Saving Seafood

MAINE: Iconic fishing shacks in Portland, Maine, destroyed as coast sees historic water levels

January 16, 2024 — Iconic fishing shacks in Portland, Maine, were washed away on Saturday when the coast saw record water levels, as storms sweep across the country.

Water levels at the Portland tide gauge set a new record just after noon, surpassing the previous record set in 1978. The gauge registered 14.57 feet MLLW (mean lower low water), breaking the record of 14.17 feet MLLW set at that location on Feb. 7, 1978. Records at the Portland gauge extend back to 1912.

Amid the flooding threat, all three fishing shacks at Willard Beach were “completely destroyed” in the storm, the city of South Portland said in a Facebook post Saturday afternoon.

Work had been ongoing in recent years to preserve the historic shacks, which were the only three remaining from the region’s fishing heyday during the 1800s.

Read the full article at ABC News

US has already imported most of its holiday-season goods; Portland, Maine gets funding for port upgrades

November 10, 2023 — SeafoodSource is closely following the international shipping sector by compiling a regular round-up of updates about shipping port updates.

The flow of imports to the U.S. expected to slow through the remainder of 2023, despite the expectation the holiday sales season will be record-setting.

According to the National Retail Federation (NRF), most merchandise and goods has already arrived in the U.S. in advance of the holidays, resulting in an expected lull for the shipping sector.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

MAINE: ‘You have failed us’: Maine lobstermen face federal regulators over new rules

October 7, 2022 — There were some tense moments during a public hearing with Maine lobstermen and federal regulators Wednesday night at the University of Southern Maine in Portland.

The meeting comes after Gov. Janet Mills (D-Maine) and members of Maine’s congressional delegation requested the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) visit the state to discuss tougher rules on the lobster industry.

“Our goal is to implement the approaches under the law to comply with the law in ways that have the least effect on fishing communities,” NOAA Fisheries Assistant Administrator Janet Coit said.

The new regulations include increasing zone closures and limits on traps and vertical lines.

They are all part of an increased effort to protect the endangered North Atlantic right whale from getting entangled in fishing gear.

Read the full article News Center Maine

MAINE: Portland public meeting on NMFS whale plan set for Oct. 5

September 30, 2022 — An in-person public scoping meeting on proposed changes to the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan is scheduled for Portland, Maine, on Oct. 5 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., according to the National Marine Fisheries Service.

The event will “collect public input on modifications to the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan to reduce the risk of death and serious injury caused by U.S. commercial fishing gear to endangered North Atlantic right whales in compliance with the mandates of the Marine Mammal Protection Act,” the agency said in an announcement Thursday morning.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

Safety board urges thorough inspections nearly 2 years after Emmy Rose capsized Avatar photo

September 15, 2022 — A fishing vessel that sank in New England, resulting in the loss of all four fishermen, likely capsized because of poor drainage of seawater from the rear deck and hatches that weren’t watertight, investigators said.

The National Transportation Safety Board called Tuesday for stepped up inspections and renewed its call for personal locator beacons for each crew member. The agency first made that recommendation after the loss of the cargo vessel El Faro and 33 sailors in 2015.

NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy urged fishing boat operators to purchase the individual radio beacons for crew members.

The tragedy unfolded as the Portland-based Emmy Rose was headed to Gloucester, Massachusetts, to offload an estimated 45,000 pounds of fish in November 2020.

A crew member told his girlfriend in a phone call that it was the 82-foot vessel’s biggest catch, and she told investigators that she heard ebullient crewmembers laughing and enjoying themselves in the background.

Read the full article at Bangor Daily News

MAINE: Portland restaurant acknowledges misinformation about lobster sales

September 14, 2022 — A Portland seafood restaurant and several national companies are correcting misinformation circulating in the wake of the announcement by Seafood Watch that it was red-listing American lobster because of the risk lobster gear poses to endangered North Atlantic right whales.

Shortly after the announcement, national news outlets reported that meal kit delivery services Blue Apron and Hello Fresh pulled lobster from their menus. Calls to boycott those companies began circulating on social media in response to the red-listing by Seafood Watch, a seafood sustainability project of the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California.

However, a spokesperson for Blue Apron says the company did not pull lobster from its meal kits because of the red-listing.

“The lobster on (Blue Apron’s) menu was a limited seasonal box that was no longer available for purchase prior to the report,” the spokesperson said in an email Tuesday. “It was not removed as a response to the red-listing.”

Read the full article at Sun Journal

Maine lobstermen, politicians rally in protest of fishing restrictions and boycott

September 12, 2022 — Maine lobstermen and their elected leaders are fighting back over two setbacks this week — one in court and one in the marketplace — that could threaten their livelihood.

At a rally in Portland on Friday, they protested a federal judge’s ruling allowing the National Marine Fisheries Service, a branch of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) to impose limits on where and how lobstermen fish in order to protect endangered North Atlantic Right Whales.

Gov. Janet Mills said, “Regulations that are not based on sound science, not proven fact, and will often pose a risk of devastating Maine’s lobster industry! These guys are fed up. I’m fed up. We’re all fed up!”

The rally was also protesting Seafood Watch, a California-based sustainable seafood advocacy group now advising food distributors and restaurants to boycott Maine lobster.

Read the full article at WABI

MAINE: Portland Fish Exchange gets more financial aid; deadline nears for management proposals

August 17, 2022 — Transitioning into a much more prosperous period in July and beyond, fish exchange officials have expressed optimism about increased landings and buyers after what was a particularly slow period in May and June.

An upward trend is a good sign, especially on top of the potential for an outside entity to come in and help run the business, although for now, the exchange is still seeking assistance to handle lingering financial struggles.

The exchange requested a $240,000 bailout earlier this year and received $80,000 from the pier authority in June.

Authority members OK’d another $80,000 on Aug. 8 to help pay down the exchange’s line of credit, currently more than $160,000, used to keep the business afloat during the winter.

“Since there’s been revenue, we want to beat that (credit line) down as much as we can as fast as we can,” exchange President Rob Odlin, an ex-officio member of the pier authority, said at the meeting.

Read the full article at the Portland Phoenix

Ships must slow down more often to save whales, feds say

July 29, 2022 — Vessels off the East Coast must slow down more often to help save a vanishing species of whale from extinction, the federal government said Friday.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration made the announcement via new proposed rules designed to prevent ships colliding with North Atlantic right whales. Vessel strikes and entanglement in fishing gear are the two biggest threats to the giant animals, which number less than 340 and are falling in population.

Efforts to save the whales have long focused on fishing gear, especially that used by East Coast lobster fishermen. The proposed vessel speed rules signal that the government wants the shipping industry to take more responsibility.

The new rules would expand seasonal slow zones off the East Coast that require mariners to slow down to 10 knots (19 kilometers per hour). They would also require more vessels to comply with the rules by expanding the size classes that must slow down. The rules also state that NOAA would create a framework to implement mandatory speed restrictions when whales are known to be present outside the seasonal slow zones.

The whales were once numerous off the East Coast, but their populations plummeted due to commercial whaling generations ago. Although they’ve been protected under the Endangered Species Act for decades, they’ve been slow to recover.

More than 50 of the whales were struck by ships between spring 1999 and spring 2018, NOAA records state. Scientists have said in recent years that warming ocean temperatures are causing the whales to stray out of protected areas and into shipping lanes in search of food.

Members of New England’s lobster fishing industry have made the case that too many rules designed to save the whales focus on fishing and not on vessel strikes. Some characterized the new vessel speed rules as overdue.

Fishermen are unfairly being held accountable for whale deaths that occur due to vessel strikes, said Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, which is the largest fishing industry association on the East Coast.

Read the full article at ABC