Saving Seafood

Proposed Rule to Designate a Habitat Area of Particular Concern Offshore of Southern New England

September 26, 2023 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

NOAA Fisheries is requesting comments on the proposed designation of a Habitat Area of Particular Concern (HAPC) in and around offshore wind lease areas in southern New England, including Cox Ledge. The New England Fishery Management Council recommended the HAPC designation due to concerns about the potential adverse impact on essential fish habitat (EFH) from the development of offshore wind energy projects.

The proposed designation would focus on important cod spawning grounds and areas of complex habitat that are known to serve important habitat functions to federally managed species within and adjacent to offshore wind development areas. Complex benthic habitat provides shelter for certain species during their early life history, refuge from predators, and feeding opportunities.

The proposed HAPC, if adopted, would provide additional conservation focus when NOAA Fisheries reviews and comments on federal and/or state actions that could impact Essential Fish Habitat (EFH) and HAPCs, as part of the EFH consultation process. EFH consultations provide non-binding conservation recommendations to the implementing (action) agency to avoid, minimize, and mitigate the impacts of federal actions on EFH. 

For more information, read the proposed rule as filed in the Federal Register. The comment period is open through October 26, 2023. You may submit comments via our online portal.

NOAA Fisheries to Revise Critical Habitat for Right Whales in Alaska

September 26, 2023 — Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries:

NOAA Fisheries has concluded that a revision of endangered North Pacific right whale critical habitat is warranted. We intend to proceed with a revision, including initiating the rulemaking process. There are only an estimated 30 eastern North Pacific right whales remaining.

Our decision is in response to a petition we received on March 10, 2022, from the Center for Biological Diversity and Save the North Pacific Right Whale. It requested that we revise the critical habitat designation for the species.

Critical habitat for North Pacific right whales was designated in 2008. It consists of two areas, one in the Southeast Bering Sea, the other in the Gulf of Alaska off the coast of Kodiak Island (Figure 1). The areas are approximately 35,460 square miles and 1,175 square miles, respectively.

The petition requests we revise critical habitat to connect the two existing critical habitat areas. This would entail extending the Southeast Bering Sea boundary west and south to the Fox Islands, through Unimak Pass to the edge of the continental slope. It would also extend east to the Gulf of Alaska critical habitat area off the coast of Kodiak Island. We have not yet decided whether to propose the specific revision recommended by the petitioners or some other revision to the critical habitat designation.

What’s Next? The Process to Revise Critical Habitat

On July 12, 2022, we published a positive 90-day finding that the petitioned revision may be warranted. We also initiated a review of currently designated critical habitat and solicited public comments during a 60-day period.

We conducted a review of the petition using the best scientific data available. We also considered information we received during the comment period. Our review indicates that a revision to North Pacific right whale habitat is warranted.

To identify what areas qualify as critical habitat for this species, we will conduct and analysis and synthesis of:

  • Available acoustic mooring data
  • Visual sightings
  • Observations of right whale feeding behavior
  • Spatial and temporal patterns in right whale prey

We will also consider potential economic, national security, and any other relevant impact of designating any particular areas as critical habitat.

Based on the data supporting critical habitat, we will then revise the critical habitat. We will develop a proposed rule that will undergo public comment and a final rule that addresses information and comments received during the comment period.

NOAA Fisheries Confirms 90 Percent Coverage Target for 2023 At-Sea Monitoring for Northeast Groundfish Sectors

September 26, 2023 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

Today, NOAA Fisheries confirm that groundfish vessels in the Northeast will be required to have human at-sea monitors on 90 percent of all vessel trips subject to the groundfish sector monitoring program in fishing year 2023 (May 1, 2023, through April 30, 2024). We preliminarily announced this increase in coverage in March. This does not apply to vessels that are using electronic monitoring to satisfy the monitoring requirements of their sector.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) will continue to reimburse 100 percent of sector at-sea monitoring costs, including electronic monitoring. The ASMFC will continue to administer the reimbursement program for fishing year 2023.

Rewriting the Disaster Narrative in New Orleans through Collaboration and Community

September 25, 2023 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

Today, locals in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward call the Bayou Bienvenue Wetlands Triangle a “ghost swamp.” The area was formerly a cypress forest with trees so close together people could canoe through them without paddles. Now, standing by a sign commenorating the the forest, you’ll see open water with a few bone white tree trunks jutting out. Through its grant program for underserved communities under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act, NOAA Fisheries is providing $1.2 million to galvanize the efforts of local groups to restore the habitat.

The original Bayou Bienvenue forest stood within the 30,000-acre Central Wetlands Unit in Orleans and St. Bernard Parishes. It provided residents with a place to fish and hunt, collect wild onions and herbs, and escape from the heat and noise of the city. Its towering cypress trees and live oaks, together with the marsh grass and aquatic plants, also buffered the wind and waves from hurricanes.

However, after the construction of a massive shipping channel through the wetlands in the 1960s, salt water entered the ecosystem. As the salt killed off the freshwater plants, the channel, dubbed the “Hurricane Highway,” also gave storm surge coming off the Gulf of Mexico a direct path into the wetlands and surrounding community. In 2005, storm surge from Hurricane Katrina inundated the area in up to 15 feet of saltwater, destroying homes and killing many people. In the 18 years since then, despite the development of a restoration plan and efforts to revitalize the communities, both remain a shell of their former selves.

With new NOAA funding, these groups, working in partnership with foundations and city and state governments, will:

  • Plant 15,750 trees, 18,000 plugs of marsh grass, and 20 plots of aquatic vegetation in the Central Wetlands Unit.
  • Create a nature-based engineering and design plan for additional restoration work in the Bayou Bienvenue Wetlands Triangle
  • Engage residents of the Lower Ninth Ward and St. Bernard Parish in all aspects of restoration work and project planning to improve the health and sustainability of the community

“We feel grateful that we’re stewards of these congressionally-appropriated dollars for coastal and community resilience,” says John Barco, Marine Habitat Resource Specialist for NOAA. “We’re excited to work with these partners and the community to build off the work they’ve already accomplished.”

“Road Toward Extinction” – Nantucket Group Appeals Vineyard Wind Decision

September 25, 2023 — A group of Nantucket residents has appealed the dismissal of a lawsuit aimed at stopping the Vineyard Wind offshore wind energy project, which is currently under construction in the waters southwest of the island.

The group ACK For Whales – formerly known as Nantucket Residents Against Turbines – filed the appeal Saturday with the First Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals and is seeking to overturn the May 2023 decision of U.S. District Court judge Indira Talwani, who dismissed the original complaint.

ACK For Whales believes that the federal agencies involved in permitting the Vineyard Wind project – including the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the National Marine Fisheries Service – failed to properly consider the impacts Vineyard Wind could have on endangered North Atlantic right whales.

Those agencies “failed to utilize the best scientific and commercial data available, and failed to adequately consider a number of important, significant risks to the North Atlantic Right Whales induced by the Project, and incorrectly found that the suite of mitigation measures would adequately obviate North Atlantic Right Whale injury and death,” the group said in its appellant brief.

The failure, ACK For Whales asserted, constitutes a violation of the federal Endangered Species Act.

Vineyard Wind did not immediately return a request for comment on Sunday. The company, owned by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid Renewables (a subsidiary of the Spanish energy giant Iberdrola), stated earlier this year when the original complaint was dismissed that the review by the federal agencies had been “rigorous and thorough.”

Read the full article at the Nantucket Current

Millions pegged for salmon, steelhead recovery

September 25, 2023 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is recommending sending $106 million to 16 salmon and steelhead recovery efforts in five Western states.

NOAA and the Department of Commerce recommended grants to state agencies with salmon protection missions, tribes and tribal partnerships in Idaho, Alaska, Oregon, Washington and California.

The funding “provides an important opportunity to bolster salmon and steelhead recovery and invest in the communities that rely on them,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said in a statement.

Read the full article at The Challis Messenger

Trawl vessels caught 10 killer whales in ’23 off Alaska, federal agency says

September 25, 2023 — A federal agency that takes an active role in “shaping international ocean, fisheries, climate, space and weather policies” reported last week one of its teams is “evaluating data collected” on 10 killer whales incidentally caught in Alaska by Bering Sea and Aleutian Island groundfish trawl fisheries in 2023.

In a statement, NOAA Fisheries, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said just one whale ended up being released alive. For the other nine, the agency is in the process of determining the cause of injury or death and which stocks these whales belong to through a review of genetic information.

In addition, NOAA Fisheries is reviewing information regarding “a killer whale incidentally caught during the Alaska Fisheries Science Center’s longline survey for sablefish and groundfish this summer.” The agency added that on June 7, a dead killer whale was observed entangled in gear on the Central Bering Sea slope.

Read the full article at KIRO

Can $82 million stop the first modern-day extinction of a great whale?

September 25, 2023 — The U.S. government has issued an $82 million grant to protect the critically endangered North Atlantic right whales — “the largest climate and conservation investment in history,” the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said. The whale is fast approaching extinction, with just 70 females of reproductive age amid its dwindling numbers.

The funding from the Inflation Reduction Act will be used to ensure that the NOAA can implement technology to help ships detect and avoid the whales, alongside existing conservation measures.

Read the full article at SEMAFOR

NORTH CAROLINA: Dare commissioners oppose NOAA amendment, joined by Congressman Murphy

“We’ll continue fighting for you,” said Dare County Board of Commissioners Chairman Robert L. Woodard to Dewey Hemilright, a pelagic longline waterman from Kitty Hawk.

At the Sept. 6, 2023 meeting of Dare’s commissioners, Hemilright protested the proposal that pelagic watermen pay for all electronic monitoring equipment and operation.

In an email, Jeff Oden, another longline fisherman, accuses the National Marine Fisheries Service of creating a major contraction of the fishery.

Read the full article at The Coastland Times

 

Trawlers accidentally caught 10 orcas off Alaska this year — only one lived

September 25, 2023 — A federal fishery agency reported last week that 10 killer whales were caught in the gear of trawl net vessels fishing this year in the Bering Sea and North Pacific waters off the Aleutian Islands.

Only one was released alive, according to a brief Alaska NOAA Fisheries statement posted online. A team is analyzing data collected about the other nine whales to determine the causes of injury or death, and also to determine which stocks these whales belonged to through reviewing genetic information.

Killer whales, also known as orcas, have been entangled in trawl gear off Alaska in years past, but the numbers reported in 2023 are higher.

“The agency is working quickly to evaluate these incidents and will share findings as soon as possible, after all required analyses are completed,” the statement said.

The agency reported that another killer whale was entangled with longline gear set out by a vessel conducting a federal fishery survey in the Central Bering Sea. On June 7, a dead whale was observed caught up in gear, the statement said. NOAA Fisheries scientists were on board the survey vessel, which was designed to provide an assessment of black cod — also known as sablefish — populations, and that incident is also under review.

Read the full article at The Seattle Times