Saving Seafood

Whale entanglements along West Coast drop by nearly half

September 9, 2019 — A conservation group says the number of whales entangled in crab fishing gear along the West Coast dropped by nearly half this year after a lawsuit settlement ended California’s commercial Dungeness crab season early.

The Center for Biological Diversity says preliminary data released by the National Marine Fisheries Service shows 18 whale entanglements were reported in the first eight months of this year, down from 42 reports during that same period in 2018. The majority of entangled whales were spotted off California.

Read the full story at the Associated Press

Comments Wanted: NMFS To Open Pacific Cod in BSAI After January Closure

September 4, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — After closing the fishery January 12, 2019, NMFS proposes a short opening to clean up the remaining 2,650 metric tons of Pacific cod remaining in the 2019 apportionment for less than 60 feet vessles using hook-and-line or pot gear.

The agency is asking for comments online or by mail. NMFS is terminating the previous closure and is opening directed fishing based on the current catch of Pacific cod by catcher vessels less than 60 feet LOA using hook-and-line or pot gear in the BSAI and the harvest capacity and stated intent on future harvesting patterns of vessels in participating in this fishery.

The change would be effective noon Alaska local time, September 1, 2019, through midnight December 31, 2019. Comments must be received at the following address no later than 4:30 p.m., A.l.t., September 18, 2019.

* Federal e-Rulemaking Portal. Go to www.regulations.gov/#!docketDetail;D=NOAA-NMFS-2018-0089, click the “Comment Now!” icon, complete the required fields, and enter or attach your comments.

* Mail: Submit written comments to Glenn Merrill, Assistant Regional Administrator, Sustainable Fisheries Division, Alaska Region NMFS, Attn: Records Office. Mail comments to P.O. Box 21668, Juneau, AK 99802-1668.

In today’s Federal Register notice, the agency said “The Assistant Administrator for Fisheries, NOAA (AA), finds good cause to waive the requirement to provide prior notice and opportunity for public comment pursuant to the authority set forth at 5 U.S.C. 553(b)(B) as such requirement is impracticable and contrary to the public interest. This requirement is impracticable and contrary to the public interest as it would prevent NMFS from responding to the most recent fisheries data in a timely fashion and would delay the opening of directed fishing for Pacific cod by catcher vessels less than 60 feet LOA using hook-and-line or pot gear in the BSAI. Immediate notification is necessary to allow for the orderly conduct and efficient operation of this fishery, to allow the industry to plan for the fishing season, and to avoid potential disruption to the fishing fleet and processors. NMFS was unable to publish a notice providing time for public comment because the most recent, relevant data only became available as of August 27, 2019.

The AA also finds good cause to waive the 30-day delay in the effective date of this action under 5 U.S.C. 553(d)(3). This finding is based upon the reasons provided above for waiver of prior notice and opportunity for public comment.

Without this inseason adjustment, NMFS could not allow the fishery for Pacific cod by catcher vessels less than 60 feet LOA using hook-and-line or pot gear in the BSAI to be harvested in an expedient manner and in accordance with the regulatory schedule. Under SEC 679.25(c)(2), interested persons are invited to submit written comments on this action to the above address until September 18, 2019.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

California Whale Entanglements Halved with Shorter Crab Season

September 4, 2019 — According to data from the National Marine Fisheries Service, the rate of whale entanglements in fishing gear along the U.S. West Coast has fallen by half this year, from about 40 incidents January-August last year to 18 incidents for the same period this year. The environmental advocacy group Center for Biological Diversity connected the improvement to a legal settlement shortening the California crab fishing season.

A lawsuit filed by the center in 2017 ultimately led to a settlement with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Association, and the terms included ending the California crab season on April 15 instead of June 30 as scheduled.

The settlement also includes additional measures to mitigate entanglement risks. It promotes the use of ropeless gear and creates a system for assessing risks to whales and triggering area closures when necessary.

Read the full story at The Maritime Executive

NMFS, SSA Report Poor Gulf of Mexico Shrimp Landings in July

August 29, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Shrimp landings in the Gulf of Mexico have been some of the worst in recent history, according to the Fishery Monitoring Branch of the NMFS Southeast Fisheries Science Center and the Southern Shrimp Alliance.

NMFS reported shrimp landings in the Gulf for July were only 7 million pounds, well below the 7.9 million pounds in July 2018 and the 8 million pounds in July 2017. The July commercial shrimp landings were 37.8 percent below the prior 17-year historic average of 11.3 million pounds for July.

Only 1.6 million pounds of shrimp were reported as landed in Louisiana — the third lowest volume for the state for a July in the last 18 years. All told, Louisiana landings were 62.1 percent below the prior 17-year historic average of 4.2 million pounds in July.

In Mississippi, only 415,000 pounds of shrimp were reported as landed, the second lowest total reported for any July from that state in the last 18 years, according to a Southern Shrimp Alliance press release.

For the year, landings of shrimp in Louisiana and the west coast of Florida are at the lowest levels they have ever been through the first seven months. Outside of 2010, the landings reported in Mississippi for the year are the lowest they have been in the past 18 years.

Shrimp harvests at historical levels in Texas and significantly above historical levels in Alabama have somewhat offset the low numbers from the rest of the Gulf, but landings in the region, at 35.6 million pounds, are the second lowest volume reported in the last 18 years.

Last month, NMFS reported ex-vessel prices for four of six count sizes of shrimp landed in the eastern Gulf (west coast of Florida) and five of six count sizes of shrimp landed in the northern Gulf (Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi). In the northern Gulf and western Gulf, the ex-vessel prices showed a large divergence between prices for large shrimp, U15, and all other shrimp. In the western Gulf, prices for U15 size shrimp were the highest reported for any July (not adjusting for inflation) in the 19-year database maintained by the Southern Shrimp Alliance.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

PFMC: Ad Hoc Southern Resident Killer Whale Workgroup to hold meeting October 8-9, 2019

August 28, 2019 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Ad Hoc Southern Resident Killer Whale (SRKW) Workgroup (Workgroup) will hold a two-day meeting that is open to the public.  The meeting will begin Tuesday, October 8, 2019, at 10 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time and recess at 5:00 p.m.  It will continue at 9 a.m. Wednesday, October 9, and will end at 2 p.m. The meeting times are an estimate; the meetings will adjourn when business for the day is complete.

Please see the SRKW Workgroup October 8-9, 2019 in-person meeting notice on the Council’s website for participation details.

For further information:

MAINE: DMR puts hold on whale rule meetings

August 27, 2019 — Hold everything.

Early last week, the Department of Marine Resources published a list of tentative dates for a second round of lobster zone council meetings relating to the measures Maine intends to submit to the National Marine Fisheries Service to reduce risk to right whales supposedly posed by lobster gear.

At the end of the week, DMR postponed the meetings scheduled for Zone C in Stonington and Zone E in Wiscasset.

On Tuesday, DMR sent out a notice postponing all the zone council meetings until further notice.

“At this time, DMR is advising the industry that the entire schedule of meetings is currently on hold,” the notice from DMR Lobster Resource Manager Sarah Cotnoir said. “The commissioner (Patrick Keliher) regrets the delays but wants to ensure that we develop a proposal for submission to NMFS that reflects a thorough review of all data.”

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

MAINE: Lobstermen say whale rules threaten way of life

August 15, 2019 — Maine has more than 6,000 licensed lobstermen. If the 100 or so who gathered at Ellsworth High School Tuesday evening to discuss proposed whale protection rules are a representative sample, most of those lobstermen are angry.

The fishermen gathered for a National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) scoping session on proposed measures to protected endangered right whales. The rules would require a 50 percent cut in the number of vertical buoy lines in the water.

“You’re dealing not just with our livelihoods but with the life blood of our communities,” Stonington lobsterman Julie Eaton told the National Marine Fisheries Service representatives. With earlier whale protection efforts, Eaton said, “We’ve done everything you’ve asked us to do, but this ask is way too big. People will die.”

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Meetings About New Whale Protections Come to Maine This Week

August 14, 2019 — Representatives of the federal government are in Maine this week to gather feedback about the possibility of new protections for endangered whales.

The National Marine Fisheries Service is conducting meetings with the public this month about potential new protections for the whales. The effort is focused on North Atlantic right whales, which number only about 400.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at U.S. News

Maine lobstermen insist they are not the ones killing right whales

August 13, 2019 — Lobsterman Charlie Smith has already paid a steep price to protect the right whale, an endangered species that he has never even seen in a long career spent at sea, much less found entangled in his fishing rope.

When the Jonesport lobsterman raises his left hand, it is clear that he has lost the ends of several fingers, ripped off several years ago by a tangle of weighted rope that fishermen were ordered to use in 2009 to protect right whales.

“That’s what happened here to these fingers,” said Smith, holding up his hand, at a National Marine Fisheries Service hearing Monday night. “The rope got all chafed up. There’s all kind of stories from sinking ground line. What comes next?”

About 70 fishermen came to the first fisheries service public meeting in Maine on the latest round of lobster rule changes being considered to protect the endangered whales. They expressed safety fears and their mounting frustration.

The state’s $485 million-a-year lobster industry is facing a federal mandate to lower the number of buoy lines in the Gulf of Maine by 50 percent to protect right whales. Fishermen worry the rules will make their jobs less profitable and more dangerous.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Federal Managers Finalize Turtle Interaction Measures with Hawai’i Swordfish Fishery

August 12, 2019 — The following was released by the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council:

The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council met on Thursday, August 8 to amend the Pelagic Fishery Ecosystem Plan with revisions to the loggerhead and leatherback turtle mitigation measures for the Hawai‘i shallow-set longline fishery. The amendment sets an annual fleet-wide hard cap limit on the number of leatherback turtle interactions at 16. An interaction occurs whenever a sea turtle becomes hooked or entangled in longline gear.  Few interactions lead to serious injury or mortality of the animal, which is normally released unharmed.  The Council did not recommend setting an annual fleet-wide hard-cap for loggerheads in light of that species’ improving population trends and other mitigation measures, but the Council retains the authority to set a hard cap limit in the future if necessary.

To limit the impact of interactions on sea turtles and to promote year-round fishing opportunities, the Council further recommended the establishment of individual trip interaction limits of five loggerheads and two leatherback turtles. Once a vessel reaches either of these trip limits, the vessel is required to return to port, and will be prohibited from engaging in shallow-set longline fishing for five days after returning.  This action is expected to allow sea turtle “hot spots” to disperse, while encouraging fishermen to take action to avoid sea turtle interactions before the trip limits are reached.

Additional restrictions set trip limits on each vessel – any vessel that reaches the trip limit twice for either leatherback or loggerhead sea turtles in a calendar year will be prohibited from shallow-set longline fishing for the remainder of that year. The following calendar year, these vessels will have an annual vessel limit equivalent to a single trip limit – either 5 loggerheads or 2 leatherbacks. These additional vessel restrictions are measures required under a new biological opinion (BiOp) prepared by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).

Read the full release here