Saving Seafood

NOAA officials get an earful from Maine lobstermen over further efforts to protect right whales

September 29, 2022 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is considering a new round of measures aimed at reducing the risks that commercial fishing poses to the endangered North Atlantic right whale population.

Several hundred people attended a virtual meeting Tuesday evening, which NOAA officials billed as a forum to collect feedback from fishermen about possible trap limits and more seasonal closures and gear changes.

Most of the speakers were Maine lobstermen, who believe the changes will devastate their businesses and the state’s economy.

“If these things are implemented as I see, we’re going to be turned into seasonal communities,” said Jason Joyce, a fisherman from Swan’s Island. We’re not going to be year-round communities. I think it’s a shame, and honestly being a taxpayer I’m ashamed of my government for pushing this on me.”

Read the full article at Maine Public

As pressure mounts, more Maine lobstermen are quietly trying ‘ropeless’ gear

September 29, 2022 — Organizations that have been testing experimental fishing gear designed to protect whales are seeing growing interest from Maine fishermen after recent setbacks have pushed the state’s lobster industry on its heels

A handful of groups have been testing new “ropeless” and “on-demand” fishing gear throughout New England, but only a small number of Maine lobstermen have been quietly trying the technology out for more than a year.

Now more Mainers, worried for the lobster fishery’s future, are reconsidering the technology after a federal court rejected an industry challenge of new fishing regulations earlier this month and a sustainability watchdog advised people to avoid eating lobster due to the fishery’s risk to the endangered right whale.

The Northeast Fisheries Science Center, which has been lending out ropeless fishing gear to fishermen throughout the region, says it has heard from more Maine lobstermen interested in trials recently. Meanwhile, one of the state’s major ports is now pushing for a more robust testing program.

Read the full article at Bangor Daily News

Group that claims catching lobsters is harmful to whales draws sharp rebuke in Gloucester

September 27, 2022 — Nothing says “Massachusetts, or really “New England”, like a lobster.

But our iconic crustacean just got a failing grade from an environmental group.

The Seafood Watch Project, which operates out of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, put lobster on their red list. That designation advises consumers not to buy the items on that list due to what they see as a negative impact on the environment from harvesting them.

In this case, the organization says the way lobsters are caught presents a threat to the North Atlantic Right Whale which is an endangered species.

Read the full article at Vicki Graf, Boston 25 News

MAINE: Maine lobsterman say ‘red listing’ a threat to their livelihoods without cause

September 26, 2022 — The men and women who harvest Maine lobster say new restrictions on fishing, combined with the so-called “red listing” of lobster by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch, are a threat to their livelihoods, and the economy of coastal Maine.

Both the listing and fishing regulations are part of the ongoing efforts to protect the endangered right whale. Fishermen, however, say those steps are misdirected, because they are not to blame for the decline of the right whale.

“I truly believe the lobstermen have done everything we’ve been asked by National Marine Fisheries and the DMR [Maine Department of Marine Resources],” said Gerry Cushman, who has been lobstering in Port Clyde for 38 years.

“We’re not the bad guys here,” he said. “You ask us to do it, we do it. So why are you putting us on the red list?”

The Seafood Watch listing is recommending consumers not buy American lobster from either the U.S. or Canada. Maine is the primary producer of that lobster for the U.S. Cushman said he believes Seafood Watch has taken the action against Maine fishermen to pressure them to stop fighting proposed regulations in court.

“Because we challenged the science. We have that right to be able to challenge science. We have a lot of knowledge, and that’s why we challenge it. But to put us on the red list is a kind of bullying,” he said.

Steve Train, a lobsterman from Long Island in Casco Bay, echoed those points, saying Maine fishermen have followed all the whale protection rules, even though they have also been challenging them in court.

Read the full article at News Center Maine

Court weighs vastly different timelines for making new whale rules

September 26, 2022 — The timeline for how fast federal fishery regulators should come up with new rules to protect the endangered right whale is the latest dispute in years of courtroom battles that could decide the future of Maine’s lobster fleet.

Both the conservation groups that sued the federal government for not safeguarding the whales and the federal agency that oversees the fishing industry recently proposed their visions for the pace of rulemaking.

Predictably, the timelines are vastly different.

The National Marine Fisheries Service, the government agency that has been sued for not properly protecting whales, asked the court on Sept. 19 if it could have until December 2024 to come up with new regulations to bring them in line with the Endangered Species and Marine Mammal Protection acts.

Addressing the deficiencies will require a scientific analysis, public engagement and major advances in fishing technology, wrote Todd Kim, a U.S. assistant attorney general.

That 26-month timeline is “eminently reasonable” and necessary to develop and implement solid rules to protect right whales, argued Kim.

Read the full article at Bangor Daily News

MAINE: Maine petitioners ask California seafood group to remove lobster listing

September 22, 2022 — Maine’s lobster industry has launched an online petition seeking to convince a California-based seafood group to back off its calls for a boycott of the popular crustacean food.

The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative’s petition calls on the Monterey Bay Aquarium to remove lobster caught in the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank from its “red” list of food to avoid, saying the designation is “not supported by the facts.”

“Maine Lobster has always been sustainable, and the baseless decision by the Seafood Watch program greatly impacts an industry that is the backbone of the economy in Maine, supporting entire communities, composed of generations of fishermen who have always prioritized the health of the fishery and the Gulf of Maine,” the petition reads.

Read the full article at The Center Square

Maine Lobstermen’s Association will appeal right whale ruling

September 21, 2022 — The Maine Lobstermen’s Association said it will appeal a federal judge’s ruling that new restrictions on their fishery can proceed to protect endangered right whales, calling the plan  “scientifically flawed” and “draconian.”

In an opinion issued Sept. 8, U.S. District Court Judge James E. Boasberg turned aside the lobstermen’s arguments that the National Marine Fisheries Service acted arbitrarily and overstated the hazard their gear poses to whales.

The association had sued NMFS and allied environmental groups to block implementation of the new rules. It was the latest in several years of action in Boasberg’s Washington, D.C. courtroom as NMFS, environmental groups and fishermen battled over measures to protect the right whales – now estimated to number just about 340 animals – from entanglement in fishing trap lines.

“We refuse to let a single judge’s decision be the last word,” MLA President Kristan Porter said in announcing the new appeal. “The facts are clear. Maine lobstermen are not driving the whale towards extinction. There has never been a known right whale mortality associated with Maine lobster gear, and there has not been a single known right whale entanglement with Maine lobster gear in nearly two decades.”

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

MAINE: Maine lobstermen, their livelihoods threatened, push back against California aquarium’s ‘red listing’

September 21, 2022 — Lobstermen from Maine are speaking out over recent warnings about the product they catch to make their living after a West Coast aquarium discouraged consumers from purchasing lobsters.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium, in Monterey, California, is standing by its decision to “red-list” the lobster industry over concerns that North Atlantic right whales are harmed in the fishing process.

“We stand by our science-based assessments,” Seafood Watch, a sustainable seafood advisory list released by the aquarium, told FOX Business via email.

Specifically, they charge that North Atlantic right whales, which number less than 340, become entangled in the lobstermen’s buoy lines.

The Seafood Watch website’s “red list” advises consumers to “take a pass on these [species] for now; they’re overfished, lack strong management or are caught or farmed in ways that harm other marine life or the environment.”

Other lobsters included in the warning include a green “best choice,” a yellow “good alternative” and a blue “certified.”

The aquarium told FOX Business via email that Seafood Watch “started the assessments [you’re] inquiring about in 2018,” after 17 North Atlantic right whales were reported dead in the United States and Canada the previous year.

Read the full article at Fox Business

Maine Lobstermen’s Association appeals federal judge’s rejection of lawsuit

September 20, 2022 — The Maine Lobstermen’s Association is appealing a federal judge’s ruling that rejected its lawsuit challenging new restrictions on the harvesting of lobster off the Maine coast.

The MLA filed the lawsuit in September 2021.

U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg denied the MLA’s request in a Sept. 8 ruling. It’s the latest in a string of legal setbacks for lobster fishermen who are coping with increasingly strict fishing rules meant to save North Atlantic right whales, which number less than 340 and are vulnerable to entanglement in fishing gear.

Read the full article at News Center Maine

MAINE: Public campaign grows as Maine lobster sector appeals court ruling on gear restrictions

September 20, 2022 — The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative (MLMC) is urging consumers to support the lobster fishery in the U.S. state of Maine on National Lobster Day and beyond after Seafood Watch downgraded the fishery to “red/avoid”.

Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch’s lower rating of North American lobster and Canadian snow crab was primarily due to potential impacts the fisheries could be having on North Atlantic right whales.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource