Saving Seafood

The electronic monitoring of groundfish industry

June 13, 2017 — Randy Cushman rises before dawn each day, drives down to his trawler at Port Clyde Harbor and meets his crew. They prep their boat and head out for another day of chasing flounder and halibut. These days, Cushman and his crew rest easier and sleep in a little later, thanks to the camera installed in the boat’s wheelhouse.

“We used to have to take observers to help count our catch,” said Cushman.

Regulations had required observers appointed to certain vessels by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association to help keep track of fish stock.

“Taking an observer out with you is cumbersome,” Cushman said. “You have to train them, get down to the boat an hour early. Sometimes they clash with the crew. And you have to worry about another body on your boat. The camera eliminates those issues. And there are a lot more advantages than that.”

For three years, Cushman has been participating in the Maine Coast Fisherman’s Association’s Electronic Monitoring System pilot project. The project swaps out the observers with surveillance cameras in order to count fish and take other observations on board New England groundfish vessels.

In the groundfish industry, 15 percent of trips must be covered by observers. The data gleaned from those trips is then used to portray industry norms.

All legal fish are counted at the docks, but until recently only human observers could properly count fish that were thrown back in the ocean.

Read the full story at The Times Record

INSIDE THE MULTI-MILLION-DOLLAR WORLD OF EEL TRAFFICKING

June 13, 2017 — The alleged kingpin of one of the biggest domestic wildlife smuggling operations ever to hit the East Coast is exactly where you’d expect to find him on a rainy evening in early May: firmly planted in a swivel chair at a big green metal desk inside his renovated Quonset hut on Foster Street, in Ellsworth, Maine.

At this post Bill Sheldon waits day and night for fishermen to come and fill his bowl with writhing masses of baby eels.

The 72-year-old fisherman wears glasses, a blue flannel shirt, jeans, duck boots, and a brown L.L. Bean baseball cap. His cell phone goes quack, quack, quack when it rings. The sign above his head reads, “Buying Glass Eels Here,” with the day’s market price: $1,250 per pound. The eel bowl sits atop a digital scale on a small, four-legged table. Nearby a scented candle burns in a glass jar (“to cut the fish smell”).

Grandfatherly and laid-back, Sheldon doesn’t look the part of a serious criminal. But on March 30, one week after the start of Maine’s 10-week-long eel fishing season, Sheldon and another man, Timothy Lewis, were indicted for illegally trafficking wildlife. They pleaded not guilty.

According to court documents, Lewis, 46, is charged with two felonies involved with conspiring to unlawfully launder eels up and down the East Coast. Sheldon, who operated a business called Kennebec Glass Eels at his home in Woolwich, a motel in Ellsworth, and a rental house in Moncks Corner, South Carolina, is up against more serious charges: seven counts of conspiracy to smuggle eels while violating laws in seven states (Maine, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and South Carolina).

For each felony, Sheldon faces a maximum sentence of a $250,000 fine and up to five years in prison, as well as the forfeiture of any related vessels, equipment, and vehicles, including a black 2012 Ford F450 with the license plate EELWGN. (He preemptively sold the truck but kept the vanity plate.) Sheldon and Lewis are scheduled for separate hearings in July.

For now, Sheldon is free to buy eels for a newly formed company, Maine Eel Trade & Aquaculture, which opened in 2015, with purchasing locations in Waldoboro, Portland, Steuben, and the Quonset hut in Ellsworth.

Read the full story at National Geographic

Maine elver fishermen caught $12 million worth of eels this season

June 12, 2017 — Maine elver fishermen netted more than $12 million in baby eels in the season that ended last week — the fourth-highest grossing year since 1994, officials said.

The season came to a close last week with 9,282 pounds of elvers caught in Maine, which is 334 pounds shy of the statewide catch limit, according to Maine Department of Marine Resources.

Maine, where more eels are caught than any other state, has a yearly statewide limit of 9,616 pounds on elver harvests, and by law the season ends either when that quota is reached or on June 7.

Maine’s 1,000 or so licensed elver fishermen on average earned just above $1,300 per pound this year, keeping the average price above $1,000 per pound for the fifth time in the past six years. The highest average price was in 2015, when fishermen earned more than $2,100 per pound but a cold spring resulted in fishermen catching only 5,200 pounds of elvers statewide.

The $12 million annual harvest value is the fourth-highest total for the fishery since 1994, according to DMR statistics. The highest-ever statewide harvest value was $40.3 million in 2012.

Maine’s elver fishery has been one of the state’s most valuable fisheries since 2011, when changes in global supply and demand made prices in Maine nearly quintuple, from $185 per pound to nearly $900 per pound. The baby eels, about 2,000 of which comprise a pound, are shipped live to East Asia, where they are raised in aquaculture ponds and later harvested for the region’s seafood market.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

MAINE: Midcoast lobster pound co-op sees a promising future in aquaculture

June 12, 2017 — The Bremen Lobster Pound Co-op on Keene Neck has been a fixture of Bremen’s working waterfront for decades. After a merger between the fishermen’s association and Community Shellfish LLC, the co-op’s new owner is looking to keep it that way.

Boe Marsh is a Bremen selectman and owns Community Shellfish LLC, a dealer in lobster, clams and shrimp. The company buys from harvesters at its processing and distribution center at 656 Waldoboro Road in Bremen and at the co-op.

The co-op will continue in its current role as a base of operations for local lobstermen and other commercial fishermen, and Marsh is reintroducing aquaculture, a field the co-op first experimented with in previous years.

Marsh hopes to repurpose the co-op’s two lobster pounds for aquaculture space, particularly the growth and harvesting of oysters and clams, while keeping the co-op open and available to local lobstermen and commercial fishermen.

According to Marsh, co-ops across Maine have long used lobster pounds — roughly 50 are spread along the state’s coast — to house and nourish lobsters during the height of the crustacean’s season. The co-ops used plentiful groundfish to sustain the lobsters when a seasonal surplus tends to drive prices down, saving the lobsters for a time of year when they are more valuable.

Marsh said this practice has changed in recent years because of the rising cost of groundfish, such as herring, and the development of technology to keep the lobsters indoors. Some tanks use thermal elements to keep the lobsters in hibernation for two to three months.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

Shucks Maine Lobster plans to build processing plant in Gorham

June 12, 2017 — Shucks Maine Lobster plans to build a 28,000-square-foot processing plant in Gorham that will employ up to 80 people.

The Gorham Planning Board voted Monday to approve plans for construction of the facility at 65 Olde Canal Way in the Olde Canal Business Park. The plant could open by May 2018.

John Hathaway, president of the Richmond-based company, said he is excited to expand his company and join the Gorham business community. Depending on the season, the company will employ as many as 80 workers at the new plant, he said.

“This is a huge opportunity for us to expand into Gorham,” Hathaway said.

Shucks Maine Lobster, founded 10 years ago, is the only lobster processor in the country to use a high-pressure process to humanely kill lobsters and remove raw meat from the shells, Hathaway said. He purchased a high-pressure machine after seeing oyster processors use the system in Louisiana, the company website said. Hathaway dubbed his machine, which is 16 feet tall and weighs 80,000 pounds, the “Big Mother Shucka.”

Shucks Maine Lobster products are shipped worldwide. The company, which now employs more than 80 people, is part of the $1.6 billion lobster industry in Maine, which last year saw a record haul of 130 million pounds of lobster valued at $533 million.

The opening of the Gorham plant will allow the company to purchase a second, larger high-pressure processing machine, Hathaway said.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Gulf of Maine Sea Scallop Surveys Planned

June 9, 2017 — Sea scallops in the Gulf of Maine will be the focus of surveys this summer, initiated by NOAA Fisheries and the New England Fishery Management Council.

The council needs updated scallop biomass estimates from the area to support upcoming management decisions.

At their request, NOAA Fisheries will add portions of the Northern Gulf of Maine Scallop Management Area to two existing surveys already planned on Georges Bank.

The additional work will be done through the Atlantic Sea Scallop Research Set-Aside (RSA) Program under two current grants.

The Coonamessett Farm Foundation will survey portions of Stellwagen Bank and Jeffreys Ledge with the Habcam optical imaging system, complemented by the deployment of a scallop survey dredge to collect biological samples.

The University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, School for Marine Science and Technology will conduct a high-resolution drop-camera survey of a portion of Stellwagen Bank.

These additional surveys will generate scallop biomass estimates that will be provided to the council to support the development of Gulf of Maine management measures later this year.

Research set-aside programs are unique to federal fisheries in the Greater Atlantic Region.

Read the full story at CapeCod.com

NOAA recommends Maine fisheries research projects for $1.5M in funding

June 8, 2017 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has recommended over $1.5 million in Saltonstall-Kennedy Grant Program funding for six fisheries research projects in Maine.

The goal of the Saltonstall-Kennedy program is to fund projects that address the needs of fishing communities, optimize economic benefits by building and maintaining sustainable fisheries and increase other opportunities to keep working waterfronts viable.

The program has recommended the following projects for funding; final approval is pending:

  • Downeast Institute for Applied Marine Research and Education, $278,000: Demonstrating aquaculture technologies designed to increase the supply, quality and diversification of domestic seafood: Field experiments with cultured arctic surf clams.
  • Gulf of Maine Research Institute, $288,888: Addressing the issue of “Choke” species in a changing climate.
  • Atlantic Offshore Lobstermen’s Association Lobster, $141,092: Migration and growth: Continuation and expansion of 2015 tagging effort on Georges Bank and in the Gulf of Maine.
  • Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, $298,932: A ‘Halo’ for shellfish aquaculture: Discovering the phytoremediation potential of farmed kelp.
  • University of Maine, $299,623: Evaluating the life history and stock structure of yellowfin tuna in the northwest Atlantic Ocean.
  • University of Maine, $275,308: Assessing the potential for sustainability of fishing-dependent communities in coastal Maine in the face of environmental and socioeconomic change.

In a news release announcing the NOAA’s recommendations, U.S Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, characterized the projects as “key to the future of the Gulf of Maine and the thousands of Mainers who make their living from it.”

Read the full story at MaineBiz

Elver season ends

June 8, 2017 — Maine’s elver season ended Wednesday. By most accounts it was successful.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission limited Maine harvesters to a landings quota of 9,616 pounds for this year. According to the Department of Marine Resources, as of 6 p.m. Monday, Maine dealers reported buying 9,281.269 pounds of elvers and paying harvesters a total of $12,088,884 — an average price of $1,303 per pound.

The total quota is allocated among harvesters licensed by the state and the four federally recognized Indian tribes.

As of Monday evening, DMR-licensed harvesters had landed just over 7,315 pounds out of a total quota of 7,566.3 pounds.

Harvesters of the Houlton Band of Maliseet had landed about 87 pounds from their approximately 107-pound quota.

Micmac Nation harvesters landed their entire 38.8-pound quota and Penobscot Nation harvesters had landed all but one pound of their 620-pound quota.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Maine senators say Congress should save Sea Grant program

June 8, 2017 — Maine’s U.S. senators are signing on to a request to keep the National Sea Grant College Program funded at least at its current level.

President Trump has proposed to eliminate the program, which funds science that’s beneficial to commercial fisheries, conservation and coastal businesses. It has existed for about a half-century.

Maine Sens. Susan Collins, a Republican, and Angus King, an independent, are joining an effort led by Connecticut Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy to save the program. The group is sending a letter to the chairman and ranking member of the commerce appropriations subcommittee to stress the importance of Sea Grant.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Portland Press Herald

New protections for threatened dusky sharks taking effect

June 7, 2017 — New protections for a species of threatened East Coast shark go into effect this week.

Dusky sharks range from Maine to Florida and are down to about 20 percent of their 1970s population off the East Coast and Gulf of Mexico.

The sharks are in decline in part because of years of harvesting them for their meat, oil and fins. It’s already illegal to fish for them off the U.S., but they sometimes get caught as bycatch.

The federal government is rolling out new protections for the shark this week, starting on June 5. One measure requires longline fishing vessels that target fish such as tuna and swordfish to take new precautions when they accidentally catch a dusky shark and release it.

 The environmental group Oceana is suing the federal government for better protection of the sharks. The group contends the new rules to protect dusky sharks don’t go far enough.

Read the Associated Press story at The Gloucester Times