Saving Seafood

Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board Approves Draft Addendum VI for Public Comment

August 9th, 2019 — The following was published by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Atlantic Striped Bass Management Board (Board) approved Draft Addendum VI for public comment. The Addendum was initiated in response to the 2018 Benchmark Stock Assessment which indicates the resource is overfished and experiencing overfishing. The Draft Addendum explores a range of management alternatives designed to end overfishing and reduce fishing mortality to the target level in 2020.

“The Draft Addendum is a critical first step to stem overfishing as quickly as possible and begin efforts to rebuild the biomass,” said Board Chair Dr. Michael Armstrong with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries. “Following approval of the Addendum, the Board will likely initiate a new amendment to consider a longer-term strategy to fully rebuild the resource.”

The Draft Addendum proposes management options for both commercial and recreational sectors in the ocean and in the Chesapeake Bay in order to reduce total fishery removals by 18% relative to 2017 levels. The proposed measures include reduced quotas for commercial fisheries, and changes in bag limits, minimum sizes, and slot size limits for the recreational sector. Since catch and release practices represent a significant component of overall fishing mortality, the Draft Addendum also explores the mandatory use of circle hooks when fishing with bait to reduce release mortality in recreational striped bass fisheries.

It is anticipated the majority of Atlantic coastal states will conduct public hearings on the Draft Addendum; a subsequent press release will announce the details of those hearings once they become finalized. Fishermen and other interested groups are encouraged to provide input on the Draft Addendum either by attending state public hearings or providing written comment. The Draft Addendum will be available on the Commission website (www.asmfc.org) under Public Input by August 19th. Public comment will be accepted until 5:00 PM (EST) on September 27, 2019 and should be forwarded to Max Appelman, Fishery Management Plan Coordinator, 1050 N. Highland St, Suite A-N, Arlington, VA 22201; 703.842.0741 (FAX) or at comments@asmfc.org  (Subject line: Draft Addendum VI). Organizations planning to release an action alert in response to Draft Addendum VI should contact Max Appelman at mappelman@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.

Read the press release here

Great white sharks rule Cape Cod waters

August 1, 2019 — Scientists have begun a new research program around Cape Cod in Massachusetts, focusing on movements and behavior of a growing great white shark population, to reduce the increasing potential for interactions with humans.

Atlantic white sharks are the center of attention in the frenetic Cape Cod summer tourism season, as the combined resurgence of their primary food source, gray seals, and the shark population plays out.

The shark season has been early and active, with numerous sightings and several temporary beach closings ordered as a result in July. It’s been just one year since two shark attacks off cape beaches resulted in the first recorded fatal shark attack in Massachusetts since 1936 when a body board rider was killed.

Barnstable County towns have invested in better warning and communication systems, pre-position first aid trauma kits and equipment to be prepared for another attack. One Nantucket-based group even asked local officials to seek federal action for changing the seals’ legal status under the Marine Mammal Protection Act — an echo of demands years ago in New England and Canada for the animals be culled in hunts.

Instead the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, the nonprofit Atlantic White Shark Conservancy based at Chatham, Mass. and other partners are in a new push to expand their study of white shark movements and behavior, with an emphasis on improving public safety in nearshore waters and channels where the animals hunt seals.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Massachusetts backers push again to expand lobster processing

July 25, 2019 — Massachusetts could reform its long-standing limits on selling and processing lobster parts, in an effort to capture trade in frozen product now processed in Canada.

The state budget for fiscal year 2020 includes a provision that would set out a framework for new regulations governing the sale, transport and processing of unfrozen, shell-on lobster parts.

Pushed by state Sen. Bruce Tarr, the Republican minority leader in the state Senate, the effort to expand processing has bipartisan support seeking to overcome resistance to similar measures that passed the in the Senate of the legislature in the last three years, but failed to make it into law after opposition in the lower House.

Backers say too many Massachusetts lobsters end up shipped to Canadian processors, when the Bay State could be modernizing and expanding its own processing sector as Maine has been doing. Lobster can be sold live, cooked or canned in Massachusetts, but state law requires lobstermen and seafood vendors to sell or ship their lobsters out of state for processing.

“We have the second-largest lobster catch in the nation yet, without this change in law, our raw and frozen lobster parts are processed in Canada or Maine only to then be brought back to local consumers,” said Tarr in a statement after the measure was accepted by legislators in a final budget conference report. “By modernizing these lobster laws we bolster the fishing industry, give consumers more choices, and sustainably support coastal fishing communities.”

A study by the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries recommended changing the processing law, citing growing consumer interest in value-added lobster products in the form of shell-on tails and claws.  Massachusetts lobster could compete in the global market when processed in state, while now as much as 80 percent of those lobsters get shipped out for processing elsewhere, the agency reported.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Meeting scheduled to discuss recent shark sightings off Massachusetts coast

July 18, 2019 — According to the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy’s “Sharktivity” app, dozens of shark sightings have been reported off Cape Cod in the last month.

Greg Skomal, a shark biologist with the Division of Marine Fisheries, tweeted Tuesday that the agency tagged four white sharks, bringing its total to a dozen this season.

‘We haven’t tagged this many this early, so it’s been a banner year,” he said.

While this means it’s potentially easier to track the sharks and know just how many are new to the area or not, it still has beachgoers on edge.

On Wednesday, ATI Systems of Boston and the Wellfleet Concerned Citizens Coalition are presenting to the Barnstable County Board of Regional Commissioners.

The groups have scheduled educational presentations on “Cape Cod seal and shark-related issues.”

Read the full story at WPRI

Climate Change and its Effect on Our Coastal Ecosystem

July 16, 2019 — Climate change and rapidly warming water mean a major impact on our coastal ecosystem.

The North Atlantic shelf, which includes our Connecticut shoreline and extends all the way up to the coastal waters of Canada, is warming faster 99 percent faster than our global oceans. Scientists are concerned for what the future holds.

“There’s a lot of concern about what climate change can do. The Gulf of Maine which is an incredibly productive body of water which includes Cape Cod and parts North is warming at an alarming rate. And it will be interesting to see how that changes the distribution of both the predator and prey,” said Dr. Greg Skomal of the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries.

In the case of great white sharks, climate change will likely affect the prey before the predator.

Read the full story at NBC Connecticut

MASSACHUSETTS: Despite red tide, some still clamming

July 8, 2019 — The Gloucester shellfish warden is urging the public to refrain from all shellfish harvesting at city beaches and flats during the current red tide closure to guard the health of both the public and the city’s commercial shellfish industry.

Shellfish Warden Peter Seminara said his staff documented 16 violations in just the past week — including one on July 3 that involved 70 pounds of illegally harvested surf clams and another on the Fourth of July involving 40 pounds of surf clams. Both incidents occurred at Wingaersheek Beach.

“We’re really trying to alert all beachgoers to the health dangers of taking shellfish during the closure,” Seminara said Friday. “It presents a danger to the public’s health and it does have an economic impact on our commercial clamming industry if people start getting sick from shellfish harvested in Gloucester.”

The portion of the city’s shellfish areas in Essex Bay was closed June 18 because of the red tide, or algal blooms, that occurs when pollution causes toxin-producing algae to proliferate, posing a serious threat of illness or death if ingested. The remaining city shellfish areas followed suit on June 20.

Waters, tributaries and flats off Essex, Ipswich, Rowley, Newbury, Newburyport and Salisbury are also closed due to red tide.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Commercial Striped Bass Season Opens, Amid Concerns About Fishery

June 26, 2019 — By the end of the day Monday, the first day of the commercial striped bass season, the Menemsha Fish House had brought in 297 filleted pounds of the elusive — and profitable — fish.

Otto Osmers, a commercial fisherman and fishmonger at the Fish House, said it was an about average commercial day in terms of pounds of fish landed.

And he acknowledged that the season begins amid concern among fishermen and regulators over declining stocks.

Striped bass is a highly regulated fishery, especially in the commercial market. Fishermen with a permit are allowed to catch and sell the fish on Mondays and Thursdays. They have a bag limit of 15 fish per commercial day; the minimum commercial size is 34 inches.

The only added regulation this year is that fishermen are not allowed to gaff fish that are below legal size. Story Reed, state Division of Marine Fisheries permitting manager, said most fishermen have already adopted the practice of not gaffing smaller fish, so it was a matter of “putting it down on paper.”

Read the full story at The Vineyard Gazette

This Discovery Could Be The Key To Managing New England’s Cod Population

June 24, 2019 — Cod has long been a staple of the New England fishery, but this once-plentiful fish has declined in recent decades. Despite repeated attempts to rebuild the stock, assessments suggest that the species has not recovered, frustrating biologists and fishermen alike.

Although the species is managed as a single population, cod in the Gulf of Maine can be divided into two genetically-distinct groups. And according to a new study, understanding the unique behavior and lifecycles of these two groups may be the key to creating a better management strategy.

“These subpopulations are dramatically different from one another,” says Micah Dean, a doctoral student at Northeastern’s Marine Science Center who led the study. “And the mix of these subpopulations changes over space and season, and over time. This sort of complexity needs to be accounted for.”

Incorporating the differences between these two groups into population models could improve management decisions, says Dean, who is also a senior biologist for the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries. And those decisions are vital to the survival and recovery of the fishery.

Both fisheries managers and fishermen have known that groups of cod in the Gulf of Maine gather to release and fertilize eggs twice each year, when the bottom temperatures are between 6 and 8 degrees Celsius (42.8 and 46.4 degrees Fahrenheit). In the last decade, researchers have confirmed that the fish spawning in May and June are distinct from the fish spawning in November and December. But there hasn’t been a clear way to incorporate this information into management strategies, so the animals have continued to be grouped together.

Read the full story at News at Northeastern

Researchers to Begin New Study on White Shark Behavior

June 6, 2019 — The Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries five-year white shark population study is nearing completion and scientists will begin a new wave of research off Cape Cod this summer.

Since 2014, research led by state marine biologist Dr. Greg Skomal has been conducted to get a more accurate picture of how many sharks spend their summers in waters off the Cape.

Results from the five-year study are expected to be released soon.

The Atlantic White Shark Conservancy, in collaboration with DMF, will start several projects that are focused on getting a better understanding of the predatory behavior of white sharks in the region.

“The big focus now is to get better information to inform public safety practices,” said Megan Winton, a staff scientist with the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy.

“The best way we can do that at this point is to learn more about what these animals are doing in the waters off of the coast.”

The research conducted over the next five years will be a continuation of the previous population study.

“Now the focus is to really get as many tags on animals as we can to get a better idea of what the population is doing as a whole off of our coast,” Winton said.

Atlantic White Shark Conservancy CEO Cynthia Wigren said it is critical to get a better idea of hunting and feeding behavior from a public safety perspective.

“If sharks are feeding at certain times of the day or stages of the tide, for example, we can use that information to identify periods when the risk of interactions between sharks and recreational water users may be highest,” Wigren said.

Read the full story at CapeCod.com

MASSACHUSETTS: Cape Cod Bay fishing gear restriction lifted

May 13, 2019 — The director of the Division of Marine Fisheries has rescinded the Cape Cod Bay gear restriction for fishermen and speed limit restrictions intended to protect endangered North Atlantic right whales, according to a statement released Thursday night.

The restrictions originally were set to end May 14, but a recent aerial survey by the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies showed that right whales have migrated out of state waters adjacent to Cape Cod.

Commercial and recreational fishermen are now allowed to set their trap gear in the waters north and east of Cape Cod, the statement says. Boaters operating vessels smaller than 65 feet in length may now operate at a speed greater than 10 knots.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times