Saving Seafood

Sturgeon Tag Find Brings NOAA Scientists to California School

October 30, 2015 — A green sturgeon tag is a real find, for a kid on the beach and for NOAA scientists.

Ethan Mora and Liam Zarri, researchers from NOAA’s Southwest Fisheries Science Center in Santa Cruz, woke up early on a recent October morning to gather critical scientific data on green sturgeon. But they weren’t off to some remote research station; they were going to an elementary school in Napa to reward one of the students with $20 for finding a lost satellite tag.

Deja Walker, a third-grade student at Napa Valley Boys and Girls Club, was strolling with her grandparents on Stinson Beach near San Francisco in early October when she noticed some boys throwing around what looked like a toy. When the kids tossed it aside, she investigated and found the nearly foot-long tube offered a reward for its return to NOAA.

What Deja didn’t know was that she had found one of several satellite tags used by NOAA researchers to understand the impact of commercial halibut fishing on green sturgeon, one of nature’s most prehistoric fish.

Green sturgeon are bottom feeders, scavenging on invertebrates and small fish. They can grow to about eight feet in length and live for about 70 years. Although they spawn in fresh water, the adults may travel up and down the West coast from Mexico to Alaska.

Sturgeon have meandered throughout our oceans and rivers since dinosaurs roamed the Earth. But despite their long history, one population of green sturgeon in California may be edging closer towards extinction. The southern population, or those green sturgeon that spawn in the Sacramento River basin, were listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 2006 because of the loss of historical spawning habitat.

Read the full story at The Fishing Wire

 

Report: Gloucester, Mass. landings down, but worth more

November 2, 2015 — The volume and value of U.S. seafood landings remained flat in 2014, while the declines locally in volume and value have leveled off from the ear-popping decline experienced the previous year, according to NOAA’s Fisheries of the U.S. report.

According to the annual report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Gloucester held serve at No. 22 among U.S. ports in volume of landings, but declined to 26th (from 25th last year) in the value of its landings.

New Bedford, riding the lucrative success of its scallop fishery, was ranked as the nation’s top revenue-producing port for the 15th consecutive year. It generated $329 million from the 140 million pounds of fish landed in 2014, but that was down 13.2 percent from the $379 million in value from 2013.

Dutch Harbor, Alaska, reported a catch of 762 million pounds, and came in second for value, at $191 million.

Nationally, U.S. ports landed 9.5 billion pounds of fish in 2013 worth $5.4 billion. That represents a 4 percent decline in landings and less than 1 percent decline in value.

“The overall trends from landings and value for U.S. wild-caught fish is positive even though landings and value are down slightly from last year,” said NOAA Chief Scientist Richard Merrick, who said the declines all fall within the range of statistical error.

Local data

For Gloucester, the report’s data produced a mixed bag, with a slight decrease in landings offset by a slightly higher value from those landings that NOAA primarily attributed to a strong pricing year for lobsters.

A year after losing about 25 percent of both the volume and the value of its landed catch, Gloucester in 2014 landed 61 million pounds of fish, down slightly from the 62 million pounds landed in 2013 and drastically below the 83 million pounds landed here in 2012, before the current slide commenced.

Read the full story at Gloucester Daily Times

 

Fishermen get face-to-face meeting with NOAA official

October 29, 2015 — HAMPTON, N.H. – Fishermen had a rare meeting Saturday with the federal administrator whose agency has put what Granite State fishermen call backbreaking regulations on their industry.

While no promises for action were made by the official — Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association — those who met with her said they appreciated the hour and a half sit-down she gave them at the Ashworth by the Sea Hotel.

Sullivan took notes, asked questions and heard right from the mouths of the fishermen their fears that recent regulations will make New Hampshire the first state to have its groundfishing industry completely wiped out.

“I said (to Sullivan) I felt that I’m very patriotic, I love my country, but I feel my government has completely failed us in New Hampshire and in the fishing industry, and the public process has been non-existent,” said Ellen Goethel, Hampton marine biologist and wife of commercial fisherman David Goethel. Both met with Sullivan, as well as Portsmouth commercial fisherman Erik Anderson, Fish and Game’s Marine Fishery Division Chief Doug Grout, state Sen. Nancy Stiles (R-Hampton) and state Rep. Renny Cushing (D-Hampton).

U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., organized the 4 p.m. meeting. Shaheen contacted the NOAA administrator when she learned Sullivan would be attending a summit at the Ashworth Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 24 and 25.

Ellen Goethel said it was important for Sullivan to hear about the economic impact the regulations have had on the fisheries in New Hampshire, supported by information gathered by Grout.

Grout said the gross income for New Hampshire’s groundfishermen was reduced roughly 69 percent between 2009 and 2014, according to analysis provided by NOAA. That’s a bigger impact on groundfishermen income than in any other state, the analysis showed.

Also discussed was the core of the problem for struggling fishermen in New Hampshire – whether the science behind the strict regulations is accurate.

Grout told Sullivan there was an apparent disconnect between what NOAA’s scientists were reporting for cod stock levels and what fishermen are seeing on the water.

Read the full story at Portsmouth Herald

Ladders and Licenses: Fish Passages Play Role in Relicensing Hydroelectric Facilities

October 30, 2015 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

By Bill McDavitt, Integrated Statistics, under contract to Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office, Habitat Conservation Division

Hydroelectric facilities use the energy of river water spilling down the height of a dam to power turbines, which generate electricity. These facilities generally operate under a license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (the Commission). These licenses typically last a long time-30 to 50 years.

When licenses need to be renewed, we have an opportunity to review how the power plant operates, not just in terms of generating electricity but also in how it affects the environment. The Habitat Conservation Division works with these facilities to ensure that their operations are not harming diadromous fish and their habitats.

Read the rest of the story about how we work with hydropower facilities in our region to improve fish passages.

Questions? Contact Jennifer Goebel, Regional Office, at 978-281-9175 or Jennifer.Goebel@noaa.gov.

New Bedford once again nation’s No. 1 dollar value fishing port

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — October 29, 2015 — New Bedford remained the No. 1 port in the country for the dollar value of the catch, NOAA Fisheries reported Thursday.

It was far ahead of the second place finisher, Dutch Harbor, Alaska.

In terms of weight, New Bedford improved from 130 million pounds in 2013 to 140 million pounds in 2014, good for ninth place.

The report put the value of New Bedford’s catch at $329 million, thanks largely to scallops. Dutch Harbor reported a catch of 762 million pounds, and came in second for value, at $191 million.

Read the full story from the New Bedford Standard-Times

NEFMC: Response to Study on Rising Water Temps in the Gulf of Maine

October 29, 2015  — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:

The Gulf of Maine, located off northern New England and Canada, has hosted important commercial and recreational marine fisheries for centuries. In addition to existing threats from land-based pollution, marine discharges, energy development, and disturbances to habitat, a more recent problem, temperature rise, has emerged. The just-published paper in Science —Slow Adaptation in the Face of Rapid Warming Leads to the Collapse of Atlantic Cod in the Gulf of Maine — adds to the increasing body of work on this topic.

As an organization responsible for the management of fisheries in federal waters that encompass the Gulf of Maine, the New England Fishery Management Council (Council), along with partners, NOAA Fisheries and the New England states, offers comments on this paper.

  • Most importantly, climate change is a very real issue that affects fisheries in ways we are just beginning to understand and is one the Council and others must confront.
  • This particular paper presents interesting research, but as is generally the case, it is rare that any one scientific study provides “The Answer.” This one will almost certainly generate more discussion and further consideration of how fisheries management bodies might respond.
  • NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center is actively investigating climate change that could help develop possible responses. The Science paper will likely become part of the larger discussion on how to adapt and respond to climate change. During that process, it will be the subject of careful review, including testing of its assumptions and conclusions. Should they stand up to this scrutiny, the work may influence future quota-setting
  • Work is underway by the Council to look more broadly at fisheries through ecosystem-based fisheries management; those efforts may illuminate the way in which we consider this pressing threat to the productivity of fisheries in the Gulf of Maine and elsewhere.
  • More critically, the Science paper appears to presume that the Council should have anticipated the unusual temperature rise in 2012, without any explanation of how that could have been done. The current quota for Gulf of Maine cod is the lowest on record, and will almost certainly remain so in the foreseeable future. The goal at this time is to allow sustainable levels of fishing on healthy stocks, such as haddock, redfish, and pollock to continue, while creating the opportunity for cod to recover.

After reviewing the paper, Council Executive Director Tom Nies summarized his reaction to the challenges raised in the Science paper. “Fishery managers will need to adapt to the host of significant changes caused by the rapid rise in water temperatures in the Gulf of Maine; specifically, the New England Council will continue its close partnership with the scientific community in order to mount an effective response to this circumstance.”

View a PDF of the release here

NEW BEDFORD STANDARD-TIMES: Fishery science will make all the difference

October 29, 2015 — The message coming to New Bedford fishermen from federal regulators isn’t all bad.

On Tuesday, the top administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, visited New Bedford to meet with local members of the fishing community and spoke in a way that suggests the regulators understand the industry’s perspective.

“We are committed to working with the best science and trying to find the right way forward to sustain the health of the fisheries and the fishing community,” she said following a closed-door meeting, a harbor tour and a discussion at the School for Marine Science and Technology in the South End.

There are short-term crises for the Northeast Multispecies Fishery as well as long-term crises. A brief postponement of industry-funded observers takes some pressure off the fishermen and allows more work to find a compromise that satisfies the requirement of the law without driving boats out of business. In the meantime, while the right folks work out that short-term crisis, there is a necessity to keep working on the long-term issues.

The industry can hardly focus beyond the looming requirement that they pay for the implementation of at-sea monitors on groundfish boats and the immediate economic effect it will have on marginally profitable permit holders.

For too long, the message from the courts, some environmental groups and older NOAA enforcement actions had been concerned with only the resource, not the impacts of trying to sustainably harvest that resource. Administrator Sullivan’s statement of NOAA’s commitment to keeping both strong — and underpinning that work with science — opens great opportunities for collaboration and success.

Read the full editorial at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: NOAA head visits New Bedford, tours harbor

October 28, 2015 — NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — The commercial fishing community had an opportunity to meet and discuss regulations on Tuesday with Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, the administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the first in person meeting between the NOAA administrator and local fishing community since 1993.

The closed-door meeting included a boat tour of the New Bedford Harbor and a discussion at the School for Marine Science and Technology at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth with fishermen, city leaders, and other officials.

Sullivan’s visit comes as the ground fishing industry prepares to take another hit with the cost of at-sea monitors shifting to the fishing boats. Estimates are it will cost fishing boats $710 or more each day to employ a person to count the fish that a boat takes in.

The meeting was meant to spark a conversation between the regulators and the commercial fishing community in New Bedford, which is considered the United States’ top fishing port with annual landings valued at $379 million.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Lecture Series: Whales in the Heart of the Sea

October 27, 2015 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

The following free lectures exploring our evolving relationship with whales will take place at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. 

6:00 p.m. Reception  |  6:30 p.m. Lecture

Tuesday, Nov 3

Whales: An Economic, Cultural, and Environmental Icon

Dr. Michael Moore (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute), Scott Landry (Center for Coastal Studies), Robert Rocha (New Bedford Whaling Museum), and Regina Asmutis-Silvia (Whale & Dolphin Conservation) discuss the complex and evolving relationship between people and whales.

Tuesday, Nov. 10 

The Culture of Sperm Whales 

Dr. Hal Whitehead, Dalhousie University Professor of Biology and author of Sperm Whales: Social Evolution in the Ocean, illuminates the underwater lives and rich culture of these these misunderstood “monsters of the deep.”

Tuesday, Nov. 17 

Survivors: Life Before & After the Essex 

Michael Harrison, Chief Curator from the Nantucket Historical Society, discusses the real life tragedy that inspired Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick and upcoming Warner Bros. film In The Heart of the Sea (based on the novel by Nathaniel Philbrick).

Save your seat by calling 508-997-0046 x 100 or register online.

These events will also be broadcast live online.  

This lecture series is supported by a grant from the NOAA Preserve America Initiative.

Questions? Contact Jennifer Goebel, Regional Office, at 978-281-9175 or Jennifer.Goebel@noaa.gov.

 

 

SAFMC: Proposed Commercial Trip Limit for the Atlantic Coast Dolphin Fishery

October 27, 2015 — The following was released by the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council:

The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council is soliciting public input in November on measures affecting fishermen as far north as New England. Commercial fishermen that target dolphin (fish) in federal waters along the Atlantic coast may be operating under a new commercial trip limit if measures proposed by the Council are approved during its December 7-11, 2015 meeting in Atlantic Beach, NC. The Council is developing Regulatory Amendment 1 to the Dolphin Wahoo Fishery Management Plan with trip limit alternatives designed to help extend the commercial season. On June 30, 2015, the commercial dolphin fishery was closed for the first time when NOAA Fisheries projected that the annual catch limit of 1,157,001 pounds would be met. Dolphin are managed from New England to the Florida Keys under the fishery management plan, and the closure impacted the commercial fishery along the entire Atlantic coast. The Council approved measures in December 2014 to modify the allocation between commercial and recreational sectors, increasing the commercial allocation to 10% and the annual catch limit by 377,484 pounds. NOAA Fisheries is currently reviewing the measures approved by the Council. As proposed, the trip limit would become effective once a designated portion of the commercial annual catch limit is reached. Fishermen and other interested members of the public are being asked to provide their comments on various alternatives by participating in public hearings being held via webinar or by submitting written comments (see details below).

The Council is also requesting public input on proposed management measures for blueline tilefish, yellowtail snapper and black sea bass in Regulatory Amendment 25 to the Snapper Grouper Fishery Management Plan. New annual catch limits for blueline tilefish in the South Atlantic and other management parameters are being considered based on a new Acceptable Biological Catch of 224,100 pounds. Changes to commercial trip limits and recreational bag limits for blueline tilefish are also being considered. For yellowtail snapper, a species commonly targeted off the southeastern coast of Florida, the amendment includes alternatives to change the fishing year and modify accountability measures. The change in the current fishing year is being requested by fishermen in order to allow harvest during the winter season and have any closures that may occur due to meeting the annual catch limit coincide with the spring/summer spawning season. The final action in Regulatory Amendment 25 would allow an increase in the current recreational bag limit for black sea bass of 5 fish per person per day. Alternatives range from increasing the bag limit to 6 fish up to a total of 10 fish per person per day. Once overfished, the stock was deemed rebuilt based on the 2013 stock assessment and the annual catch limit more than doubled. The Council is scheduled to approve measures in Regulatory Amendment 25 during its December meeting in Atlantic Beach, NC.

The public is encouraged to provide written comment and participate in upcoming public hearings scheduled via webinar with concurrent comment stations at various locations. A public hearing scheduled for Monday, November 9th will address actions proposed in Snapper Grouper Regulatory Amendment 25. A public hearing scheduled for Thursday, November 12th will address commercial trip limits for dolphin through Dolphin Wahoo Regulatory Amendment 1 and measures proposed in Snapper Grouper Regulatory Amendment 25. The public hearings begin at 6:00 PM.

Learn More – Q&A Webinar

Monday, November 2, 2015 at 6:00 PM – Question and Answer Webinar for Snapper Grouper Regulatory Amendment 25. Registration for the webinar is required and information is available from the Public Hearing and Scoping Meeting page of the Council’s website at www.safmc.net. Public Hearing Summary documents for each amendment and other materials will be posted on the same page by October 30, 2015.

Submit Written Comment

Written comments for both amendments can be submitted via mail, fax, and email and will be accepted until 5:00 PM on November 16, 2015. Instructions for submitting comments are available from the Public Hearing and Scoping Meeting page of the website or by contacting the Council office at 843/571-4366 or Toll Free 866/SAFMC-10.

Public Hearing Webinars and Comment Stations

Public hearings will be held via webinar in conjunction with comment stations throughout the region beginning at 6:00 PM. Stakeholders have two options for participating in the public hearings: Option1) Participate via webinar on the scheduled dates listed below; and Option 2) Participate in person at one of the designated comment stations in NC, SC, GA and FL on the scheduled dates listed below. Registration is required for each webinar. Webinar registration links are available from the Public Hearing and Scoping Meeting page of the Council’s website at www.safmc.net. Council staff will be available one hour prior to each webinar to assist with setup if needed. Call 843/571-4366 or Toll Free 866/SAFMC-10 for assistance. Council staff will review the amendments via webinar beginning at 6:00 PM and local Council members will be on hand at each comment station and tuned into the webinar. Members of the public on the webinar and at comment stations will then have an opportunity to go on record to provide comments for consideration by the Council.

 

SAFMC November 2015 Public Hearings Webinar and Comment Station Dates 6:00 PM

 

Snapper Grouper Regulatory Amendment 25 

 

Monday, November 9th

 

Public Hearing via Webinar

Register at www.safmc.net

 

Comment Stations:

GA Department of Natural Resources

Coastal Resources Division

One Conservation Way

Brunswick, GA 31520-8687

Phone: 912/264-7218

 

Hilton Garden Inn Charleston Airport

5265 International Boulevard

North Charleston, SC 29418

Phone: 843/308-9330

 

Dolphin Wahoo Regulatory Amendment 1 and Snapper Grouper Regulatory Amendment 25 

 

Thursday, November 12th

 

Public Hearing via Webinar

Register at www.safmc.net.

 

Comment Stations:

Dare County Government Complex

Room 168, 1st Floor

954 Marshall C. Collins Drive

Manteo, NC 27954

Phone: 252/475-5000

 

Wingate by Wyndham (Hotel)

2465 State Route 16

St. Augustine, FL 32092

Phone: 904/824-9229

 

View a PDF of the release here