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Legislators act to save right whales

June 14, 2018 — A $5 million annual grant program is proposed for fishermen, shippers and conservationists to collaborate to protect North Atlantic right whales but the state’s lobstermen are still considering it.

“We’ve read it,” Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association Executive Director Beth Casoni said of the SAVE Right Whales Act of 2018, filed in Congress June 7. “We have not had a chance to discuss it as an organization.” At a regularly scheduled monthly meeting Wednesday, the association’s elected delegates are expected to discuss and possibly determine whether to support the measure, Casoni said.

The filing of the SAVE Act comes a week after a report of the second right whale carcass this year, both off Virginia, based on preliminary analyses, according to the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium. The decomposed carcass was reported May 31 on Metompkin Island, Virginia. After a review of the photos, the carcass was tentatively identified as a North Atlantic right whale, and bone samples will be submitted for genetic verification.

The SAVE Act itself, which stands for Scientific Assistance for Very Endangered North Atlantic Right Whales, was introduced by U.S. Reps. Seth Moulton and William Keating, both Democrats from Massachusetts, and House members from Arizona and California, and by U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-New Jersey, with co-sponsors from New York, New Jersey, Florida and Delaware.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Boston advocacy group sues NMFS twice

May 11, 2018 — The Conservation Law Foundation, a Boston, Massachusetts-based environmental advocacy group, filed two law lawsuits this week against the US’ top fishing regulatory agency over environmental concerns, Courthouse News reports.

In one lawsuit, filed against the US National Marine Fisheries Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric assistant administrator Chris Oliver and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, the group says the partial passage, on April 9, of  New England’s Omnibus Essential Fish Habitat Amendment failed to meet some of its initial goals, like minimizing the impact of fishing gear on fish habitats.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

 

Pair of Lawsuits Seek to Bolster Protections for Right Whale

May 11, 2018 — WASHINGTON — The critically endangered right whale took center stage in a pair of federal lawsuits from an environmental nonprofit that says a significant reduction in protected fish habitat in the Northeast will further imperil the whale and other fish species.

In one of the lawsuits filed Monday, the Conservation Law Foundation says partial passage on April 9 of New England’s Omnibus Essential Fish Habitat Amendment failed to meet some of its initially worthy goals, like minimizing the impact of fishing gear on fish habitats.

The Conservation Law Foundation says the amendment opened up more than 3,000 square miles of once protected ocean in the Northwest Atlantic Ocean to commercial fishing activities known to destroy fish habitats.

“In the region, the final Amendment reduced the amount of currently protected essential fish habitat by over 40 percent and lifted current restrictions on destructive fishing practices in vital parts of the remaining ‘protected’ habitat, including areas that are critical habitat for endangered North Atlantic right whales,” the complaint says.

In particular, the environmentalists argue federal regulators have failed to minimize the impacts of fishing gears in the Cashes Ledge area, which has been closed since 2002 to large bottom trawls and other bottomtending fishing gears capable of catching groundfish.

Read the full story at the Courthouse News Service

 

Coast Guard, NOAA Increase Efforts to Protect North Atlantic Right Whale

May 5, 2018 — BOSTON — Northeast Coast Guard units and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Office of Law Enforcement personnel are increasing focus this year on the enforcement of the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan(ALWTRP), to detect and deter illegally placed fishing gear and reduce the likelihood of fatal whale entanglements from occurring.

Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and in alignment with whale migration patterns, increased operations will run May 1 through June 30 and compromise of more frequent air and sea patrols in seasonal gear closure areas by NOAA law enforcement personnel and Coast Guard patrol boats, cutter crews, and air assets.

Additionally, Coast Guard units across the First District will engage in an operation taking aim on at-sea inspections of unattended lobster and gillnet gear. The goal is to identify and affect the removal of illegally rigged and improperly marked gear in an effort to decrease whale entanglements within New England’s waters.

Read the full story at Cape Cod Today

 

Massachusetts: Whales in distress located off Provincetown

April 27, 2018 — The Center for Coastal Studies Marine Animal Entanglement Response team recently shot a “cutting arrow” at a rope around a whale to save the marine mammal from entanglement.

Two weeks ago the team got a report of an entangled right whale about three miles north of Provincetown.

The right whale was identified as a mature female, according to a statement from Center for Coastal Studies executive assistant Cathrine Macort.

“She was found with a tight wrap of very thick rope around her upper jaw and over the top of her rostrum (blow hole),” it stated. “There was no trailing line, so the usual technique of attaching buoys to the entanglement to slow the whale and keep it at the surface could not be utilized. Instead, responders used a cutting arrow fired from the deck of the rescue boat to damage the rope. The now-weakened line should deteriorate and be shed naturally over time.”

Researchers will continue to monitor the whale. It was originally seen in Stellwagon Bank, the 842-square-mile federally protected marine sanctuary.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Wicked Local

 

Bay State Wind Announces Plans For Grants to Protect New England Fisheries, Whales

April 12, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Bay State Wind, an offshore wind developer, announced on Tuesday that they plan on providing more than $2 million in grants for research and programs to protect New England’s fisheries and whale populations.

The grants would be spread out amongst different organizations. The developer plans to offer $1 million for a Bay State Wind Marine Science Grant Program for directed fisheries resources research on the Bay State Wind lease area. Woods Hole Oceanography Institute, which has been working on a ropeless fishing concept to protect whales, would receive a $500,000 multi-year grant to use for the development of advanced whale detection systems. The New England Aquarium Right Whale Research Project and the Lobster Foundation of Massachusetts would each receive $250,000 to prevent gear entanglement of the North Atlantic Right Whale. Bay State Wind also plans on offering grants to Whale Alert Project, Center for Coastal Studies and the National Ocean Science Bowl/ Blue Lobster Bowl.

“These grants demonstrate Bay State Wind’s commitment to environmental responsibility,” Bay State Wind environmental manager and whale biologist Laura Morse said in a press release. “We are taking steps to strengthen the population of the North Atlantic Right Whale, which is weakened by boat strikes and fishing gear entanglements. In addition, Bay State Wind will address two of the main threats to marine life – rising ocean temperatures and ocean acidification – with the clean energy that is wind farms will produce.”

Bay State Wind is currently in the running to supply offshore wind power to Massachusetts, a hot topic for the Massachusetts fishing industry. Just this week a group of fishing industry officials set a letter to Governor Charlie Baker suggesting changes to “make offshore wind more palatable.” The group suggested that the state’s first offshore windfarm be “modest in size and scope” so that the impacts on commercial fishing can be studied.

Bay State Wind, which is a joint venture between Ørsted, the offshore wind global leader, and Eversource, a New England transmission builder, released a statement reaffirming their commitment to the fishing industry in Massachusetts: “We are the only project that has hired a marine biologist to ensure that we protect marine species and do not interfere with migration patterns, and we will continue to work closely with the fighting industry in the South Coast to minimize disruption and to preserve fish stocks for future generations.”

This story originally appeared on Seafood News, it is republished with permission.

 

Massachusetts: Hoping for a state contract, Bay State Wind offers more than $2 million in environmental research grants

April 11, 2018 — NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — In what could be the final weeks before Massachusetts awards its first offshore wind contract, Bay State Wind has announced more than $2 million in grants it would provide for fisheries research and whale protection, contingent upon Bay State Wind winning a contract.

The grants include:

• $1 million for a marine science grant program to be administered by Bay State Wind. It would fund research in the Bay State Wind lease area designed to address specific questions and concerns raised by the fishing industry.

• $500,000 to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution for a multi-year grant to develop advanced whale detection systems.

• $250,000 each to the New England Aquarium right whale research project and the Lobster Foundation of Massachusetts to prevent gear entanglement of the North Atlantic right whale.

The deadline for the state and electric companies to announce one or more winners of offshore wind contracts is April 23, but the decision could be delayed, State House News Service reported last week.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

 

Massachusetts: Bay State fishing advocates oppose offshore drilling

February 26, 2018 — Frustrated by the Trump administration’s plans to potentially open areas off the Massachusetts coast to oil drilling, U.S. Sen. Ed Markey convened groups with sometimes divergent interests to collectively oppose the plan on Monday.

The oil industry’s use of controlled explosions to explore the seafloor kills and disrupts the ocean life, from plankton to the endangered right whale, said Scott Kraus, vice president and senior science adviser at the New England Aquarium. If the industry builds oil wells in the offshore fishing areas, that would put the area’s fishing industry at risk, said Gloucester Mayor Sefatia Romeo Theken at an event held at the aquarium.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

 

Attorneys general urge offshore drilling plan’s cancellation

February 2, 2018 — The top lawyers for a dozen coastal states want the U.S. Interior Department to cancel the Trump administration’s plan to expand offshore drilling, warning it threatens their maritime economies and natural resources.

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey and her fellow attorneys general, all Democrats, wrote Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on Thursday about his agency’s proposed five-year oil and gas leasing plan that opens new ocean waters.

“Not only does this irresponsible and careless plan put our state’s jobs and environment at risk, but it shows utter disregard for the will and voices of thousands of local businesses and fishing families,” said Healey in a prepared statement. “My colleagues and I will continue to fight this plan.”

Healey first announced her opposition to the plan in an August 2017 letter to Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. The Northeast Seafood Coalition and the Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association agreed with her that the Interior Department’s plan to expand offshore drilling threatens Massachusetts’ $7.3 billion commercial fishing industry — the third largest in the country — and more than 240,000 jobs in the state.

The plan also could devastate the state’s robust recreation and tourism industries, according to Healey, as well harm the state’s coastal environment and protected endangered species, including the Northern Right Whale, which feeds in the waters off of Cape Cod and Nantucket, according to the comment letter. There are only about 460 critically endangered Northern Right Whales remaining worldwide.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

 

Susan Larsen: What’s causing right whale decline?

January 30, 2018 — There is no argument that the North Atlantic Right Whale is in dire straits. Dr. Mark Baumgartner, a biologist from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, gave a compelling presentation on “The Plight of the Right Whale” this past Tuesday evening, Jan. 23, at the Vineyard Gazette office. Since it was advertised, it was well attended.

One point of interest was that the right whales were making a healthy comeback, a two-decade period of modest annual growth; the population rebounded from 270 living whales in 1992 to 483 in 2010. From 2010, the numbers began to decline rapidly, with 2017 being a particularly devastating year, a loss of 17 whales. Dr. Baumgartner stressed the main focus was on whale entanglements with snow crab and lobster gear, and the urgent measures needed to be taken immediately within the fishery. Massachusetts fishermen are leading the way with break away links at the base of surface buoys (to 600lbs in 2001), sink rope (mandated in 2003), gear reductions and seasonal gear restrictions in Cape Cod Bay. He also touched on ship strikes as being a cause of death. However, the Marine Mammal Commission stated on their website, “other potential threats include spills of hazardous substances from ships or other sources, and noise from ships and industrial activities.”

But what Dr. Baumgartner could not explain was the scarcity of food that these leviathans need to feed on and their low birth rate. He showed the audience slides on the Calanus finmarchicus, known as copepods and remarked that this type plankton, sought after by these whales, are basically comprised of fat, or as Dr. Baumgartner called them “buttersticks.” Each adult whale needs to consume between 1,000-2,000 a day to remain healthy. The birth rate has dropped 40 percent from 2010-2016 and all five calves that were born in 2017 were to older mothers. “Since about 2011, we’re not seeing those sub-adults and juveniles in Florida and the question is, well, where are they?” asks Jim Hain, senior scientist at Associated Scientist at Woods Hole. Scott Kraus, a marine mammalogist from the New England Aquarium in Boston says, “Females are having young just every 9 years or more, compared with every 3 years in the 1980’s.”

Perhaps the decline is linked to the environmental disaster on April 20, 2010, the Deep Water Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. From April 20, 2010, to July 15, 2010, more than 200 million gallons of oil spilled into the Gulf followed by another one million gallons of Corexit, a dispersant mixture of solvents and surfactants that break down the oil into tiny droplets. It is documented that for 3 months, marine microorganisms have ingested these toxins, which are carried along the Gulf Stream, a strong underwater current that flows through the Gulf of Mexico, skirts around Florida, flowing between Cuba and up the Eastern seaboard. Since the right whale gives birth off the coasts of Georgia and Florida, could these toxic chemicals be part of their decline?  “The chemicals in the oil product that move up through the food web are a great concern for us,” said Teri Rowles, coordinator of NOAA’s marine-mammal health and stranding response program. It is also documented that female mammals including humans who have been in contact with these toxins have suffered from irregular menstrual cycles, infertility, miscarriages and stillborns, along with premature aging and other debilitating side effects. John Pierce Wise Sr., co-author of the 2014 study and head of the Wise laboratory of Environment and Genetic Toxicology at the University of Southern Maine says, “To put it simply, after a sudden insult like an oil spill, once it’s over, it takes a long time for the population effects to fully show themselves.” This same article states “research has shown that the calves of other baleen whales (other than Bryde’s whale) may be particularly vulnerable to toxins that build in their tissues.”

A letter dated Aug. 17, 2017, from the office of the Massachusetts Attorney General in “Reference for information and comments of the 2019-2024 National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program,” refers to the Deepwater Horizon disaster and its “harm to coastal communities and marine environment” and “long ranging impacts on marine mammals. The impacts on sea turtles could span the Atlantic.” The letter also states, “from 2010 through September 2016, there were 43 significant oil spills.”

In an article dated Dec. 5, 2017, ecologist Peter Corkeron of NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Center in Woods Hole at the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium’s annual meeting, “They’re (female right whales) dying too young, and they’re not having calves often enough.” This study found the females are struggling to reproduce. Dr. Baumgartner is the president of the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium.

Read the full letter at the Martha’s Vineyard-Times 

 

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