July 20, 2018 — The U.S. Coast Guard says two fishermen whose boat overturned off the North Carolina coast have been rescued.
A news release said the wife of one of the men called for help Tuesday after reporting that the generator on their boat wasn’t working and the men were trying to find a safe place in deteriorating conditions.
The Coast Guard said the men had departed Ocracoke that morning and were planning to shrimp in Pamlico Sound before unloading their catch in Engelhard.
July 18, 2018 — The Swan Island Oyster Sanctuary project has wrapped up its second phase and has received funding for a third phase in their expansion.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently announced a recommendation of $950,000 to go towards the third phase of the sanctuary’s restoration, a contribution that will be matched by the state through the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries.
According to Erin Fleckenstein, coastal scientist and regional manager for the North Carolina Coastal Foundation, the project leaders requested $1.5 million from NOAA and thus $1.5 from the state, as NOAA had stipulated that the state must match its own contribution.
“It’s slightly less but it’s still a great contribution towards our goals,” Fleckenstein said.
Swan Island is home to the largest oyster restoration project in the state, according to Fleckenstein. North Carolina is home to 10-to-50 percent of the historic population of the vulnerable eastern oyster, compared to the one-to-10 percent of historic population present in Chesapeake Bay. But this is still low, a problem the sanctuary creators are hoping to change.
July 10, 2018 — The following was released by the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council:
Fishermen are reminded that harvest and/or possession of red snapper is prohibited in federal waters off the coasts of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and the east coast of Florida. The fishery remains closed as NOAA Fisheries and the Secretary of Commerce continue final review of Amendment 43 to the Snapper Grouper Fishery Management Plan for the South Atlantic Region. A Fishery Bulletin regarding approval is expected from NOAA Fisheries and the Secretary within the next two weeks. Given the timeline for the review process, it is likely that, IF the amendment is approved, a red snapper season would begin in August 2018.
The amendment specifies a total annual catch limit (ACL) for red snapper of 42,510 fish, with 29,656 fish allocated to the recreational sector. The bag limit for red snapper would be 1 fish per person/day with no minimum size limit. The recreational season would be weekends only (Friday, Saturday and Sunday). The number of weekend openings for the recreational fishery would be determined by NOAA Fisheries and announced in advance. The commercial fishery would open with a 75-pound trip limit (gutted weight) with no minimum size limit, and close when the commercial ACL is met or projected to be met. The Council approved Amendment 43 for Secretarial review in September 2017. A benchmark stock assessment for red snapper will be conducted in 2020.
Sign up for E-News from the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s website at www.safmc.net and receive Fishery Bulletins from NOAA Fisheries’ Southeast Regional Office at http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/index.html.
July 5, 2018 — The North Carolina legislature has ended its session without considering a bill that would have made it easier for Cooke Seafood USA and others to ramp up oyster farming in the state. Costal Review Online reported.
The North Carolina General Assembly had been preparing to vote on the Support Shellfish Industry Act, HB 361, which would have raised the cap for oyster permits in the Pamlico Sound, the US’ second largest estuary, covering over 3,000 square miles of open water behind North Carolina’s touristy Outer Banks. Permits would have risen from a combined 50 acres to 200 acres, allowing for larger scale operations. It’s a change being sought by the Wanchese Fish Company, a Suffolk, Virginia-based harvester and processor acquired by the Canadian Cooke family in 2015, among others.
July 3, 2018 — We have, upon occasion, written of our fear of flying monkeys, robots, drones, wasps and eggs. There are more, but that seems sufficiently embarrassing.
Well, the robots are back at it and we’re here to tell you they’re not going to stop until they run the whole magilla. Wait until you walk into Delaney’s for a Tuesday night special and there’s a robot making your linguica pizza instead of Ronnie.
NOAA, in particular, seems enamored of the creatures, using them for all manner of survey and discovery tasks. It now has a fleet of Saildrones — wind-powered autonomous marine surface vehicles — it uses to help assess climatic and marine conditions, as well as the health of some fish stocks.
It also has other unmanned craft.
Just last week, according to The Charlotte Observer and the livescience.com website, NOAA researchers were aboard the vessel Okeanos Explorer to map the ocean floor off the coast of North Carolina when they came across something they called a “sonar anomaly” (which is science speak for “huh?”) and hinted it might be “an archaeology site, a geological formation or otherwise.”
July 2, 2018 — A group of concerned citizens visited businesses Saturday in Wilmington, Carolina Beach, and Wrightsville Beach asking them to publicly oppose offshore drilling.
The Don’t Drill NC Coalition organized the Coastal Day of Action.
“We have a number of concerned citizens, volunteers that are coming out to help us with our day of action,” said Drew Ball, director of Environment North Carolina.
Ball cited North Carolina’s coastal jobs, tourism economy, and fishing industry as reasons to avoid offshore drilling.
“North Carolina has a lot to lose if this plan moves forward,” said Ball. “(North Carolina) supports well over 30,000 jobs directly because of our clean coast, and we have a huge fishing industry, and a huge tourism industry, and all that would be put at risk if there were offshore drilling. When you drill, you spill, and we know that no matter what.”
July 2, 2018 — There were fewer fishing trips and fewer fish caught along the North Carolina coast last year.
Information from the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries shows those engaged in recreational fishing made about 4.5 million trips last year. That included shoreline or pier fishing, charter boats, private boats or in man-made ponds near the coast.
The agency says that’s down from 5.4 million fishing trips in 2016. Officials say Hurricanes Jose and Maria were part of the reason for last year’s decline.
The number of fish caught was also down in 2017. The number of fish caught dropped from 8.6 million in 2016 to 5.5 million last year.
June 27, 2018 — NOAA Fisheries announces a final rule for Regulatory Amendment 4 to the Fishery Management Plan for Spiny Lobster in the Gulf of Mexico and the South Atlantic (Regulatory Amendment 4). Regulatory Amendment 4 increases the catch limit for spiny lobster based on updated landings information and revised scientific recommendations; and prohibits the use of traps for recreational harvest of spiny lobster in federal waters off North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.
WHEN RULE WILL TAKE EFFECT:
Regulations will be effective at 12:01 a.m., local time, on July 23, 2018.
WHAT THIS MEANS:
FORMAL FEDERAL REGISTER NAME/NUMBER: 83 FR 29044, published June 22, 2018
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQs)
Why increase the catch limits for spiny lobster?
Why prohibit recreational harvest of spiny lobster using traps in federal waters off North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia?
June 25, 2018 — The following is excerpted from a story originally published in Undercurrent News:
Many North Carolina fishermen are petitioning in support of the Support Shellfish Industry Act. One group, Citizens for a Level Playing Field, have created a petition in support of the Act.
A vote by the North Carolina General Assembly — potentially as early as Monday — could make it easier for Cooke Seafood USA and others to harvest more oysters in the US coastal state. But it’s coming down to the wire, as the state’s legislature is expected to end its session either this week or next.
The Support Shellfish Industry Act (HB 361) would raise the cap for oyster permits in the Pamlico Sound – the US’ second largest estuary, covering over 3,000 square miles of open water behind North Carolina’s touristy Outer Banks — from a combined 50 acres to 200 acres, allowing for larger scale operations. It’s a change being sought by the Wanchese Fish Company, a Suffolk, Virginia-based harvester and processor acquired by the Canadian Cooke family in 2015, among others.
The measure, which was originally introduced in late May as Senate Bill 738 by Republican state senators Bill Cook, Harry Brown and Norman Sanderson, passed the North Carolina upper chamber on June 15 by a 28-9 vote, but still requires approval by the state’s Republican-dominated House of Representatives.
“With our acres of pristine waters, and a large and growing interest in cultivated oysters, the potential for the industry in the state is huge,” the three lawmakers said in a press release when introducing the original bill. “Our goal is for North Carolina to become the ‘Napa Valley’ of oysters and to become a $100 million dollar industry in 10 years.”
The North Carolina lawmakers might have picked a different area to represent dominance in the US wine industry. Despite its reputation, Napa Valley produces just 4% of the grapes used in California.
Regardless, Jay Styron, president and owner of the Carolina Mariculture Company, an oyster grower in Cedar Island, North Carolina, would settle right now for his state just getting on a playing field that’s level with the oyster industries in Virginia and Maryland, two states on the Chesapeake Bay (the US’s largest estuary), with lease caps that allow operations of up to 2,000 total acres.
Other states, like Louisiana and Washington, allow similarly high oyster growing caps, he said in a letter to the editor published Friday by Undercurrent News.
Styron told Undercurrent he isn’t interested in expanding beyond the 6.5-acre floating-cage oyster and clam farm he owns in the adjacent Core Sound, but is arguing for the change on behalf of other oyster growers in his role as the president of the North Carolina Shellfish Growers Association.
Read the full story at Undercurrent News
June 22, 2018 — The following is a letter to the editor of Undercurrent News from Jay Styron, owner and president of the Carolina Mariculture Company, in Cedar Island, North Carolina:
If North Carolina wants to be a major player in the shellfish industry, it needs to make it easier for oyster farmers to lease space and raise their products. The Support Shellfish Industry Act, currently being debated in the state’s General Assembly, is a major step in the right direction.
The bill expands North Carolina’s shellfish leasing program, making it easier for local businesses to acquire leases and ensuring that our state’s working watermen are the ones operating the farms. Most importantly, it expands the area that can be leased for oysters in Pamlico Sound. Currently, businesses are capped to leasing only 50 acres in the sound. The bill raises that cap to 200 acres total, while keeping individual sites to 50 contiguous acres.
The bill ensures that this expansion is done in a responsible and cautious way. Before the additional acreage can be approved, the state’s Division of Marine Fisheries will be required to first study and identify suitable lease areas. The bill does not change this cap for other parts of the state, which will remain at 50 acres.
Allowing larger leases in Pamlico Sound, part of the nation’s largest single-state estuary, will help North Carolina keep up with other coastal shellfish-producing states. In the Chesapeake Bay, both Virginia and Maryland have lease caps of 2,000 total acres. Other states, like Louisiana and Washington, allow for similarly high caps. While this legislation won’t immediately raise North Carolina to the same level as these states, it represents a significant step towards closing the gap.
The bill makes other improvements to the state’s aquaculture industry beyond expanding leasing areas. It opens new areas for shellfish nurseries and hatcheries to operate, which will help clean the surrounding waters, and creates a new, in-state source of seed to make it easier to populate new shellfish beds. It also creates new administrative procedures for the DMF to quickly mitigate conflicts arising from leasing decisions. These provisions will all allow shellfish cultivation in North Carolina to grow and diversify.
Improving our shellfish leasing program will help North Carolina regain its competitive edge regionally, particularly with respect to Virginia. In recent years, Virginia has moved aggressively to expand its fresh wild-caught and farm-raised oyster harvest, now producing about $35.8 million in oyster production annually. By contrast, North Carolina lags well behind at $3.9 million annually. This disparity is even more alarming considering just 13 years ago North Carolina’s shellfish industry was worth four times as much as Virginia’s.
The Support Shellfish Industry Act will lead to greater economic development, providing much needed jobs for North Carolina oyster farmers. Importantly, the legislation keeps requirements that leaseholders have a business registered in North Carolina and a commercial fishing license – which only state residents can get – safeguarding North Carolina jobs. Leased areas will still be public waters owned by the state, and leases can be canceled at any time should issues arise. Strict regulations on lease sales will also remain in place, including hearings where members of the public can make their voices heard.
The benefits of the bill extend to the environment. Oysters are among the most sustainable forms of food production available, filtering the water around them and improving fish habitat. According to a recent study, led by University of Washington professor Ray Hilborn, farmed shellfish are among the least carbon-intensive sources of food, and have among the smallest environmental impact.
North Carolina’s shellfish industry has the potential to provide great economic benefits to our state’s coastal communities, but only if we tap into its full potential in places like Pamlico Sound. That requires passing the Support Shellfish Industry Act, which will help us regain an equal footing with our neighbors, instead of keeping us in their shadow.