhode Island and other coastal states, the U.S. Senate unanimously approved a resolution designating Monday, Sept. 25, 2017, as “National Lobster Day.” The resolution, cosponsored by U.S. Senators Jack Reed (D-RI), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and seven New England colleagues, invites lobster-lovers to mark their culinary calendars for the last Monday in September.

“This is a fitting tribute to our local lobstermen and women and the important economic impact lobsters have on Rhode Island’s economy. As consumer demand for sustainably harvested, wild-caught New England lobsters continues to grow, ‘National Lobster Day’ offers an opportunity to celebrate and appreciate an industry that supports hundreds of Rhode Island families and helps bring tourists to the area to enjoy delicious, freshly caught lobster and seafood,” Reed said. “It will also help showcase Rhode Island’s culinary diversity and boost sales. Whether you enjoy lobster fresh off the boat, or with fresh-made pasta, Rhode Island offers plenty of ways to join the celebration.”

“National Lobster Day is a great time to remember that the lobsters caught off of Rhode Island are some of the best on the East Coast, and we’re fortunate to have no shortage of first-rate restaurants to serve them up,” Whitehouse said. “Although warming seas have contributed to the reduction of our lobster landings by half in the last twenty years, I’ll continue to do everything in my power to make sure lobstermen and other Rhode Island fishermen, who make enormous contributions to the local economy, will continue to find healthy stocks off our coast and be able to call Rhode Island ports home for decades to come.”

Read the full story at the Westerly Sun