Saving Seafood

Deep Sea Corals Off Coastal Maine Get Permanent Protection

June 24, 2021 — Fisheries regulators in the Northeast are permanently putting some 25,000 square miles of seafloor off-limits to some types of commercial fishing, in an effort to protect sensitive deep-sea corals.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a final rule this week that bars mobile bottom-trawling gear from vast deep-sea areas along the outer continental shelf off New England and in some smaller areas closer to Maine’s coast.

“The deep sea corals have a very fragile skeleton, and can be broken or displaced with a single pass of these nets, and they won’t recover,” says Gib Brogan, who directs advocacy campaigns for the international group, Oceana.

Brogan says the areas in question don’t see many trawlers right now – but the NOAA designations mark a proactive effort to ward off damaging fishing practices that have emerged elsewhere.

“Looking for other species that are not part of the fisheries in the U.S. There’s a particular piece of gear called a “canyon-buster door” that was specifically engineered to go fishing in the deep water canyons where the corals are growing,” Brogan says.

Read the full story at Maine Public

MAINE: Two dozen Bar Harbor fishermen sign against proposed Frenchman Bay salmon farm

June 23, 2021 — Twenty-six Bar Harbor fishermen have signed onto a statement opposing a proposed salmon pen operation in Frenchman Bay.

The statement cited numerous concerns about the proposal by American Aquafarms, a business based in Norway that has submitted applications to the Department of Marine Resources to lease 120 acres in order to install 30 “closed net” pens for raising salmon. The company has said its goal is to scale up to grow 66 million pounds of salmon per year.

Hatchery and processing facilities would be located in Gouldsboro. Support vessels would travel between the pens and facilities.

Fishermen say they’re concerned about the potential “loss of prime fishing ground for lobster, scallops and shrimp,” increased fishing pressure on grounds adjacent to the proposed operation, loss of gear from service vessels and related support activity, navigational conflicts, water pollution related to discharge, feed and fuel spills, habitat impacts, and disturbance to the ocean bottom around the pens.

In addition, the statement said, the proposal could lower “the potential for a comeback to the historical fisheries of the bay, including the recent shrimping fishery that centered inside the bay on these two deep water holes.”

Read the full story at MaineBiz

MAINE: Discovery Wharf opens doors after year-long hiatus

June 21, 2021 — The Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries on Atlantic Avenue in Stonington has announced the reopening of its marine education center, Discovery Wharf. The interpretive center will open its doors beginning Tuesday, June 22, with a limited schedule and new reservation system.

Discovery Wharf has welcomed thousands of visitors from across the country and world, but it was closed to the public last summer due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, a news release reports. The use of a booking system this season will allow staff to follow CDC, state, and local guidelines as well as proper cleaning procedures in between visitors to ensure a safe experience for everyone.

Visitors can enjoy the marine touch tank, interactive display wall, and virtual reality exhibit. This year’s VR exhibit will feature new experiences, including scallop and offshore lobster fishing, a tour of an oyster farm, and ice fishing. Visitors can also expect to see a familiar face when being welcomed by Captain Leroy Weed, the star of MCCF’s online video series, “Ask Leroy!”

Read the full story at the Penobscot Bay Press

Bar Harbor, Maine seeks intervenor status on American Aquafarms salmon farm

June 21, 2021 — The town council of Bar Harbor, Maine, U.S.A. has filed to seek intervenor status in with the Maine State Department of Marine Resources regarding a salmon farm project proposed by American Aquafarms.

The project is planned to initially produce 30,000 metric tons of salmon a year out of its proposed site in Frenchmen’s Bay in Gouldsboro, Maine – across the water from Bar Harbor’s location on Mt. Desert Island. Bar Harbor’s intervenor status, if approved, would allow the town to provide testimony at a public hearing on the lease and potentially comment on draft decisions, reports the Mount Desert Islander.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

BILL MCWEENY: Innovation can save whales and lobstermen

June 21, 2021 — The Maine Lobstermen’s Association (MLA) claims that NOAA’s rulemaking efforts to address entanglement threats are an overreach because right whales no longer come to the Gulf of Maine, and over many decades, only one right whale has been found in Maine lobster gear.

I feel it is important to correct MLA on several counts, as it is unfortunately presenting only a small part of this complex story. First, since 1980, right whale scientists have photographed right whales throughout their range and have documented at least 1,617 entanglements involving 87 percent of the population based on the presence of entanglement scars or attached fishing gear. The research suggests that right whales are being entangled in all types of United States and Canadian east coast fishing gear with often 60 or more entanglement events per year.

Also, while some right whales have shifted their distribution, they still occur in waters that Maine lobstermen fish in every month of the year with some sightings in Maine state waters. Acoustic data backs up past official and opportunistic sightings confirming that right whales are no strangers to Maine fishing grounds. A recent deployment of acoustic buoys recorded calls from right whales off Casco Bay, Monhegan Island, Milbridge, Great Duck Island, Lubec, the Schoodic ridges, all around Mount Desert Rock and many calls from Outer Falls.

MLA states on its website that only one right whale has ever been entangled in Maine gear, and that was in 2002. It is mistaken. It is true that there was a right whale entangled in Maine lobster gear in 2002 and it was disentangled and is probably alive today because of that. But the MLA fails to acknowledge two other cases.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Maine’s annual elver harvest value jumps by more than $11M

June 18, 2021 — Maine’s annual baby eel fishing season has ended with a statewide catch worth an estimated $16.5 million, representing an $11.5 million increase over the value of the state’s 2020 harvest.

Worldwide demand for eels was abnormally low in 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic depressed global trade and demand for eels at restaurants. The vast majority of baby eels caught in Maine are shipped live to eastern Asia, where they are raised in aquaculture ponds to adult size and then harvested for the global seafood market.

Maine is limited to an annual harvest of roughly 9,600 pounds of baby American eels, also known as elvers, to help protect the species from overfishing. The state’s annual elver fishing season runs each year from late March through early June. Maine is the only state with a sizable elver fishery.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

MAINE: U.S. Interior Secretary to visit Acadia National Park on Friday

June 17, 2021 — U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland will visit Maine on Friday to talk with state and tribal leaders about the Biden administration’s support for public lands.

Haaland will join Gov. Janet Mills and all four members of Maine’s Congressional delegation at Schoodic Point, a smaller and lesser-known part of Acadia National Park located on a peninsula in eastern Hancock County.

The visit kicks off with a special sunrise musical performance by renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma and several Wabanaki musicians at 4:05 a.m. That event is by invitation only.

Haaland is the first Biden administration Cabinet member to visit Maine.

Haaland’s approach is likely to be radically different from that of Ryan Zinke or David Bernhardt, her predecessors under former President Donald Trump. The Washington Post reported this week that Haaland has recommended restoring protections to three national monuments that had been rolled back by Trump. They are Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante monuments in Utah, as well as the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument off the coast of Massachusetts.

There had been some concern in 2017 that Maine’s Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument also might be targeted for a reduction in size, but that never happened.

Read the full story at Central Maine

Increasingly valuable pogie fishing season gets underway in Maine

June 15, 2021 — Russell Libby turned to his crew at CBS Lobster and Bait on Union Wharf on Monday afternoon, telling them another boat was due in five minutes. Libby also told them it was close to sinking.

That turned out to be an exaggeration but not by much.

Before long, a small fishing boat came chugging around the corner. The Deja Vu II was so loaded with pogies, the open transom was several inches underwater.

The crew was jubilant.

“That’s the most I’ve had on there in 20 years,” said Capt. Dan Harriman of Cape Elizabeth.

Dozens of plastic barrels stood stacked on the vessel’s deck. What little open space remained was awash in fish. The crew stood ankle-deep in them. Even the engine compartment was full of pogies.

“We’ve got some down forward — we really do,” crewman Corey Doughty shouted up to the dockworkers. Doughty is also from Cape Elizabeth and Harriman’s cousin.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

Red Lobster latest seafood vendor to get hit with sustainability-focused lawsuit

June 15, 2021 — A growing number of class-action lawsuits are being filed against seafood retailers and foodservice outlets, claiming their offerings do not meet their own sustainability claims.

Earlier this month, in a complaint filed in the U.S. Superior Court in the District of Columbia, ALDI was accused of false advertising and marketing, with the advocacy group GMO/Toxin Free USA alleging ALDI’s claim that its salmon is sustainably sourced is not credible. Earlier this year, Mowi agreed to settle a similar lawsuit for USD 1.3 million (EUR 1.1 million). The complaint alleged that the sustainability claims on its Ducktrap River of Maine smoked salmon were false.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Maine’s having a lobster boom. A bust may be coming.

June 15, 2021 — Ask any outsider what Maine brings to mind, and the response might well be: Bone-chilling winters. Forests. Moose. Quaint fishing villages along a rocky coast. Flannel shirts and Bean boots. And lobsters—lots of lobsters.

These cold-water-loving, bottom-feeding crustaceans are top of mind for many Mainers too, including Monique Coombs. She’s the director of community programs for the Maine Coast Fisherman’s Association, in Brunswick. She’s also the wife of Maine lobsterman, Herman Coombs, and the mother of 16-year-old Joceylne, who’s going into the family trade. Homarus americanus—the American lobster—is what keeps bread on the Coombs’ table.

Last year during the pandemic shutdown, Maine didn’t get its usual blast of summer visitors, but there were plenty of lobsters. Signs are promising for a revived tourism season in 2021, and Monique expects it to be another good year for lobsters.

But that doesn’t stop her from worrying. The waters off Maine’s coast are warming, and no one knows what that’s going to mean for the state’s half-billion-dollar-a-year lobster industry—the largest single-species fishery in North America. Some fear that continued warming could cause the lobster population to collapse.

Read the full story at National Geographic