Saving Seafood

New regional shark research consortium established

December 2, 2020 — The fatal great white shark attack on swimmer Julie Dimperio Holowach in July in Harpswell, Maine, caught many in the shark research community by surprise.

While it was known that some great whites do travel north into Canadian waters in the summer, there was little in the way of sightings, and just a smattering of attacks on seals.

Holowach was the only confirmed fatality from a shark attack in Maine history, according to Patrick Keliher, state Division of Marine Resources director. Cape Cod, with hundreds of great whites patrolling beaches and daily sightings in the summer months, has had two major attacks on swimmers and a fatal attack on a bodyboarder.

“The incident really did rattle the state of Maine, and justifiably,” said Gregory Skomal, Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries shark expert. “A lot of us doing work on white sharks reached out to assist.”

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Feds Push Vineyard Wind Decision Into 2021

December 1, 2020 — The Vineyard Wind project has been delayed again.

The project, which is poised to be the first utility-scale offshore wind farm in the country, is already more than a year behind schedule and now will have to wait about a month longer. A federal decision on final permitting for the project had been expected by Dec. 18, 2020, but the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management updated its timeline in recent weeks and now expects a final decision by Jan. 15, 2021.

“BOEM received more than 13,000 comments on the Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for Vineyard Wind,” a spokesman for the agency told the News Service in an email. “BOEM continues to work with cooperating agencies in the review of these comments. An updated schedule is posted on BOEM’s website.”

A final federal decision on the 800-megawatt offshore wind farm had initially been expected by Aug. 16, 2019 but BOEM sent shockwaves through the offshore wind industry in August 2019 when it announced a plan to withhold the final environmental impact statement for Vineyard Wind while it studies the wider impacts of an offshore wind sector that is hoping to ramp up in Northeast and mid-Atlantic waters also used by the fishing industry.

Read the full story at WBUR

Foley Fish navigating the pandemic with retail, direct-to-consumer sales

December 1, 2020 — Like most other seafood processors and distributors, New Bedford, Massachusetts, U.S.A.-based Foley Fish had to quickly pivot when the COVID-19 pandemic struck the United States in early March.

The 114-year-old company supplies retail, foodservice, and consumer accounts across the country, but the coronavirus proved an existential threat to the company’s existence.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Fishermen were right: Dogfish are eating cod

November 30, 2020 — When Chatham commercial fisherman Bruce Kaminski took Lt. Gov. Tim Murray and other state officials out fishing in August 2008, he hoped to prove the spiny dogfish were overrunning their fishing grounds and inhibiting the restoration of more valuable species such as cod.

That day, Kaminski and his crew caught 300 dogfish on 300 hooks in a scant 10 minutes. It was a sign that dogfish populations were rebounding from low numbers in the late 1990s. Cape fishermen were asking that their daily catch limit of dogfish be increased from 600 pounds per day to something closer to the 7,000 pounds per day they caught in the early ’90s.

Dogfish have since rebounded to relatively healthy levels, and fishermen are now allowed to catch 6,000 pounds per day, but they say the dogfish comeback happened at the expense of cod, which are still mired at all-time low population levels.

There are many reasons for the lack of success reviving the cod population — chronic overfishing, a rapidly warming ocean and insufficient habitat protection, to name a few. But fishermen told scientists for decades they think an imbalance in the ecosystem, brought on by a resurgent dogfish population, shares a good portion of the blame.

Fishermen say they have witnessed dogfish eating cod, but that’s been hard to quantify. From 1977 to 2017 only 14 cod were found in the stomachs of dogfish caught in NOAA’s annual bottom trawl survey that involves random sampling using a fishing net in waters from Cape Hatteras to the Canadian border.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Vessel Slow Speed Zone SW of Nantucket in Effect Through December 14

November 30, 2020 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

NOAA Fisheries is triggering voluntary vessel speed restriction zone (Dynamic Management Area or DMA) southwest of Nantucket, Massachusetts.

This DMA was triggered on November 29, 2020, when an aerial survey team from the New England Aquarium sighted right whales in the area.

Mariners, please go around this area or go slow (10 knots or less) inside this area where right whales have been seen.

South of Nantucket, MA DMA is in effect through December 14, 2020

40 01 N
40 22 N
070 07 W
070 59 W

Other Slow Speed Zones

South of Nantucket, MA DMA is in effect through November 30 (expires today)

40 59 N
40 23 N
069 05 W
069 52 W

Southeast of New York City Slow Zone is in effect through December 2

40 41 N
40 01 N
073 03 W
073 55 W

Southeast of Atlantic City, New Jersey in effect through December 5

39 25 N
38 44 N
073 44 W
074 36 W

Read the full release here

GoFundMe raises over $83K for fishermen presumed lost at sea

November 30, 2020 — Four fishermen lost at sea last week when their fishing vessel, the Emmy Rose, sank off the Massachusetts coast, were “honorable men” who loved their families and the sea, according to a GoFundMe page organized for their grieving families.

“These four men were the best out there. They will be deeply missed, but they will never be forgotten,” the organizer of the page wrote.

The Coast Guard on Tuesday night suspended the search for the four men whose boat sank in eight-foot waves off Provincetown. Crews searched more than 2,000 square miles for 38 hours.

The page, created Wednesday, had raised nearly $83,000 of its $100,000 goal as of Saturday morning. The money funds will go to the families of the Emmy Rose crew who held a candlelight vigil Wednesday night that included about 100 people.

Read the full story at the New York Post

MAINE: Portland fishing community mourns the crew of the Emmy Rose

November 27, 2020 — Members of Portland’s fishing community gathered on the city’s waterfront Wednesday night to remember and honor the four Maine men who were lost at sea when the Emmy Rose sank off Cape Cod early Monday.

Candlelight vigils were held on the Maine State Pier and on the Portland Fish Pier, with roughly 100 people between both sites talking about the men, their lives and their devotion to fishing.

At the Maine State Pier, family and friends placed candles around a makeshift memorial that said, “Family is the anchor that holds us through life’s storms.” At the Portland Fish Pier, candles were placed in front of the fishermen’s memorial that says, “In memory of those lost at sea.”

The 82-foot Emmy Rose, which was based in Portland, sank early Monday roughly 22 miles northeast of Provincetown, Massachusetts, where 30-knot winds were whipping up 6- to 8-foot waves.

The Coast Guard suspended its search for the boat Tuesday evening.

Read the full story at Central Maine

A dead right whale calf found on North Carolina shore bodes ill for species birth rate, according to experts

November 25, 2020 — Scientists with National Marine Fisheries Service found a North Atlantic right whale calf dead on Friday, Nov. 20, at Cape Lookout National Park in North Carolina, boding ill for the birth rate of a critically endangered species.

The newborn likely died during birth or very soon after, according to a government report issued Monday.

The species’ birth and death rates are under extended scrutiny with an overall population decline to under 400 animals, with a possible threat of extinction.

Right whales visit Cape Cod Bay in the late winter and early spring as part of their annual migratory pattern along the Atlantic coastline from Florida to Canada. The calving season for the whales takes place in the winter off Florida and Georgia.

Read the full story at Wicked Local

EAGLE-TRIBUNE: Another tragedy underscores fishing’s dangers

November 25, 2020 — It was almost exactly a year ago that a scalloper out of New Bedford sank, taking the lives of three men on board and adding to the long roll call of people who die each year to put flounder, scallops and haddock on the table.

Tragically, that toll continued to go up this week with word the Emmy Rose, a Portland-based fishing boat, sank in high winds and rough seas off the coast of Provincetown. Although the U.S. Coast Guard was continuing to search for the four crew members, the empty life raft and debris found Monday morning near the last known location of the vessel left little reason for hope.

Fishing has always been a dangerous job. Even with improvements in technology, emergency location devices, life rafts and survival suits, the quest for seafood has pushed fishermen and some women farther out to sea in often treacherous and unpredictable weather. The Emmy Rose disappeared at a time when the wind was gusting to 30 mph or more, and seas were reportedly 6 to 8 feet – conditions severe enough to force a rescue helicopter to return to base.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health regularly documents the dangers of working conditions in many industries. Working on a commercial fishing boat means working in a hazardous environment. It’s strenuous work with long hours and in all kinds of weather – often on a slippery, rolling work surface with heavy equipment and many moving parts.

Read the full opinion piece at The Eagle-Tribune

Coast Guard suspends search for missing fishing vessel crew

November 25, 2020 — The Coast Guard said Tuesday it called off the search for the four-member crew of a Maine fishing boat that sank off Massachusetts.

The Coast Guard searched an area of approximately 2,066 square miles for more than 38 hours, Capt. Wesley Hester said in a release.

“The decision to suspend a search is never an easy one,” Hester said. “We extend our condolences to the friends and loved ones of these fishermen during this trying time.”

The 82-foot (25-meter) Emmy Rose, based in Portland, Maine, went down about 20 miles (32 kilometers) northeast of Provincetown, Massachusetts, around 1:30 a.m. Monday. It was heading for Gloucester, Massachusetts.

Read the full story at ABC News