Saving Seafood

Op-Ed: Preserving our heritage and livelihood – A shrimper’s stand against unjust regulations

January 18, 2024 — I’ve been a shrimper for over 45 years. It’s more than just a job; it’s a legacy that’s been passed down through generations in my family. Since I was 15, I’ve been working in the waters of Plaquemines Parish, my workplace, my passion, and my source of livelihood. Today, as I continue to bring the finest Gulf shrimp to your tables, I find myself fighting not only for my job but for the very soul of Louisiana’s shrimping heritage.

The recent rule by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) mandating the use of Turtle Excluder Devices (TEDs) on skimmer trawl vessels longer than 40 feet is a real threat to our community. This rule, though it may seem well-intentioned, is an example of overreach and disregard for our industry’s reality. That’s why, under my leadership, the Louisiana Shrimp Association is taking a stand by suing against this unfair regulation on the same day the Supreme Court is hearing arguments on the power of faraway bureaucrats in the Loper Bright case.

Our challenge isn’t about denying environmental stewardship; we shrimpers understand the importance of preserving marine life more than anyone else. Our problem lies in the NMFS’s lack of consideration for the real-world reasons and impact of this rule. Studies show that there is minimal interaction between sea turtles and shrimpers in the waters where we mostly operate, and our waters aren’t primary nesting sites for these creatures. However, the NMFS chose to ignore this evidence and push through a rule that could devastate our industry.

Read the full article at The Center Square

Environmental and tribal groups add support to lawsuit calling federal fisheries management into question

December 12, 2023 — Five environmental and tribal organizations have signed their support onto a lawsuit against federal fisheries managers. The suit alleges that the National Marine Fisheries Service has violated environmental policies by using outdated data to guide the way it regulates the trawling industry in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Chain fisheries. This includes the Alaska pollock fishery, responsible for the vast majority of salmon bycatch in the region.

“There’s so many factors as to why salmon declines are where they’re at right now in our rivers,” said Laureli Ivanoff, the executive director of Native Peoples Action, one of the supporting organizations. “We know it’s not just the pollock industry. However, if the analysis and if the environmental impact statement that they use for analysis and for decision-making was updated, there would be a more complete picture of what’s happening in the ocean to base their decisions on.”

The lawsuit calls into question the use of environmental impact statements dating back to 2004 and 2007. It was originally brought in April by the Association of Village Council Presidents (AVCP) and Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC), tribal non-profit organizations that together represent the vast majority of communities hit hardest by salmon crashes in Western Alaska. The groups are being represented by the national environmentalist law organization Earthjustice.

In early December 2023, five Alaska Native and fisheries conservation organizations: Native Peoples Action, Ocean Conservancy, the Kuskokwim River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, SalmonState, and the Alaska Marine Conservation Council, filed what is known as an amicus brief on the same side as the original two plaintiffs. It is a way for parties with a stake in the outcome of a lawsuit to offer additional information that courts may consider before ruling.

Read the full article at KYUK

NMFS to pay $160,000 legal fees to settle Gulf charter captains’ lawsuit

December 11, 2023 — The National Marine Fisheries Service must pay attorney fees for Gulf of Mexico charter captains who successfully challenged the agency’s requirement for them to pay for vessel monitoring systems.

The settlement approved by the U.S. Fifth District Court of Appeals calls for the U.S. Department of Commerce and NMFS to pay $160,000 for lawyers of the New Civil Liberties Alliance, a non-profit legal foundation who represented lead plaintiff Allen Walburn, a Naples, Fla., charter operator and five other Gulf captains.

The appeals court Feb. 23 decision “struck down the VMS monitoring requirement implemented by the Department of Commerce and the other defendants under the Administrative Procedure Act and strongly implied it was prohibited as an unreasonable search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution,” wrote John Vecchione, senior litigation counsel for the NCLA, in a Dec. 8 email to the captains.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Feds move to designate islands as critical habitat for coral species

November 30, 2023 — The National Marine Fisheries Service issued a proposed rule Wednesday to designate 16 islands as critical habitat for five Indo-Pacific coral species listed under the Endangered Species Act, a move mostly linked to climate change.

A designation of critical habitat requires federal agencies to ensure their actions don’t destroy or negatively impact those areas, or pose any risk to species listed under the Endangered Species Act. The designation potentially could focus preservation efforts among others, including state and local governments, individuals and private organizations.

Many coral species have experienced population loss and continue to face threats like ocean warming, diseases, the effects of fishing and land-based pollution.

“We determined that these species are likely to become endangered throughout their ranges within the foreseeable future as a result of a combination of threats, the most severe of which are related to climate change,” the fisheries service stated in a report.

Read the full article at Courthouse News Service

Feds will form team to tackle fishing gear threats to Pacific humpback whales

September 29, 2023 — The National Marine Fisheries Service announced it is forming a team to protect endangered Pacific humpback whales from deadly sablefish fishing gear entanglements in the Pacific ocean.

The service intends to form a take reduction team by Oct. 31, 2025, under a settlement with the Center for Biological Diversity, which sued the service in January 2022.

The take reduction team will develop plans to address the incidental mortality and serious injury of Pacific humpback whales from sablefish pot fisheries. Most pot fisheries use static, vertical lines that connect buoys on the water’s surface to heavy traps on the ocean floor. These lines, typically made of heavy rope, can wrap around whales’ mouths, fins, and tails, cutting the animals. When a whale cannot break free, it can eventually drown from exhaustion or die of starvation.

“Fishing gear entanglements regularly injure and kill Pacific humpbacks. This team offers a glimmer of hope for change,” said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Humpbacks cycle nutrients that feed fish, delight whale-watchers and intrinsically improve the oceans. A dedicated team could keep these endangered whales from starving, suffering and dying in fishing gear. It can’t start soon enough.”

Read the full article at Courthouse News Service

Environmental Alliance Challenges Accepted Offshore Sonar Levels

September 13, 2023 — Saying protective distances adopted by the National Marine Fisheries Service for incidental harassment authorizations related to offshore wind sonar work is having the opposite effect, Save the Right Whales Coalition wants the federal government to take emergency action to halt the work.

NOAA Fisheries issues permits for “incidental harassment” of whales and dolphins when it authorizes seabed surveying using high-intensity noise devices.

“Our data shows that the sonar is producing Level B harassment noise levels at distances that exceed those set by NOAA Fisheries,” Lisa Linowes, co-founder of Save the Right Whales Coalition, wrote in a Sept. 8 letter to Richard Spinrad, NOAA administrator and undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere. “Marine mammals are likely getting much closer to the sonar than should be allowed.”

Read the full article at the Sand Paper

Federal fisheries service agrees to deal aimed at curbing whale entanglements in fishing gear

July 19, 2023 — A legal agreement finalized Tuesday over the protection of humpback whales is expected to help the threatened animals thrive while maintaining the ocean’s health.

The deal stricken between the National Marine Fisheries Service and Center for Biological Diversity will create a team to reduce the number of whales that get tangled in a West Coast federal fishery. The service will form the team by Oct. 31, 2025, a press release stated.

“There is no reason these animals should have to suffer or die in this way,” said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the center. “This agreement is incredibly important.”

A federal court in March sided with the center after it filed suit last year against the fisheries service. The center argued the service failed to protect Pacific humpback whales from getting entangled in sablefish pot gear off the California, Oregon and Washington coasts.

According to Monsell, the fishery operates in an area with two humpback whale populations: a Central American population and a Mexican one. The Central American population is considered endangered and only hundreds of the whales remain. The Mexican population is threatened and some 3,000 remain.

Read the full article at Courthouse News Service

Feds to reevaluate threat of gillnet fishing to humpback whales

April 23, 2023 — Environmentalists claimed victory following an agreement by the National Marine Fisheries Service to complete a new biological assessment on the state of humpback whales living in the waters off the West Coast.

The announcement follows a joint stipulation approved Thursday by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer after the Center for Biological Diversity sued Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and the National Marine Fisheries Service in 2022. The suit claimed the drift gillnet fishery caused “excessive harm to endangered humpback whales,” in violation of the Endangered Species Act.

“Humpback whales just won a key victory against destructive gillnets,” said Catherine Kilduff, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, in a statement. “These amazing animals face so many threats off California, and absurdly huge nets are a hazard they really shouldn’t have to dodge. This agreement will help ensure whales are protected while the drift gillnet fishery winds down operations over the next five years.”

Kilduff said humpbacks have been endangered since the creation of the Endangered Species Act in 1973.

Read the full article at Courthouse New Service

‘Ropeless’ Fishing Gear Aims to Protect Whales, But Adds Complications, Costs

April 13, 2023 — A handful of Rhode Island lobster fishermen are working this season with federal regulators to use and study some complex and early stage equipment that is intended, eventually, to greatly reduce entanglements and deaths of whales.

The experimental equipment for this so-called “ropeless” fishing would eliminate the vertical ropes — or “lines” — running down the water column from buoys on the surface to lines connecting a series of traps on the seafloor. The existing function of buoys and vertical lines — to find and retrieve traps — would be replaced under a new system by computerized acoustic signals from boats to the seafloor and geopositioning via cell signals or satellites.

Using federal experimental fishing permits, three Port Judith-based lobstermen are struggling to use the new gear, borrowed from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), a branch of NOAA Fisheries.

On a recent sunny April morning, Richard Lodge and his sea dogs Rudder and Dory were preparing to embark from his dock at Point Judith on his boat Select for a day of lobster fishing using the experimental gear. The gear is informally called “on demand” because the fisherman uses an acoustic signal, like a dog whistle, to release floats on the seafloor and to raise one end of the trawl line to the surface.

His experimental fishing permit allows Lodge to use and test the gear in a portion of the ocean called the South Island restricted area, to the south and east of the Rhode Island coast. The restricted area was designated two years ago, and lobster fishing — using buoys and vertical lines — is banned there from February through April, when the endangered North Atlantic right whale is moving through the area.

Lodge uses a mild tone in talking about using the gear, which is a little surprising, considering the years of previous regulations on the fishery and the hassles of managing the computer-driven gear.

“Ropeless technology is excessive; I honestly don’t think it is necessary,” Lodge said. “This is a solution to a problem that isn’t there.” He and other Point Judith-based lobstermen said that in decades of time at sea, they don’t know of one instance in which whales were entangled in their lines.

“I’ve fished here for 40 years and we haven’t had a problem with whales,” said Galilee-based fisherman Eric Marcus, who also has an experimental fishing permit to use and test the ropeless gear in the restricted zone. “Where we are isn’t a breeding ground for whales.”

Daniel McKiernan, director of the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, said there are 6,000 commercial lobstermen and 350 right whales, “so naturally the vast majority of lobstermen are not entangling whales.”

Read the full article at ecoRI News

Tribal organizations file lawsuit alleging NOAA fisheries use outdated data, harming subsistence fishing

April 11, 2023 — The Association of Village Council Presidents and the Tanana Chiefs Conference have filed a lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries Service in U.S. District Court to protect subsistence fishing rights.

The two organizations represent nearly a hundred tribes in Alaska, and are suing the federal government in order to protect their rights to subsistence fishing. The nonprofit EarthJustice is representing the Tribal organizations.

“It’s challenging the National Marine Fisheries Service’s recent decision adopting the catch limits for the Bering Sea groundfish fisheries,” EarthJustice senior attorney Kate Glover said.

The lawsuit alleges that NOAA fisheries have been using outdated environmental studies when setting groundfish catch limits for the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands.

Read the full article at Alaska New Source