Saving Seafood

Researchers Report Spike in Ocean Sunfish Strandings

November 8, 2019 — Marine researchers are reporting a spike in sunfish strandings this fall as waters continue to cool off Cape Cod.

Ocean sunfish, also known as mola mola, is one of the heaviest known bony fishes in the world. Adult sunfish typically weight between 550 and 2,200 pounds.

It is a unique shape and resembles a fish head with a tail and has a mainly flat body.

As the sunfish are migrating south to warmer waters they can get trapped and cold stunned, mainly in Cape Cod Bay, similar to what happens with sea turtles.

Marine biologist Carol “Krill” Carson, the president of the New England Coastal Wildlife Alliance, said sunfish strandings average between 20 and 40 per season, and there have been 135 carcasses documented this year.

“This year is our busiest season and we have exceeded all previous seasons already,” Carson said. “The stranding season hasn’t even ended.”

The sunfish stranding season typically runs from mid-August through the end of December.

“It’s been a really bad season for ocean sunfish,” Carson said.

Read the full story at CapeCod.com

Right whale named Snake Eyes died due to entanglement

November 7, 2019 — The probable cause of the death of a North Atlantic right whale found in September off Long Island is entanglement in fishing gear, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The 40-year-old male whale, known as No. 1226 and named “Snake Eyes,” died after being seen alive in July and August in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. In September, researchers performed a necropsy at Jones Beach State Park to determine the cause of death.

Critically endangered right whales — which spend late winter and early spring in Cape Cod Bay and nearby waters — are experiencing what is called an unusual mortality event along the Atlantic coast, given the high number of deaths since 2017, which currently stand at 30, according to NOAA.

There are currently about 400 right whales remaining.

“His death is testament to a couple of important issues,” said Regina Asmutis-Silvia, who directs Whale and Dolphin Conservation in Plymouth. First, the habitats of right whales have shifted both in the United States and Canada and government managers who protect the animals must also shift the areas being managed, Asmutis-Silvia said. Second, fixed gear fisheries, such as commercial lobstering, are an unintentional but lethal threat to the species’ survival, and the faster gear modifications can be implemented the more likely it is that the species and fisheries can both thrive, she said.

Read the full story at Wicked Local

Mayflower Wind wins second Massachusetts bid for wind power

November 5, 2019 — An 804-megawatt plan by Mayflower Wind won the second Massachusetts state bid for offshore wind energy, as developers forge ahead despite a federal study of how the burgeoning new U.S. market may affect the commercial fishing industry and other maritime interests.

Mayflower Wind, a 50/50 joint venture between Shell New Energies US LLC and EDPR Offshore North America LLC, beat out Vineyard Wind and Bay State Wind, which hold adjoining federal leases the companies obtained south of Martha’s Vineyard, in the competition for the state power bid. Mayflower says it will deliver long-term power below the state’s original price cap of USD 84.23 (EUR 76.1) per megawatt-hour, and more than 10,000 jobs in state over the life of the project.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Global Warming Is Already Destroying New England’s Fisheries

November 5, 2019 — To wake up in the Northeastern United States—as California blazes and Japan digs itself out of typhoon damage—is to experience an uneasy gratitude for all that is not burning, battered or underwater. Seven years out from Superstorm Sandy, we know not to get cocky, but there’s a relief in being able to worry about work and more pedestrian finances instead of evacuation plans, or ordering the right kind of smoke mask. It’s a small luxury in climate-didn’t-come-for-me-today compartmentalization.

But deep down, we know better. And if the national discussion hasn’t moved to climate change in the Northeast yet, it soon will. The effects are already profound—they just happen to be underwater.

Fourth-generation fisherman Al Cottone holds no illusions of being spared climate impacts in 2019.  He captains one of the 15 fishing boats still active in the waters around Gloucester, Massachusetts. Not a decade ago, there were 50. To fish in the Gulf of Maine—the ocean inlet spanning from Cape Cod up to the southern tip of Nova Scotia—is to navigate one of the fastest-warming bodies of water on the planet. “It’s not something you see with your naked eye,” Cottone told me. “But fish are definitely reacting differently, and I’m attributing it to climate change. We’re seeing them in deeper water—they’re trying to get the right temperature at depth.”

Read the full story at The New Republic

Atlantic Herring Spawning Re-Closure for Western Maine in Effect November 6 through November 19, 2019

November 5, 2019 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The Atlantic Herring Area 1A (inshore Gulf of Maine) fishery regulations include seasonal spawning closures for portions of state and federal waters in Eastern Maine, Western Maine, and Massachusetts/New Hampshire. The Commission’s Atlantic Herring Management Board approved a forecasting method that relies upon at least three samples, each containing at least 25 female herring in gonadal states III-V, to trigger a spawning closure. A spawning closure can be extended for two additional weeks if one sample taken from within a spawning closure area indicates a significant number of spawn herring.

The Western Maine spawning area will be re-closed starting at 12:01 a.m. on November 6 extending through 11:59 p.m. on November 19, 2019. One sample of herring was collected and analysis of the sample indicated 20% mature herring had yet to spawn.

Vessels in the directed Atlantic herring fishery cannot take, land, or possess Atlantic herring caught in the Western Maine spawning area during this time and must have all fishing gear stowed when transiting through the area. An incidental bycatch allowance of up to 2,000 pounds of Atlantic herring per trip/calendar day applies to vessels in non-directed fisheries that are fishing within the Western Maine spawning area. Information on the location of the spawning area is included in the below coordinates and the figure on the next page.

Read the full release here

Massachusetts picks lowest-price offshore wind option

October 31, 2019 — The Baker Administration announced Mayflower Wind as the winner of the state’s second offshore wind farm procurement, praising a proposal that the company said offered the lowest price and the least onshore investment of its three major offerings.

Few details about the price or the onshore investment were revealed, but Mayflower said in its original bid that the price would be “the lowest cost offshore wind energy ever in the US.” Mayflower is a joint venture of Shell New Energies and EDP Renewables.

The choice of the lowest-cost option is controversial because it touches on a sensitive policy issue. Officials on the South Coast have been pressing the Baker administration to focus more on onshore investment so that the state could begin to supply more and more of the supply chain for wind farms springing up along the coast. Gov. Charlie Baker is eager to see onshore industry develop, but he is wary of doing so at the cost of higher prices for power, which negatively affects customers and businesses across the state.

Mayflower laid out three options for a wind farm with a capacity of 804 megawatts. The first proposal, called “low cost energy,” offered the lowest price and some onshore investment. The second proposal, called “infrastructure and innovation,” offered a slightly higher price but promised more investment onshore. The third option, called “Massachusetts manufacturing,” offered the highest price but more onshore investment.

Read the full story at Commonwealth Magazine

Study shows psychological distress felt by US skippers after cod collapse

October 31, 2019 — Dramatic reductions in Atlantic cod catch limits in the US Gulf of Maine have taken a psychological toll as much as a financial one on New England’s fishing captains, reports a six-year study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Using a repeated cross-sectional survey, researchers at Northeastern University, in Boston, Massachusetts, led by Steven Scyphers, an assistant professor of marine and environmental sciences, said they found that 62% of the captains they studied self-reported “severe or moderate psychological distress one year after the crisis began and patterns that persisted for five years,” according to an abstract of the study, titled “Chronic social disruption following a systemic fishery failure”.

“Distress was most severe among individuals without income diversity and those with dependents in the household,” the researchers added.

It was in December of 2011, five days before Christmas, that cod fishermen in the Gulf of Maine received a letter from regulatory officials telling them that new assessments showed the New England cod stocks were not going to recover by 2014, as had previously been expected, recounts a university magazine article about the study. Catch limits were then decreased by more than 95% over the next four years.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Sacred Cod, Sustainable Scallops

October 31, 2019 — “I am a pirate,” Carlos Rafael once told a group of federal regulators at a Fisheries Management Council meeting. “It’s your job to catch me.” And they did.

Rafael, aka the Codfather, was one of the most successful fishermen on the East Coast. He owned more that 50 boats, both scallopers and ground-fishing vessels, in New Bedford, the #1 value fishing port in the U.S. All the boats were emblazoned with his trademark “CR.”

Scallops sit in the sand underwater in the Nanatucket Lightship area. This photo was taken duringIn 2016, after an undercover sting, he was arrested on charges of conspiracy and submitting falsified records to the federal government to evade federal fishing quotas. In addition to his boats, the Codfather owned processors and distributors on the docks. When he caught fish subject to strict catch limits, like cod, he would report it as haddock, or some other plentiful species. He got away with it, at least for a while, because he laundered the illegal fish through his own wholesalers, and others at the now defunct Fulton Street Fish Market in New York City.

“We call them something else, it’s simple,” Mr. Rafael told undercover cops who feigned interest in buying his business. “We’ve been doing it for over 30 years.” He described a deal he had going with a New York fish buyer, saying at one point, “You’ll never find a better laundromat.” Caught on tape, the jig was up. In 2018, Rafael, 65, was convicted on 28 counts, including conspiracy, false labeling of fish, bulk cash smuggling, tax evasion and falsifying federal records. CR? Caught red-handed!

Read the full story at Medium

Federal judge renews ban on gillnet fishing in Nantucket area to protect whales

October 30, 2019 — A federal judge in Washington, DC, on Monday ruled that the US’ National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) violated the Endangered Species Act, Magnuson Stevens Act, and other federal laws when it removed a roughly 20-year-old ban last year on gillnet fishing within a 3,000 square mile area south and east of the Massachusetts island Nantucket.

US District Court judge James Boasberg has renewed the ban in order to protect North Atlantic right whales, the Boston Globe reports. He said, in his 32-page ruling, that his decision was “not a close call” and quoted Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick”.

“Demonstrating that ‘there is no folly of the beasts of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men’ … humans have brought the North Atlantic right whale to the brink of extinction,” he wrote.

Boasberg’s ruling does not apply to the scallop industry, which will be allowed to continue using its dredging equipment in the area, as it has not been found to harm the marine mammals.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Federal judge requires fishing areas off Nantucket closed to protect right whales

October 29, 2019 — In a ruling that could create greater protections for North Atlantic right whales, a federal judge ruled Monday that the National Marine Fisheries Service violated the Endangered Species Act and other federal laws when it made the controversial decision last year to reopen long-closed fishing grounds off Nantucket.

The ruling, which was a major victory for conservation groups, requires the agency to renew the ban on gillnet fishing in about 3,000 square miles of water south and east of Nantucket. Gillnets, walls of netting that rise vertically in the ocean to catch many fish at a time, present a major risk to right whales, whose numbers have plummeted by about 20 percent since 2010. Scientists say there are fewer than 400 left, and the main threat to their survival has been entanglements in fishing gear.

Boasberg’s ruling, however, does not apply to the scallop industry, which has been allowed to fish in the area. The lawsuit did not contest the right of scallopers to use their dredging equipment in the area, as they have not been found to harm the marine mammals.

“It reaffirms that the scallop industry is not at issue with regards to right whale conservation,” said Drew Minkiewicz, an attorney at the Fisheries Survival Fund in Washington, D.C., which represents the scallop industry.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe