Saving Seafood

Shellfish Farmers Fear Ocean Acidification May Affect Harvests in 2016

January 8, 2016 — Ocean acidification was blamed for the shutdown of the Washington oyster fishery last year and B.C. could be next, partially for the same reason, said Rob Saunders, owner of Island Scallops at Qualicum Beach.

Speaking to TheProvince, Mr Saunders said that Island Scallops, which provides seed oysters and scallops for farmers, lost 90 per cent of its oyster larvae last year.

Acidic water affects the oysters’ ability to grow a hard shell. It takes two years for oysters to mature for harvest, and Mr Saunders said oysters may be in short supply this year.

Read the full story at The Fish Site

Fish Stocks Are Declining Worldwide, And Climate Change Is On The Hook

December 14, 2015 — For anyone paying attention, it’s no secret there’s a lot of weird stuff going on in the oceans right now. We’ve got a monster El Nino looming in the Pacific. Ocean acidification is prompting hand wringing among oyster lovers. Migrating fish populations have caused tensions between countries over fishing rights. And fishermen say they’re seeing unusual patterns in fish stocks they haven’t seen before.

Researchers now have more grim news to add to the mix. An analysis published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds that the ability of fish populations to reproduce and replenish themselves is declining across the globe.

“This, as far as we know, is the first global-scale study that documents the actual productivity of fish stocks is in decline,” says lead author Gregory L. Britten, a doctoral student at the University of California, Irvine.

Britten and some fellow researchers looked at data from a global database of 262 commercial fish stocks in dozens of large marine ecosystems across the globe. They say they’ve identified a pattern of decline in juvenile fish (young fish that have not yet reached reproductive age) that is closely tied to a decline in the amount of phytoplankton, or microalgae, in the water.

Read the full story at NPR

 

North Carolina Fisheries Association Weekly Update for Dec. 7, 2015

December 8, 2015 — The following was released by the North Carolina Fisheries Association:

MFC SEEKS COMMENTS ON DRAFT OYSTER AND HARD CLAM PLANS, 2015 COASTAL HABITAT PROTECTION PLAN 

Fishermen and others will get a chance to comment on future management of oysters and clams and coastal habitat at a series of public meetings to be held in the coming weeks.

The N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission will hold four meetings to receive public comments on draft amendments to the Oyster and Hard Clam fishery management plans and on the 2015 Coastal Habitat Protection Plan.

The meetings will be held in conjunction with Marine Fisheries Commission advisory committee meetings scheduled for:

Dec. 8, 5:30 p.m.

Shellfish/Crustacean AC

N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries Central District Office

5285 Highway 70 West, Morehead City 

Contacts: Anne Deaton

Phone: 252-808-8063

Email: Anne.Deaton@ncdenr.gov 

Trish Murphey

Phone: 252-808-8091

Email: Trish.Murphey@ncdenr.gov

Read agenda

Dec. 9, 5:30 p.m.

Southern Regional AC

Department of Environmental Quality Regional Office

127 Cardinal Drive Ext., Wilmington 

Contact: Trish Murphey

Phone: 252-808-8091

Email: Trish.Murphey@ncdenr.gov

Read agenda

Dec. 10, 5:30 p.m.

Northern Regional AC

Department of Environmental Quality Regional Office

943 Washington Square Mall, Washington 

Contacts: Katy West

Phone: 252-948-3884

Email: Katy.West@ncdenr.gov

Holly White

Phone: 252-473-5734

Email: Holly.White@ncdenr.gov

Read agenda

Dec. 14, 1:30 p.m.

Habitat and Water Quality AC

Department of Environmental Quality Regional Office

943 Washington Square Mall, Washington 

Contacts: Anne Deaton

Phone: 252-808-8063

Email: Anne.Deaton@ncdenr.gov

Katy West

Phone: 252-948-3884

Email: Katy.West@ncdenr.gov

Read agenda


Whether to re-open shallow bays (less than six feet deep) of Pamlico Sound to mechanical harvest.The draft oyster plan amendment looks at:

  • Whether to continue the monitoring trigger of 26 percent legal-sized live oysters to determine when to close mechanical harvest (adopted in Supplement A to Amendment 2 to the N.C. Oyster Fishery Management Plan).
  • Whether to make hand harvest limits the same statewide.
  • How to mitigate harvest effort impacts on oyster resources in the Southern region.

The draft clam plan amendment looks at:

  • Whether to increase the recreational maximum daily harvest limit for hard clams.
  • Whether to allow the use of power hauling equipment in the hand harvest of hard clams.
  • Whether to modify mechanical clam harvest lines to exclude areas no longer fished.
  • The draft amendments to the oyster and clam plans also consider multiple changes to the shellfish lease program, changes to the shellfish license, and shading requirements for shellfish.

The draft 2015 Coastal Habitat Protection Plan contains four goals and four priority issues:

  • Goal 1 – Improve effectiveness of existing rules and programs protecting coastal fish habitats — includes five recommendations to enhance permit compliance, monitoring, outreach, coordination across environmental commissions and management of invasive species.
  • Goal 2 – Identify and delineate strategic coastal habitats — includes two recommendations regarding mapping and monitoring fish habitat, assessing their condition and identifying priority areas for fish species.
  • Goal 3 – Enhance and protect habitats from adverse physical impacts – includes eight recommendations on expanding habitat restoration, managing ocean and estuarine shorelines, protecting habitat from destructive fishing gear and dredging and filling impacts.
  • Goal 4 – Enhance and protect water quality – includes eight recommendations to reduce point and non-point sources of pollution in surface waters through encouragement of best management practices, incentives, assistance, outreach and coordination. This applies not only to activities under the authority of the Department of Environmental Quality, such as development and fishing, but for all land use activities, including forestry, agriculture and road construction.

Priority issues for the plan’s implementation actions include oyster restoration, living shorelines, reducing sedimentation in tidal creeks and developing metrics to evaluate habitat trends. 

Find the draft amendments to the Oyster and Clam fishery management plans at http://portal.ncdenr.org/web/mf/fmps-under-development. Find the draft 2015 Coastal Habitat Protection Plan at http://portal.ncdenr.org/web/mf/habitat/chpp/downloads.

For more information, contact Catherine Blum, division fishery management plan coordinator, at 252-808-8014 or Catherine.Blum@ncdenr.gov.

NC MARINE FISHERIES COMMISSION SEEKS ADVISERS

The N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission is looking for commercial and recreational fishermen and scientists to advise it on various fisheries issues.  For information on the types of committees, requirements and how to apply see the news release.  Applications are due by Dec. 15.  

REGULATION AND RULE CHANGES:

–South Atlantic Commercial Hook-and-Line Golden Tilefish Fishery will close Dec. 8

DEADLINES:

Dec. 15 – MFC Adviser Applications

Dec. 16 – NMFS Draft Ecosystem-based Fishery Management Policy Comments

MEETINGS:

If you are aware of ANY meetings that should be of interest to commercial fishing that is not on this list, please contact us so we can include it here.    

Dec. 7-10 – MAFMC Meeting, The Westin Annapolis, 100 Westgate Circle, Annapolis, MD

Dec. 7-11 – SAFMC Meeting, DoubleTree by Hilton Oceanfront Hotel, 2717 W. Fort Macon Rd., Atlantic Beach, NC

Dec. 16 from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. – MAFMC Northeast Trawl Advisory Panel, Radisson Hotel Providence Airport, 2081 Post Road, Warwick, RI, 02886

PROCLAMATIONS: 

SNAPPER-GROUPER COMPLEX – COMMERCIAL PURPOSES (GOLDEN TILEFISH-HOOK & LINE)

POUND NET SET CLOSURE PERIOD

GILL NETS – ATLANTIC OCEAN SEASONAL MAXIMUM MESH SIZE EXCEPTIONS

GILL NETS – ALBEMARLE SOUND AREA- MANAGEMENT UNIT A- OPEN LARGE MESH GILL NETS IN WESTERN ALBEMARLE SOUND

 

Read a PDF of the Weekly Update here

Wellfleet, Mass. shellfisherman charged with illegal sales to restaurants

December 2, 2015 — WELLFLEET, Mass. — A Wellfleet man had his state commercial shellfishing license suspended and was charged with 45 violations of state shellfishing regulations after he allegedly was caught selling oysters to at least two Outer Cape restaurants without having a wholesale license.

The evidence also indicates that David Paine, 57, may not have complied with regulations that protect the public from infections from the bacteria Vibrio parahaemolyticus.

Paine was arraigned in Orleans District Court on Monday on violations of state shellfishing regulations between July 2014 and June of this year. His girlfriend, Kristi Johns, 41, who is a co-owner of Paine’s aquaculture grant, was arraigned Oct. 26 on four counts of violating fisheries regulations in arranging for sales of the oysters to The Whitman House in Truro.

Neither Paine nor Johns could be reached for comment. The phone number listed to them has been disconnected.

According to a report by Massachusetts Environmental Police Officer Daniel McGonagle contained in court documents, Paine sold oysters directly to The Whitman House and The Lost Dog Pub in Orleans. McGonagle wrote in his report that on June 22, he and Environmental Police Sgt. Kevin Clayton were notified of a possible oyster violation by a state Department of Public Health inspector who was investigating The Whitman House for allegedly selling striped bass before the season opened and marketing it as pollock.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

 

NORTH CAROLINA: Rains keeping shellfishing waters closed

November 9, 2015 — SOUTHEASTERN N.C. — For 61 years parishioners of Dixon Chapel United Methodist Church in Varnamtown have gathered for an oyster roast on the first Saturday in November. But the 62nd roast won’t happen until after the holidays, thanks to heavy rains that have closed local waters to shellfish harvest.

For much of the last month, nearby Lockwoods Folly Inlet has been closed indefinitely — a post on the church’s Facebook page tells members that the roast might be rescheduled around the end of oyster season early next year. Even before the season opened Oct. 15, the threat of pollution from heavy rains has kept shellfish harvesters waiting throughout Southeastern North Carolina.

As soaking rains wash stormwater runoff into the Cape Fear River and Intracoastal Waterway, the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries issues the closures as a precautionary measure. An oyster filters about 50 gallons of water per day, and if that water is contaminated with fecal matter or pollutants from roadways, it’s likely to end up in the shellfish.

Closures are still in effect for some waters from the state line to Wrightsville Beach, and Patti Fowler, chief of the division’s Shellfish Sanitation and Water Quality section, said more rain in the forecast means its unclear how soon fishermen can get back to the oyster beds.

Read the full story at StarNews

Maine isn’t doing enough to protect the Gulf from the effects of climate change

October 30, 2015 — When the Maine Legislature’s commission on ocean acidification reported its findings – that the state’s fisheries and aquaculture industries were threatened by this baleful byproduct of global warming – officials here were not exactly spurred to action.

Acidification, driven by increased carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and freshwater runoff from extreme rainfall in river basins, has been implicated in failures at oyster hatcheries and mussel farms, and has been shown to weaken clams and other shell-building animals vital to Maine’s fishing and aquaculture industries. But bills introduced in the last session – one each by a Democratic marine scientist and a Republican lobsterman – to implement many of the panel’s findings were withdrawn, one for lack of resources, the other for lack of support from Gov. Paul LePage’s administration.

“I could see the bill wasn’t going to go anywhere and that the governor was going to veto it,” Rep. Mick Devin, a Democrat from Newcastle, says of legislation he sponsored to allow the commission to continue its work for another three years.

Patricia Aho, who was the commissioner of environmental protection until she resigned in August, opposed Devin’s bill, saying the status quo was sufficient. “Since the issues of climate change and ocean acidification are inextricably linked, we think it will be more efficient to consider this issue in the broader context of climate change and adaptation programs,” she said in written testimony to legislators.

Devin’s bill and another one sponsored by Rep. Wayne Parry, a Republican from Arundel, were carried over to the next legislative session. Parry’s bill would have put a bond issue on the ballot that would borrow $3 million to fund several of the expert committee’s recommendations: collecting data, monitoring waterways, and performing tests in coastal waters to better assess the impact of acidification on wildlife and commercial fish species. It was withdrawn after failing to make it to the top of an informal list of bonding priorities drawn up by legislative leaders.

Read the full story at Portland Press Herald

 

Aquaculture on the rise in coastal North Carolina

October 22, 2015 — NEW HANOVER COUNTY, N.C. – Nearly all of southeastern North Carolina’s waters are now open for shellfish harvesting after heavy rains and floods left most areas polluted earlier this month.

Not only are oysters one of the state’s most popular shellfish to eat, but the shells themselves can be used as hardworking landscape material, in the form of driveways and patios.

Oyster shells make up many of the paths at Colonial Williamsburg to to get around. But starting October 1, a new law went into effect prohibiting contractors from using the shells in commercial landscaping.

The new law is an effort to increase the state’s oyster shell recycling program, where the shells are used to rebuilt oyster reefs.

“Oysters happen to be one of the few species that when we harvest it, we take the habitat right along with it, so we are trying to put that back into place,” said UNC-Wilmington’s Troy Alphin. “Larvae oysters depend on the adult oyster shell for settlement, and they have a very narrow window for settlement in their life span, only a couple of weeks. So if the shells are not in the water, they are not available for the larvae to settle on, these larvae will die. What we are trying to do is make sure the shells are back in the water as soon as we can they will be available for the next generation of oysters.”

At a summit earlier this year, North Carolina ecologists, scientists and politicians announced new efforts to make North Carolina the “Napa Valley of Oysters.”  One way that can be accomplished is by developing new oyster sanctuaries, something that Virginia and other states have already done.

A healthy oyster population is linked to the overall health of coastal fisheries.

Read the full story at WECT6

 

Most southeastern North Carolina waters back open for oyster season after bacteria levels fall

October 22, 2015 — WILMINGTON, North Carolina — Nearly all of southeastern North Carolina’s waters are now open for shellfish harvesting after heavy rains and floods left most areas polluted earlier this month.

The StarNews of Wilmington (http://bit.ly/1GVKMiM ) reports that bacteria found throughout most waters prompted the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries to declare most areas off-limits to oyster harvesting earlier this month, even though harvesting season technically opened Oct. 15.

Read the full story at StarNews

 

 

MARYLAND: Down year seen for oysters

October 8, 2015 — Watermen dredging the muddy bottom of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries for oysters may not haul in the bounty that some recent years have produced, the Maryland Department of Natural Resources cautions as a new season gets underway.

“We’ve had good harvests the last couple years,” said Chris Judy, the department’s shellfish division director. But “we will no longer enjoy the spotlight on our oysters because other oysters are going to enter the market in a stronger way this year.”

The season kicked off Oct. 1, as it always does, but largely in name only. The same nor’easter that chewed at Delmarva’s beaches and rained out a weekend of activities at the beginning of the month kept most watermen off the water. But they were out in force after the skies cleared.

“It looks like we got the whole state of Maryland working on one bar off Tangier Island,” said Greg Price, a waterman based out of Chance in Somerset County. “I counted 55 boats this morning.”

Those freshly caught oysters are already finding their way into refrigerator cases.

“At first it was a little dreary because of the storm, but we’re booming now,” said Miranda Taylor, manager of Ocean Highway Seafood and Produce in Pocomoke City.

Read the full story at Delmarva Now

 

The Economist: Particle biology

October 10, 2015 — Filter-feeding bivalve molluscs, such as mussels, oysters, scallops and clams, are a useful and tasty source of protein. They can, though, also be harbingers of illness. A filter-feeder lives, as the name suggests, by trapping and consuming particles (mostly bacteria and single-celled algae) suspended in water it pumps through its body. If those particles are themselves toxic, they can seriously discomfort, and occasionally kill, a human who eats a mollusc that has been feeding on them.

The most common culprits are algae called dinoflagellates and diatoms, several species of which make potent toxins. These algae often multiply into spectacular blooms along coastlines. Even in the absence of such a bloom, though, they can be abundant enough to cause problems. For this reason, in most places in the rich world at least, bivalves intended for sale have to be tested before they go to market. That involves taking samples to a laboratory, which is cumbersome and time-consuming. What is needed is a simple test that can be carried out on-board a ship. And Waqass Jawaid, of Queen’s University in Belfast, thinks he has one.

One way of screening shellfish is pretty crude. This is to inject a mouse with a sample and see if it gets ill— a procedure no longer used in Europe, but still permitted in parts of America. The alternative, a mix of chromatography and mass spectrometry, is more sensitive, but requires expensive equipment and trained staff. Dr Jawaid’s method, which he and his colleagues report in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, employs antibodies to create a system similar to a pregnancy test.

Read the full story at The Economist