May 20, 2019 — “Aquaculture is farming, commercial fishing is hunting,” says Sebastion Belle of the Maine Aquaculture Association.
There are about 200 aquaculture farms on Maine’s coastal waters, and Belle says the industry is poised to double over the next decade.
Farms like Gary and Matt Moretti’s.
The father and son duo started Bang Island Mussels in 2010. They lease 17 acres of ocean from the state of Maine to grow mussels, kelp and they have just begun experimenting with scallops.
May 16, 2019 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:
NOAA Fisheries has published a minor correction to the proposed rule for 2019 groundfish recreational measures. In the published version of the proposed rule, the Federal Register made a transcription error in Table 2. The table stated incorrectly that the Groundfish Committee recommended a 15-inch minimum fish size for Gulf of Maine haddock. The Committee’s recommendation and our proposed minimum size for Gulf of Maine haddock is 17 inches.
Read the correction as published in the Federal Register. The proposed rule as published in the Federal Register will still display the incorrect value in Table 2.
How to Comment
You may submit comments online through the Federal e-Rulemaking Portal or by mail to: Michael Pentony, Regional Administrator, NOAA Fisheries Greater Atlantic Region, 55 Great Republic Drive, Gloucester, MA 01930. Please mark the envelope: “Comments on the Fishing Year 2019 Groundfish Recreational Measures.”
The comment period closes May 28, 2019.
May 16, 2019 — In response to growing customer demand for groundfish processed and frozen in the United States, Bristol Seafood will begin offering individually quick-frozen haddock and cod fillets, loins, and portions processed at its headquarters in Portland, Maine, U.S.A.
The company’s new product line began shipping in April and features cod and haddock harvested in the North Atlantic that is hand-trimmed and flash-frozen, according to the company. The product line is available in the US, as well as for export to select areas.
“Our distribution partners have been asking for frozen cod and haddock fillets, loins and portions that are cut and frozen in the United States with no added water or chemical additives, and we are pleased to answer the call,” Bristol Seafood Vice President of Sales Dana Bartholomew said. “Our customers count on us for trusted, quality, storied products and our new American-processed cod and haddock meets their needs as well as our uncompromising Maine standards.”
May 16, 2019 — Maine’s annual fishing season for baby eels is nearing the end, and prices have approached record highs.
Fishermen seek baby eels, called elvers, in Maine rivers so they can be sold to Asian aquaculture companies for use as seed stock. The Maine Department of Marine Resources says fishermen are just about out of quota this year, and that means the season’s about finished.
May 16, 2019 — The latest data from the Maine International Trade Center indicates that the state’s lobster exports to China plunged dramatically in the wake of retaliatory tariffs placed on a wide range of U.S. goods.
The tariffs, implemented in July 2018, had an immediate affect on the state’s lobster industry. Prior to the tariffs, Maine had been on track to have a record-setting year, with USD 87 million (EUR 77.8 million) worth of lobster exported through June 2018, over double the USD 42 million (EUR 37.5 million) shipped through the same period in 2017.
Soon after tariffs were implemented, however, Maine’s exports to China nearly disappeared completely, and according to the latest data from the MITC exports have plunged nearly 84 percent since the tariffs were implemented.
The latest talk on the trade front doesn’t point to any improvement in those numbers any time soon. U.S. President Donald Trump threatened and then implemented further tariff increases on 10 May. In response, China fired back with its own increased tariffs, including additional tariffs on a number of seafood products.
Despite the threat of escalation, for many lobster exporters, the damage has already been done. Whether the tariffs increase or not, most of the business had already dried up.
“Retaliatory tariffs, or a move upward to 25 percent, doesn’t really change anything for U.S. exporters to mainland China,” Sheila Adams, the vice president of sales and marketing for Maine Coast Lobster, told SeafoodSource.
May 16, 2019 — In a story May 16 about recreational cod fishing, The Associated Press erroneously reported the proposed catch limit. It would be one Gulf of Maine cod per day during two seasons in September and April that last 15 days each, not one per year during those limited seasons.
A corrected version of the story is below:
The recreational fishery for a species of fish that has experienced population collapse in recent history could reopen.
Recreational fishing for Atlantic cod has not been allowed in the Gulf of Maine recently due to concerns about the decline in the fish’s population. But the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the fish could withstand a very limited fishery at the moment.
Federal regulators are considering a proposal to allow recreational fishermen to catch one Gulf of Maine cod per day during two limited seasons that last 15 days each in September and April. The Gulf of Maine is a body of water off Massachusetts, Maine and New Hampshire that once teemed with cod, which is the namesake of Cape Cod.
May 15, 2019 — Federal regulators say there will be a reduction this year in the harvest of a species of shark that is subject to commercial fishing.
Fishermen catch spiny dogfish from Maine to North Carolina on the East Coast for use as food, though there is a limited market for the shark in the United States. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says this year’s quota for the dogfish will be a little more than 20 million pounds, which is slightly less than fishermen have harvested in most recent years.
Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Washington Post
May 13, 2019 — The following was released by Lenfest Ocean Program:
What lessons can be learned from the management practices in other regions and nations to inform allocation strategies for shifting stocks along the U.S. Northeast and Mid-Atlantic coasts? On Tuesday, April 23, the Lenfest Ocean Program hosted a webinar featuring Dr. Andrew Pershing and his colleagues from the Gulf of Maine Research Institute to discuss their project characterizing different fishery allocation systems from around the world and their potential for application in the U.S.
The recording for the one-hour webinar is now available online and can be accessed on the Lenfest Ocean Program website. To share your own experience with fishery allocation issues under climate change, or if you have questions, comments or suggestions on the study, please complete this survey. Feel free to email Willy Goldsmith (wgoldsmith@lenfestocean.org) with any further questions.
May 13, 2019 — Federal regulators have given Maine’s lobster industry its marching orders: Find a way to cut the number of surface-to-seabed fishing lines by 50 percent to help prevent the injury or death of even one of the endangered right whales that pass through the Gulf of Maine.
The National Marine Fisheries Service is allowing each lobstering state to develop its own plan to protect the whale, whose numbers have fallen to a little more than 400 in recent years. But it will be hard to find one way to make it work in Maine, where the $485 million-a-year fishery is known for its diversity.
“The devil will be in the details,” said state Department of Marine Resources Commissioner Pat Keliher.
Of the 4,500 people who lobster for a living along Maine’s coast, some fish with single traps at the end of each buoy line while others place multiple traps, from two or three to as many as 30, on a single weighted ground line, with both ends linked to the surface by a single buoy line.
Deciding how many traps to put on a trawl – the gear that connects a line of lobster traps – varies throughout each of the state’s seven lobster zones, depending on traditional fishing practices, shipping traffic, the geography of the ocean floor and the size of the lobster operation.
May 10, 2019 — Two Waldoboro businesses are grappling with a March court ruling that could restrict seaweed harvesting throughout the state.
Both North American Kelp, at 41 Cross St., and Ocean Organics Corp., at 141 One Pie Road, have based their business models on sustainable rockweed harvesting, parlaying the natural resource to create jobs and grow their companies.
On March 28, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court ruled that rockweed along the seashore isn’t public property in a 22-page opinion upholding a 2017 ruling by the Washington County Superior Court.