Saving Seafood

Tracking Great White Sharks off Cape Cod by Land, by Air, by Sea

August 23, 2016 — Two days a week, from June through October, the Aleutian leaves the dock of the Chatham Bars Inn in Chatham, Massachusetts, in search of great white sharks.

Marine scientist Greg Skomal of the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries is usually on board armed with two poles: one for filming the elusive predators and another for placing acoustic tags. He’s joined by a small crew of researchers and by Atlantic White Shark Conservancy executive director and co-founder Cynthia Wigren.

“The ultimate goal, really, is to learn as much as we can about the species to be able to protect it and support the conservation of white sharks,” said Wigren.

Read the full story at ABC News

OCEARCH Tags and Releases Great White Shark Pups For The First Time Off Long Island

August 22, 2016 — MONTAUK, N.Y. — Meet Montauk and Hudson, two young-of-the-year great white sharks just tagged and released off Montauk, NY by OCEARCH and its collaborative team of multi-disciplined scientists.

“This is an exciting marine conservation event right here in our New York seascape,” said Jon Forrest Dohlin, Director of WCS’s New York Aquarium.

“We’ve learned a lot about the adult sharks in recent years, but the pups are still a complete mystery,” said Tobey Curtis, lead scientist and Fisheries Manager at NOAA Fisheries. “Tagging these baby white sharks will help us better understand how essential Long Island waters are for their survival.”

Montauk, a 50-pound, 4-foot female white shark, and Hudson, a 67-pound, 5-foot male white shark, are the first two white sharks tagged by the shark-tagging partnership in New York waters. The tags on these young-of-the-year sharks will allow scientists to track their movements up and down the coast for the next several years.

The team, which includes researchers from WCS, NOAA Fisheries, South Hampton Schools, Florida Atlantic University, New Jersey Institute of Technology, and Stony Brook University, collected blood samples, fin clips, parasites, muscle sample and took measurements of the sharks. Each sample provides baseline data previously unattainable for great white sharks in this initial phase of life.

Read the full release at Marketwired

MASSACHUSETTS: Thanks for all the fish!

August 16, 2016 — It can sometimes be difficult, depending on the choppiness of the waves, for pilot Wayne Davis to spot from his two-seater plane the dark silhouettes of great white sharks swimming off the coast of Chatham during research expeditions with the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy.

But there was no missing a giant school of fish this week as he flew near the Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge.

The conservancy, a non-profit based on Cape Cod, shared a photo Friday taken by Davis from his Citabria earlier in the week of what looks to be hundreds — if not thousands — of menhaden, or forage fish.

The fish are gathered together not far from a lurking great white, forming a shape like a pinpoint on a Google map. The collection of fish creates a striking black dot in the middle of the blue-green Cape waters as though a shadow were cast over the sea.

The conservancy’s nearby boat is dwarfed by the mass of menhaden, which can live to be 12 years old and are known to swim in large schools close to the water’s surface during the spring, summer, and fall, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe

Beware: Sharks are on the rise near East Coast

August 15, 2016 — “There are definitely more sharks in the area,” Paul Sieswerda, former curator of the New York Aquarium in Coney Island, told The Post. A perfect storm of successful shark conservation efforts, less-polluted waters, and warmer ocean temperatures from climate change has made our shores more welcoming to bait fish like menhaden — and the sharks who love them.

“It’s kind of like the menhaden are the wildebeests of the African plains — everything likes eating them and there are more every year,” Sieswerda said.

He said the huge schools of menhaden, a k a bunker, also attract seals, which is a favorite of great white sharks.

Read the full story at the New York Post

Is Dogfish the New Cod in New England?

August 15, 2016 — On a wind-tossed autumn morning off the Cape Cod coast, the aft deck of Doug Feeney’s 36-foot fishing boat, the Noah, is buried beneath a squirming, slimy, shin-deep layer of sharks.

The Noah’s hauler growls under the weight of the 300-hook long line emerging from the froth-tipped Atlantic. The reek of gasoline mingles with salt. A procession of small gray sharks, each pierced neatly through the jaw by a steel hook, materializes from the depths. Feeney, a lean fisherman whose goatee and hoop earrings lend him a vaguely piratical mien, yanks the sharks from the line with the steady rhythm of an assembly-line worker. A drained cup of coffee perches on the dashboard; James Taylor warbles on the radio.

“Twenty-five years ago we’d catch 10,000 pounds of these things every day,” Feeney shouts over the roar of the engines and “Fire and Rain.” “We’d just throw ’em back over the side.”

Like many Chatham fishermen, Feeney is a jack-of-all-trades. He gillnets monkfish in early spring, he trolls for bluefin tuna in late fall. But no species occupies more of his energy than the spiny dogfish, the dachshund-size shark now piling up on the Noah’s deck. Though the word “shark” conjures visions of the toothsome great white, spiny dogfish, the most common shark in the world, bears little resemblance to Jaws. For starters, it rarely grows more than 4 feet long. White freckles dot its slate-colored back and its green eyes glow with an eerie feline light. Stroked head to tail, its skin is almost velvety to the touch.

What Squalus acanthias lacks in fierceness, it makes up for in abundance. From Florida to Maine, populations are flourishing, so much so that the annual quota—the total weight that fishermen are allowed to catch—has increased every year from 2008 to 2015, cresting at a whopping 50 million pounds before dipping to 40 million this year. Such bounty stands in stark contrast to the grim status of Massachusetts’ most iconic fish, the cod, so depleted that quotas have sunk below a meager one million pounds. With the cod industry in a state of collapse, dogfish represent perhaps the best hope for struggling local fishermen. “These guys have been through so many cuts,” says Tobey Curtis, a fisheries policy analyst with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). “When we have success, we want to be able to pay them back.”

Read the full story at Boston Magazine

NMFS Releases Proposed Rule to Establish a Commercial Retention Limit for Blacknose Sharks South of 34° N. Latitude in the Atlantic Region

August 11, 2016 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has announced a proposed rule to the Atlantic Highly Migratory Species Fishery Management Plan that would establish a commercial possession limit of eight blacknose sharks per trip. It would apply to federal Atlantic shark limited access permit holders targeting small coastal sharks (SCS) south of 34˚ N. latitude. If approved, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Coastal Sharks Management Board could take action to apply this to state licensed fishermen as well.

In 2016, commercial fisheries for both blacknose sharks and SCS south of 34˚ N. latitude were closed approximately five months after the opening date of May 29, 2016 because the commercial Atlantic blacknose shark landings were projected to have exceeded 80% of the available quota. The blacknose shark and non-blacknose SCS fisheries south of 34˚ N. latitude are quota-linked under current regulations, meaning if landings from either fishery are projected to exceed 80% of the available commercial quota then the both fisheries will close.

As a result of the early closures, the non-blacknose SCS quota was underutilized in 2016. The purpose of the proposed rule is to maximize the utilization of the non-blacknose SCS quota, while minimizing the mortality and discards of blacknose sharks and other small coastal sharks. Under current regulations, there is no commercial retention limit for blacknose sharks. The preferred alternative would establish a commercial retention limit of eight blacknose sharks per trip for all federal Atlantic shark limited access permit holders. The full range of alternatives considered can be found in the Draft Environmental Assessment and/or proposed rule.

The public comment period is open until September 20, 2016. NMFS will hold a public hearing and conference call for the proposed rule. Written comments, identified by “NOAA-NMFS-2016-0095,” may be submitted electronically via the Federal eRulemaking Portal http://www.regulations.gov.

Shark scientist opposes fin trade ban

August 8, 2016 — On Friday, Dr. Robert E. Hueter, Director of Mote Marine Laboratory’s Center for Shark Research, wrote to Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) in “strong opposition” to S. 3095, The Shark Fin Trade Elimination Act.

“S. 3095 will be ineffective in making a dent in the global problem of shark overfishing,” Dr. Hueter wrote. “Instead, it will punish the wrong people by putting American commercial fishermen, who are fishing for sharks legally and sustainably, out of business.”

Dr. Hueter added that the U.S. has “one of the best systems in the world for shark fisheries management and conservation,” and that S. 3095 would promote wastefulness in the U.S. shark fishery.

Read the full letter here

Fishing regulators tighten rules for removing shark fins

August 3, 2016 — Regulators are tightening restrictions on the last species of shark whose fins can be removed at sea by fishermen in the U.S.

Smooth dogfish are the only sharks from which American fishermen can remove fins at sea. Many other sharks can be hunted, but fins can’t be removed until the sharks are processed on land.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission voted Tuesday to approve a rule that allows fishermen to bring smooth dogfish to land with fins removed, as long as their total retained catch is at least 25 percent smooth dogfish. Right now, they can bring ashore as many as they want.

The rule change better incorporates the Shark Conservation Act of 2010 into management of the dogfish, said the staff with the fisheries commission. The dogfish are harvested from Rhode Island to North Carolina, and are among the many shark species that fishermen bring to land in states from Maine to Texas.

Sharks are also hunted for their meat, but their greatest value is in their fins, which are used to make shark fin soup.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Portland Press Herald

Vote coming on rules about removal of dogfish fins

July 28, 2016 — OLD LYME, Conn. — Interstate fishing regulators will vote on changes to rules that govern removal of fins from some coastal sharks by fishermen.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is considering an amendment that would allow fishermen to bring smooth dogfish to land with fins removed as long as their total retained catch is at least 25 percent smooth dogfish.

Current rules say fishermen can bring ashore as many dogfish with fins removed as they choose. The vote is scheduled for Tuesday.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the New Jersey Herald