Saving Seafood

Drastic measures considered to arrest plunge in herring population

September 25, 2018 — The small, silver fish that teem in large schools in the waters off New England are vital to the marine ecosystem, providing a crucial source of food to many of the region’s iconic species, including cod, striped bass, humpback whales, and seabirds such as puffins.

But recent surveys have found that the Atlantic herring population in the Gulf of Maine is at risk of collapse, with so few being born that federal officials have slashed fishing quotas and are now considering even more draconian steps to reduce the catch.

The proposed measures, which the New England Fishery Management Council is slated to take up on Tuesday, are so controversial that they have pitted fishermen against each other and have raised concerns about the future of the region’s lucrative lobster fishery, which mainly uses herring as bait.

“The decline of Atlantic herring represents an existential threat to many New England fisheries and the fishing families who depend on them for their livelihoods,” said Ben Martens, executive director of the Maine Coast Fishermen’s Association, an advocacy group that promotes sustainable fishing. “Without food in the ocean, without bait in the traps, the ecosystem and the entire fishing economy of New England begins to crumble.”

Read the full story at the Boston Globe

The Future of Fish Farming May Be Indoors

September 25, 2018 — On a projection screen in front of a packed room in a coastal Maine town, computer-animated salmon swim energetically through a massive oval tank. A narrator’s voice soothingly points out water currents that promote fish exercise and ideal meat texture, along with vertical mesh screens that “optimize fish densities and tank volume.” The screens also make dead fish easy to remove, the narrator cheerily adds.

The video is part of a pitch made earlier this year for an ambitious $500-million salmon farm that Norway-based firm, Nordic Aquafarms, plans to build in Belfast, Maine, complete with what Nordic says will be among the world’s largest aquaculture tanks. It is one of a handful of projects in the works by companies hoping these highly mechanized systems will change the face fish farming—by moving it indoors.

If it catches on, indoor aquaculture could play a critical role in meeting the needs of a swelling human population, Nordic CEO Erik Heim says. He believes it could do so without the pollution and other potential threats to wild fish that can accompany traditional aquaculture—although the indoor approach does face environmental challenges of its own. “There’s always some risk, but the risk of the land-based system is a small percentage of the risk of an outdoor system,” says Michael Timmons, an environmental engineer at Cornell University who has studied aquaculture for more than 20 years and is not involved in the Nordic project.

Fish farming has often been touted as an extremely efficient way to produce animal protein: the Global Aquaculture Alliance claims 100 kilograms of fish feed can deliver up to 15 times more meat than an equivalent amount fed to cows. The industry has gained international traction, with farmed fish surpassing wild-caught ones (pdf) in the global food supply in 2014. But traditional fish-farming methods come with significant environmental drawbacks. For example, salmon farmers in Norway and Chile—the world leaders in salmon production—typically use open-ocean cages that corral fish in suspended netting or pens. This setup allows waste to flow directly into the environment, along with pathogens and parasites that can infect wild populations. Open-air pond farms—found worldwide and representing the most common type of aquaculture in China, the top global producer of farmed fish—also have a track record of polluting local waterways with fish effluent and veterinary medicines that are used to keep disease at bay.

Read the full story at Scientific American

NOAA officials say seal die-off linked to virus

September 24, 2018 — Gray and harbor seals have lured sharks in increasing numbers into Cape Cod waters, with tragic results, but the burgeoning seal population is taking a hit from viruses.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has issued an unusual mortality event alert for both species of seal in the Gulf of Maine.

From July 1 to Aug. 29 (when the alert was issued) 599 seals were found dead (137) or ill and stranded (462) on New England shores. In the few weeks since that number has soared to 921. Most of those were in Maine (629), with 147 in New Hampshire and 125 in Massachusetts.

The dead or dying seals have been located mostly to the north but a couple were found as far south as Plymouth in Cape Cod Bay.

The dead or dying seals have been located mostly to the north but a couple were found as far south as Plymouth in Cape Cod Bay.

For comparison the nearly 500 seals found last month is roughly 10 times the number that stranded in August of 2017.

“That is attributed to the influences of disease,” noted Terri Rowles, NOAA’s Marine Mammal Health and Stranding Program coordinator.

Read the full story at the Eastham Wicked Local

 

Crowd overwhelms, forces postponement of hearing on shellfish farm expansion in Maine

September 21, 2018 — KITTERY, Maine — After upward of 80 people showed up to the state-held public hearing for Spinney Creek Shellfish’s aquaculture expansion application, officials postponed the meeting on the spot due to capacity issues.

The meeting was scheduled for the basement room in Kittery’s Rice Public Library. By the start time at 6 p.m., seating was full, nearly 30 people were standing, and a line formed out the back door.

Amanda Ellis, aquaculture hearings officer for the Maine Department of Marine Resources, announced the agency would be postponing Wednesday night’s meeting, and rescheduling to Thursday, Sept. 27, at a larger venue to later be decided.

“When we try to schedule these, we never really know how many people to expect,” Ellis said. “It makes sense for a variety of different reasons to move it to Sept. 27, so everybody can hear the testimony and hear about the proposal.”

Spinney Creek, a 127-acre salt water pond split between Kittery and Eliot in the shadows of the Piscataqua River Bridge, has recently become the center of an aquaculture debate, where a 35-year shellfish company wants to grow their business and expand local farming opportunities, while residential abutters are concerned with the impact and appearance of the proposal.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

 

Baked, then boiled: Why one Maine restaurant is sedating lobsters with marijuana smoke

September 20, 2018 — Lobsters in one Maine restaurant go out in a blaze of glory once they hit the pot. The owner of a lobster joint is sedating her crustaceans with marijuana smoke before cooking them — which she says gives them a blissfully humane death.

Charlotte Gill, owner of Charlotte’s Legendary Lobster Pound in Southwest Harbor, told the Portland Press Herald that she had been looking for a way to reduce suffering of her signature menu item. She experimented with blowing marijuana smoke into a tank with one lobster, Roscoe (basically, she hot-boxed him). When Gill returned him to a tank with the other lobsters without his claw bands, she says, he was less aggressive. Gill has a medical marijuana license.

She plans to offer it as an option for customers who want their lobsters to be baked before they’re boiled. But that doesn’t mean the customer will get stoned from their dinner.

“THC breaks down completely by 392 degrees, therefore we will use both steam as well as a heat process that will expose the meat to 420-degree extended temperature, in order to ensure there is no possibility of carry-over effect,” Gill told the Press Herald. So while some might see it as a humane death for the lobster, others might think it’s a waste of perfectly good weed.

Chefs and scientists have long pondered the question of whether lobsters feel pain. Experiments have shown that crustaceans are responsive to stimuli that cause pain, like heat, but it is unclear whether this is a reflex or a pain response from their nervous systems. It’s also unclear whether cannabis has the same pain-relieving effect on lobsters that it has on humans.

Read the full story at The Washington Post

Maine nonprofit awarded NOAA grant to develop green crab market

September 19, 2018 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Saltonstall-Kennedy Grant Program has given a grant of USD 267,440 (EUR 229,165) to a Maine, U.S.A.-based nonprofit Manomet in order to work on creating a fishery for invasive European green crabs.

The grant will allow Manomet to expand its project on creating a new economic opportunity out of soft-shell green crabs in New England. The green crab, a species that is invasive to New England, has been present for more than a hundred years and has recently expanded in numbers to the point it is putting pressure on local species.

That pressure has contributed to record low landings of caught and farmed mussels, and also threatens Maine’s softshell clam industry.

Manomet has already launched efforts to galvanize efforts on commercializing green crabs. On 6 and 7 June, the organization hosted a “Green Crab Working Summit” in Portland, Maine, to bring together various experts to discuss commercialization of the species.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

 

Atlantic Herring Area 1A Trimester 3 Effort Controls

September 19, 2018 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Herring Section (Section) members from Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts met via conference call on Tuesday, September 18th to discuss Area 1A (inshore Gulf of Maine) effort control measures for Trimester 3 (October 1 – December 31). Section members agreed to five consecutive landing days until 92% of the Area 1A sub-ACL is projected to be harvested, or until further notice. Vessels may only land once every 24-hour period.

  • For the first week of October, beginning on October 1, 2018: Vessels in the States of Maine and New Hampshire, and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts may possess and land herring from Area 1A starting at 12:01 a.m. on Monday, October 1st up to 11:59 p.m. on Friday, October 5th.
  • Beginning on October 7, 2018: Vessels in the State of Maine may land herring starting at 6:00 p.m. on Sundays up to 5:59 p.m. on Fridays. Beginning October 8, 2018, vessels in the State of New Hampshire and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts may land herring starting at 12:01 a.m. on Mondays up to 11:59 p.m. on Fridays.

The Atlantic Herring Section members from Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts are scheduled to reconvene via conference call to review fishing effort on:

  • Friday, October 12 at 1:00 p.m.

To join the call, please dial 888.585.9008 and enter conference room number 502-884-672 when prompted.

Trimester 3 landings will be closely monitored and the directed fishery will close when 92% of the Area 1A sub-ACL is projected to be reached. Fishermen are prohibited from landing more than 2,000 pounds of Atlantic herring per trip from Area 1A until the start of Trimester 3.

For more information, please contact Megan Ware, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, at 703.842.0740 or mware@asmfc.org.

A PDF of the announcement can be found here –http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file/5ba145f1AtlHerringDaysOutTri3_Sept2018.pdf.

Maine communities torn apart by age-old debate: Business growth or water views?

September 18, 2018 — It’s a 127-acre salt water pond shared by two southern Maine towns. The Piscataqua River Bridge surmounts its natural landscape, the perpetual buzz of interstate traffic a striking juxtaposition with the hum of wildlife and stillness of water.

It’s a special place for the 60-some residences, split between Kittery and Eliot, affixed to its shoreline.

A proposal by a local shellfish company to expand its aquaculture operations to the length of three football fields within the body of water has posed a considerable question some abutters are hastily trying to answer: Who exactly owns Spinney Creek, both literally and figuratively?

As a state-held public hearing date draws near, attention surrounds the application for a 3.67-acre, three-year experimental aquaculture lease submitted to the Maine Department of Marine Resources by Spinney Creek Shellfish, a business with 35 years of seafood history in Eliot, specifically on the creek.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

As Herring Fishery Closes, Maine Fishermen Turn To Plentiful ‘Pogies’ For Bait

September 18, 2018 — Good news for Maine lobstermen: Just as a scarcity of the herring they use to bait their traps has closed that fishery, state officials are expanding the fishery for another baitfish – menhaden, or pogies that have shown up in large numbers off Maine for the third year in a row.

Four southern states where pogies have not been abundant this year are transferring some of their federal quotas for the fish to Maine.

Large menhaden populations have been recorded off this state for decades, but only periodically. State Marine Resources Coordinator Melissa Smith says with the Gulf of Maine’s waters warming, and North Atlantic currents changing, the state may see them return more often.

“Those environmental factors might tip the scales of the pogies natural cyclical nature,” Smith says, “so that we do see them in Maine perhaps a little more frequently.”

Read the full story at Maine Public

Residents alarmed by proposed expansion of Maine shellfish farm

September 17, 2018 — ELIOT, Maine — Frustrated residents from the Eliot and Kittery sides of Spinney Creek appeared before the Select Board Thursday night, seeking recourse about their concerns of the proposed expansion of Spinney Creek Shellfish.

Spinney Creek Shellfish, at 27 Howell Drive in Eliot, is applying to the Maine Department of Marine Resources to obtain a three-year aquaculture lease on 3.67 acres of Spinney Creek, a salt pond between Eliot and Kittery off the Piscataqua River. The new lease is for raising oysters and littleneck clams (quahogs) in suspended cages.

The residents have discovered Eliot and Kittery’s boards have no control over aquaculture in the pond.

Roberta Place of Spring Lane on Spinney Creek said residents of 50 households bordering the creek are concerned about the creek’s health.

“I have lived there a long time. I used to swim there with a wet suit. Now the temperature in the creek is 74 degrees,” she said.

She said she thought oysters are supposed to clean water, but added that the eelgrass in front of house has disappeared.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News