Saving Seafood

Right whale population downgrade ratchets pressure for decisive NMFS action

October 28, 2020 — The North Atlantic right whale population likely numbered just 366 animals with 94 breeding females in early 2019, a substantial downgrade from earlier estimates and a signal the extremely endangered species is in even more dire straits, NMFS officials warned Monday.

The warning came in an email to the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Team, an advisory panel that confers with NMFS experts on how to reduce accidental injuries and deaths of whales, the biggest threats being ship strikes and entanglement in fishing gear. Previous estimates, based on biologists’ modeling, experts’ surveys and cataloging of surviving right whales, had pegged the population that migrates between Canada and Florida at 412 animals in January 2018. That’s one source of the rounded-off “about 400” population number common in reports about the species in recent years.

The news came out one day before the annual meeting of the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium, a group dedicated to researching and reducing threats to the species. The U.S.- and Canada-based group, which includes academic, government, and shipping and fishing industries representation, opened its two-day virtual conference Tuesday with the latest population data.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

MAINE: Zone C lobster council OK’s trawl limit plan

October 27, 2020 — With the National Oceanic Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) under a fast approaching, court-imposed deadline to develop new whale protection rules, the Zone C Lobster Management Council held a special meeting on the internet in late September to get an update on the situation from Department of Marine Resources Commissioner Patrick Keliher and consider a zone-specific plan for gear modifications that will likely be required by NMFS.

On Aug. 19, U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg gave NMFS nine months to craft new rules to protect endangered right whales from entanglement in lobster fishing gear. In April, Boasberg had ruled that NMFS violated the federal Endangered Species Act in 2014 when it adopted new rules governing the lobster fishery by failing to adequately consider the risk right whales might face if they become entangled in the vertical lines that connect lobster traps on the sea floor to marker buoys on the surface.

The judge vacated the NMFS “biological opinion” required by the ESA, which allowed continuation of the lobster fishery as it is currently practiced.

In August, the judge gave NMFS and the lobster industry until May 31, 2020, to come up with a new biological opinion and new lobster fishing regulations. He ordered NMFS to submit progress reports to the court every 60 days beginning Sept. 30.

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

As their population plummets, right whales are on verge of extinction

October 27, 2020 — In dire news for a critically endangered species, federal regulators on Monday substantially reduced their estimate for the number of remaining North Atlantic right whales.

Officials at the National Marine Fisheries Service estimated there were just 366 whales alive in January 2019 — an 11 percent decline from the year before. There are likely even fewer alive today.

Worse, the agency estimated the population included only 94 breeding females.

“Given the low population numbers … it is essential that we work together to protect every North Atlantic right whale in order to avoid extinction for this endangered species,” Colleen Coogan, the agency’s marine mammal take reduction team coordinator, wrote in an e-mail to members of a federal advisory board tasked with finding ways to reduce risks to the whales.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe

Lawsuit claims Gulf of Mexico drilling permits violate Endangered Species Act

October 23, 2020 — Environmental groups went to federal court Oct. 21 with a lawsuit claiming the Trump administration is violating the Endangered Species Act by an inadequate interagency consultation on oil and gas operations in the Gulf of Mexico.

The San Francisco-based legal foundation Earthjustice filed the action on behalf of the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth and Turtle Island Restoration Network. The lawsuit attacks an assessment of the hazards that offshore oil and gas drilling and production pose to endangered marine species, issued in March by the National Marine Fisheries Service.

In an earlier 2018 lawsuit filed in a federal court in Florida, Earthjustice and other groups complained NMFS and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had unreasonably delayed developing a new biological opinion – or “BiOp” in the argot of federal bureaucracy – to evaluate impacts as required by the Endangered Species Act.

The law requires certification that government actions – such as permitting offshore drilling – won’t harm endangered species. The last biological opinion was issued in 2007; BP’s Deepwater Horizon accident and oil spill in 2010, with its sweeping environmental impacts and losses of marine life, triggered the process for a reassessment of the dangers.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Suit: Feds ignore risk of huge spills to endangered species

October 22, 2020 — Environmental groups asked a federal court Wednesday to throw out the Trump administration’s assessment of oil and gas activity’s likely effects on endangered species in the Gulf of Mexico, saying it dismisses the chance of another disastrous blowout like the BP spill of 2010.

The National Marine Fisheries Service’s 700-page analysis greatly underestimates both the likely number and size of oil spills, according to the suit filed by Earthjustice for the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, and Turtle Island Restoration Network.

Even though the study was prompted by the 2010 spill, it “essentially pretends the Deepwater Horizon spill never happened — that there was nothing to learn from that disaster,” Earthjustice attorney Chris Eaton said in an interview Tuesday.

Read the full story at The Post and Courier

Federal fishery managers to allow red snapper harvest

October 20, 2020 — Commercial and recreational fishermen will be able to harvest red snapper this season, even if the season lasts less than four days.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service announced Oct. 13 that Regulatory Amendment 33 for the South Atlantic Snapper-Grouper Fishery Management Plan will go into effect Friday, Nov. 13. The final rule allows the red-snapper fishing season to be less than four days in the federal south Atlantic region, which includes the waters between 3-200 miles offshore of North Carolina.

It removes the minimum season length requirement. Red snapper harvest, recreational and commercial, could be open for either commercial or recreational harvest for three days or less. The intent of the final rule is to improve access to the red snapper resource.

Read the full story at the Carteret County News-Times

NEFMC Gives Go Ahead for Amendment 21 to the Atlantic Sea Scallop Fishery Management Plan

October 14, 2020 — Last week, the New England Fishery Management Council signed off on Amendment 21 to the Atlantic Sea Scallop Fishery Management Plan.

The amendment includes new measures to “better manage total scallop removals from the Northern Gulf of Maine (NGOM) Management Area by all components of the fishery.” Along with expanding flexibility in the Limited Access General Category (LAGC) Individual Fishing Quota (IFQ) fishery. The NEFMC noted that the amendment still needs NMFS/NOAA approval before it can be implemented.

Read the full story at Seafood News

Judge’s ruling likely ends seismic testing off coast for years

October 9, 2020 — Seismic testing off the coast of South Carolina is likely finished for several years after a federal judge dismissed a 2018 lawsuit on Tuesday.

The suit, filed by the Coastal Conservation League, took aim at the National Marine Fisheries Service for issuing preliminary seismic testing permits off the state’s coast.

U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel dismissed the suit because there are currently no pending applications for either of the two permits needed to proceed with seismic testing, and a Nov. 30 application deadline for one, coupled with a lengthy approval process, means any approvals would be moot by the time a trial occurred, Gergel said.

Read the full story at the Charleston Regional Business Journal

Feds move toward permitting offshore Florida fish farm

October 9, 2020 — The Army Corps of Engineers will open a public comment period on a permit application for a fish farming pilot project off Florida’s southwest coast, following demands from critics and a newly issued pollution permit.

Hawaii-based developer Ocean Era LLC is proposing its Velella Epsilon aquaculture project, a single net pen system to raise up to 20,000 Almaco jack fingerlings, in the Gulf of Mexico about 45 miles southwest of Longboat Pass-Sarasota Bay.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Sept. 30 issued a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit allowing the fish farm to discharge up to 80,000 pounds of wastewater during its pilot production cycle.

“The proposed aquaculture system would be deployed for one period of 12-18 months, which will represent one production cycle including a 12-month rearing timeframe and 6 months for initial cage deployment and water quality and benthic sampling, time between stocking and harvesting, and the removal of gear at the project conclusion,” according to the Corps’ public notice of application.

Read the full story at National Fisherman