Saving Seafood

Former captain of New Bedford fishing boat pleads guilty to interfering with Coast Guard inspection

August 24, 2018 — The former captain of a New Bedford-based commercial fishing boat, admitted Thursday to interfering with a U.S. Coast Guard inspection of his vessel after he sunk the ship’s fishing net, prosecutors said.

Thomas D. Simpson, 57, of South Portland, Maine, pleaded guilty in federal court in Boston to destruction or removal of property subject to seizure and inspection, the U.S. attorney’s office said in a statement.

Sentencing was set for Nov. 28.

Simpson was the captain of the Fishing Vessel Bulldog, which was fishing off the Massachusetts coast May 31, 2014, when the Coast Guard conducted a routine inspection of the vessel, the statement said.

Officers asked Simpson, who was in the ship’s wheelhouse, to haul in the vessel’s fishing net. Instead, Simpson let out more of the cable attached to the net until it detached from the ship and sank to the ocean floor, officials said.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe

 

Initial tests of dead seals found in Maine and New Hampshire reveal avian flu and distemper

August 24, 2018 — Researchers found avian flu and distemper viruses in the preliminary tests performed on the first batch of samples from seals that have been washing up dead on beaches in Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts in unusually high numbers since July.

The Greater Atlantic Region Fisheries Office for NOAA said in a statement Thursday that the sampled seals, tested by Tufts University and the University of California, Davis laboratories, tested positive for either avian influenza or phocine distemper virus — four animals tested positive for both of the viruses.

“We have many more samples to process and analyze, so it is still too soon to determine if either or both of these viruses are the primary cause of the mortality event,” NOAA said.

Jennifer Goebel, a public affairs officer with NOAA, told Boston.com in an email that the initial results represent a “small number of the overall documented stranded seals” and continued testing is needed because co-infections are often found in the marine mammals.

Read the full story at Boston.com

Ex-New Bedford fishing captain pleads to hindering Coast Guard inspection

August 24, 2018 — A former New Bedford fishing boat captain pleaded guilty Thursday to interfering with a U.S Coast Guard inspection and faces sentencing Nov. 28, federal prosecutors said.

Thomas D. Simpson, 57, of South Portland, Maine, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to one count of destruction or removal of property subject to seizure and inspection, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Simpson was the captain of the Bulldog, a New Bedford-based commercial fishing vessel and one of several fishing vessels owned by Carlos Rafael, the news release said. On Sept. 25, 2017, Rafael was sentenced in U.S. District Court, Boston, to 46 months in federal prison on charges related to the operation of his commercial fishing business.

On May 31, 2014, the Bulldog was engaged in commercial fishing off the coast of Massachusetts when the USCG boarded the vessel to perform a routine inspection, the news release said. At the time of the boarding, the Bulldog’s net was deployed in the water and the crew was actively fishing.

The USCG boarding officer encountered Simpson in the wheelhouse and instructed him to haul in the fishing net for inspection, the news release said. Instead of hauling the fishing net onto the vessel, he let out more of the cable attaching the net to the vessel.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Mazzetta offers reason for Gloucester Seafood Processing shutdown

August 23, 2018 — Actions by the U.S. Department of Commerce prompted the Mazzetta Company to close its Gloucester Seafood Processing plant in the Blackburn Industrial Park in December 2016, according to an opinion piece the company’s founder penned for a fishing industry website.

Tom Mazzetta, founder and president of the Illinois-based seafood company that bears his family’s name, criticized the Commerce Department for forcing shrimp importers such as Mazzetta to pay additional duties on seafood imports years after the initial import duty was paid.

“The result is that three years after importing shrimp into the U.S. and paying an initial duty on that product, the Commerce Department will often come back years later and announce that importers owe millions of dollars more in duties than they originally anticipated,” Mazzetta wrote in the piece that appeared online Tuesday.

Mazzetta then tied the Commerce Department policy directly to his company’s decision to shutter Gloucester Seafood Processing and jettison about 200 full-time jobs.

“Mazzetta Company can speak first hand (sic) about the impact of the Commerce Department coming back three years after the fact and unexpectedly asking for millions,” Mazzetta wrote. “As many of you know, we were forced to close a processing facility in Gloucester, MA, and eliminate 200 American jobs as a result of this ‘gotcha’ game.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Scientists eye flu, pollution in spike in seal deaths

August 22, 2018 — As the number of dead or stranded live seals washing up along the coast from northern Massachusetts to southern Maine continues to increase dramatically, marine mammal experts are considering influenza or environmental pollution as potential explanations.

Although there is no definitive cause for the uptick in seal deaths — the count is more than 400 so far this year — the Seacoast Science Center, in Rye, New Hampshire, is continuing to test tissue from fresh seal carcasses to determine if there is a possibility of illness. Live seals have been found in poor condition with signs of lethargy, coughing, sneezing and having seizures, according to Jennifer Goebel, a spokeswoman for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration based in Gloucester.

NOAA, a scientific agency which focuses on the conditions of the oceans, major waterways and the atmosphere, released an updated number of seal strandings and deaths Tuesday morning, primarily gray and harbor seals.

In northern Massachusetts and New Hampshire, marine mammal specialists found 15 live and 26 dead seals in July. As of Aug. 20, they had found 14 live and 31 dead seals in the same region. As of the same date, 57 dead seals have been accounted for in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, according to NOAA statistics. Four seals, three babies and one adult, were reportedly found dead on Plum Island in the last week.

NOAA scientists totaled 404 dead and live seals when examining all seals found on the shoreline in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Cause of death sought for fin whale that washed ashore

August 21, 2018 — A 55-foot-long fin whale that was spotted floating in Cape Cod Bay on Sunday has washed ashore on Duxbury Beach, according to a New England Aquarium spokeswoman.

The whale was seen floating about 8 miles off Marshfield in the middle of the bay, said Diana Brown McCloy, a member of the aquarium’s media relations team. It appears to have been dead for about two or three days, she said.

The whale washed ashore Monday morning.

The aquarium’s marine mammal team conducted a necropsy on the whale, and the Yarmouth Port-based International Fund for Animal Welfare sent one person to assist, according to IFAW spokesman Rodger Correa.

There are no apparent traumatic injuries or fishing gear on the whale, which appears to be a less than full-length adult, said Tony LaCasse, the aquarium’s media relations director. After the necropsy, the whale will be buried on a barrier island.

A surrounding section of Duxbury Beach was closed Monday and police asked people to stay away from the area while town officials and marine biologists worked at the scene, according to a post on the Duxbury Police Department’s Facebook page.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Can dogfish save Cape Cod fisheries?

August 21, 2018 –Low clouds hang over the pier as fishing boats line up to drop off their catch for the day. Fishermen in orange suspendered waders and rugged boots perch on the edges of their boats. The fishermen, with weathered faces and hands toughened by their work, ignore the tourists gawking and snapping photos from a viewing platform overhead.

Then, the fog descends, giving the scene a sense of timelessness. But this scene has changed from decades past. For 400 years, fishermen across Cape Cod caught boatloads of, well, cod. The fish was so plentiful and valuable that fishermen bought houses and new boats off cod profits alone. But today, there’s a different fish filling the piers: spiny dogfish.

Cape Cod has nearly lost its namesake fish, due to overfishing and climate change. So fishermen have switched to dogfish, skates, and other more plentiful options. This move could help revive the Massachusetts fishing industry, and might even help the cod rebound, researchers say. But getting Americans to bite may not be as easy.

“This is the fish we could feed the United States with,” says Chatham fisherman Doug Feeney. “We have people that are hungry. We have prison systems. We have vets. We have homeless people. There’s just so much that can be done with this product.”

For a long time, fishermen saw dogfish as an annoyance. They were a “trash fish” with little value that often ended up clogging their nets. The large spines on their fins especially made them a pain to throw back, and they eat pretty much everything smaller than them – including juvenile codfish.

Read the full story at The Christian-Science Monitor

New England shrimp population still looks bad amid shutdown

August 20, 2018 — A new analysis of New England’s shrimp population doesn’t bode well for the future of the long-shuttered fishery for the crustaceans.

The Maine-based shrimp fishery has been shut down since 2013 because of concerns such as warming ocean temperatures and poor survival of young. Scientists working with the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission are assessing the shrimp stock, and so far it looks like little has changed.

Results of the stock assessment “look fairly similar to what we’ve seen in previous years,” said Megan Ware, a fishery management plan coordinator with the Atlantic States. That means reopening the fishery any time soon could be a tough sell when regulators meet to discuss and vote on the subject this fall.

“We’re still seeing low trends for northern shrimp,” said Ware. “Low abundance, low biomass.”

The small, pinkish shrimp were previously a popular winter seafood item in New England and around the country before regulators shuttered the fishery. Fishermen sought them with trawler boats and traps in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, sometimes catching more than 10 million pounds in a single year.

Scientists have said the shrimp face a long-term threat from the warming of the Gulf of Maine, which is one of the fastest-warming bodies of water in the world. Warm water is inhospitable for the animal’s recovery, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has said.

The closure of the fishery has left New England fishermen, who also contend with other declining species such as cod, with one less option. Terry Alexander, a longtime fisherman from Harpswell, Maine, said he’d like to see the fishery reopen, but he’s not optimistic.

Read the full story at the Associated Press

MASSACHUSETTS: Gloucester hopes catch can claw its way to top

August 20, 2018 — Building on the success of its Gloucester Fresh seafood branding campaign, the city of Gloucester plans to apply the same formula to help brand and market Massachusetts lobsters to lobster lovers the world over.

Couldn’t happen in a better place.

If you go by the numbers, there is no better Bay State lobster port to take up the banner for distinguishing Massachusetts lobsters from those hauled from the waters of neighboring states.

Gloucester has dominated the lobster trade in Massachusetts and the industry’s high profile here has helped mitigate some of the misery foisted upon the community by the continuing groundfish crisis.

It is the state’s No. 1 port in both number of active lobstermen — an average of 136 annually during the past five years — and amount of lobster annually landed. Gloucester has averaged 2.94 million pounds per year over the past five years, according to the state Division of Marine Fisheries.

During that period, no other Massachusetts lobster port ever claimed more than 60 active lobstermen in any given year, and none but Gloucester ever cracked double-digits in the percentage of statewide landings.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

MASSACHUSETTS: ‘We all wondered what happened’

August 20, 2018 — Around 70 people who attended the annual Fishermen’s Memorial Service were held rapt by the words of local author and filmmaker Ron Gilson as he shared the stories of friends he has lost, fishermen who were taken by the sea.

Gilson was the keynote speaker at the service Saturday, which was held on the second floor of the Capt. Lester S. Wass American Legion Post 3 hall because of inclement weather. Painted oars that would have been carried to the Man at the Wheel statue and its accompanying cenotaphs at Stacy Boulevard had it not rained were propped up against either side of tall windows in the hall.

Family, friends, and community members drove down to the statue to place floral arrangements and toss flowers into the harbor in memory of those they lost after the service.

“When an accident happens and you loose someone, you’re hurt, but you put them to rest,” Mayor Sefatia Romeo Theken said after the service. “For those who have not returned, there is no closure. I feel every year, it’s a little closer to that closure. It’s just hard.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times