Trawling Archives - Page 2 of 4

Hearing on Cape Cod for rules to limit herring trawlers

June 19, 2018 — For over 15 years, Cape and other small-boat fishermen in the Northeast have lobbied against the large vessels of the herring fleet, saying they are too efficient at catching fish. They claim these vessels remove such large amounts of herring from an area that there is nothing left to attract cod, striped bass, bluefish, tuna and other species that eat herring close enough to shore for local fishermen to catch them.

These concerns resulted in a proposed regulation from the New England Fishery Management Council, known as Amendment 8 to the herring fishery management plan, which bans these vessels from inshore waters. A public hearing on the amendment is scheduled Tuesday in Chatham.

Right now, these vessels of around 120-150 feet in length, frequently towing huge nets between two ships, can come within 3 miles of the Cape coastline. Fishermen and the public will have a number of options to comment on, including herring trawler bans that extend from 6 to 50 miles from shore. A few months ago, local fishermen and environmental groups were unsure how far offshore they wanted to push large herring trawlers, but recent preliminary reports indicating the herring stock may be in trouble have united many in the fishing and environmental community to press for the maximum: a 50-mile buffer zone. They say this measure not only helps them catch fish in their traditional fishing grounds, but also helps the herring stock recover.

“If you had a bigger zone of 50 miles, you would encompass spawning sites that herring use,” said Peter Baker, director of U.S. Oceans, Northeast, for The Pew Charitable Trusts. “The benefit to the herring fishery is a place, a pretty huge one, where they could live without being chased down by industrial fishing trawlers, the most efficient fishing vessel around.”

A second component of the hearing, hosted by the New England Fishery Management Council, would allow for changes in the annual allowed catch dependent on how the stocks are doing.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen’s Alliance to Host Herring Trawler Forum

June 4, 2018 — Members of the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen’s Alliance will meet with federal fisheries managers later this month to discuss the impact of big mid-water trawls working of the Cape’s coast.

After decades of lamenting the trawlers’ effect on local fishing, the fishermen will be able to testify in front of managers about how the local ecosystem has suffered from the prolonged presence of the industrial-scaled boats.

They will be advocating for a buffer zone off the coast that not only protects ocean herring, but also river herring and other forage fish that are caught and discarded as bycatch.

Public officials from every Cape town, Barnstable County, and the region’s State House delegation all support a year-round buffer, as do many environmental, scientific and civic organizations.

“Of all the issues facing us as a fishing community, protecting herring and forage fish might be the most important step we could take to rebuild our fishery and revitalize our waters,” said John Pappalardo, CEO of the Fishermen’s Alliance.

“A strong call to action would be an important message for federal managers to hear.”

Read the full story at CapeCod.com

In Their Own Words: Sablefish Gear Switching in the West Coast Trawl Quota Program

October 23, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The West Coast trawl catch shares program (individual fishing quota/IFQ program) was implemented in 2011 for the groundfish fishery — but it’s not without its problems. One provision rose to the top during the current five-year review as the most controversial: gear switching.

Sablefish is the most valuable groundfish, on a per-pound basis, on the West Coast. It is often graded on quality and at least five different sizes. Most sablefish is sold to Japan and a few other countries, but domestic markets have been in expanding for a few years. Whereas most other groundfish species have ex-vessel prices of cents per pound, sablefish frequently goes for dollars per pound. Better quality fish, i.e., those that are caught by longline or pots, typically fetch higher prices.

On the West Coast, sablefish — or blackcod — are caught in a mixed species fishery by trawl and are targeted by longline and pots. The species is an important component of the trawl “deepwater complex” that includes Dover sole, thornyhead rockfish and sablefish. Dover sole is a low price/high-volume species for trawlers but access may be limited if a trawler has insufficient sablefish quota.

Proponents of the trawl catch shares program in the late 2000s included an option to be able to switch gears to catch sablefish. That is, a trawler could use any legal groundfish gear, including pots and longline, to catch the valuable species if they so desired. Some fishermen say this was intended to allow trawlers to catch smaller amounts of sablefish that may be leftover from harvesting their deepwater complex. Other fishermen say it was intended to allow a switch to what some claim is an environmentally cleaner harvesting method. Because a single provision may have multiple purposes, both may be correct.

Regardless, the effect of the provision was that some fixed-gear vessels purchased trawl permits and quota and are now harvesting sablefish. Sablefish quota prices increased to the point where some trawlers could not afford to buy or lease it on the open market in order to access their Dover sole quota. Others may have simply chosen not to buy or lease the quota. A limited supply of sablefish quota overall may also have been the culprit for some trawlers not being able to access their Dover sole. In some years, the quota went quickly and less than five percent was available by year’s end. At the same time, fixed-gear vessels have made significant investments in gear and equipment to access trawl sablefish quota. Processors are concerned blackcod will continue to act as a choke species, limiting access to the volumes of groundfish necessary to keep processing crews working.

But there’s another wrinkle. Sablefish quota is available in two distributions: north or south of 36 degrees N. Latitude — near Point Conception in southern California. A handful of fixed-gear vessels using trawl quota have traveled from Oregon and Washington to fish the southern area. Southern California fixed-gear fishermen found themselves with new entrants on their traditional fishing grounds.

The Pacific Fishery Management Council in September took the first step at making the gear-switching provision work for everyone. One of the proposals includes eliminating the management line at 36 degrees north latitude, thereby creating one coastwide pool of quota. The Council also proposed mitigation measures to limit gear switching.

Seafood News talked with four people representing the major factions concerned about the sablefish gear-switching provision:

Jeff Lackey, a trawl vessel manager from Newport, Ore.
Michele Longo Eder, whose family members are fixed gear fishermen who have made investments in the trawl program
Mike Okoniewski, who works for a processor that depends on trawl groundfish
Chris Hoeflinger, representing Southern California traditional fixed-gear fishermen

Seafood News will run their perspectives, in their own words, of the gear-switching issue this week. The Pacific Fishery Management Council will be wrestling with this issue over the coming months.

— Susan Chambers

In his own words: Jeff Lackey, trawl vessel manager from Newport, Ore.:

The trawl catch shares program that began in 2011 has some positive elements. However, it has also led to operational difficulties that have significantly decreased catch for bottom trawlers.

The unintended consequence of the catch shares program was that a significant fixed-gear fishery for sablefish sprang up almost literally overnight within the trawl fishery. Hundreds of thousands of pounds of sablefish quota a year were going to fixed gear vessels and then coming to the dock without the associated catch of other groundfish species.

So by 2016, five years later, the species that trawl catch of sablefish helps get to the dock had seen their coastwide annual catch drop by about a third compared to pre-catch shares capacity. That’s roughly 14 million pounds a year in lost catch and corresponding seafood available to the consumer. This translates to dozens of lost full time jobs in the processing sector alone, as well as dozens of trawl vessels that left the fishery.

In 2011, some trawlers left the fishery altogether and some switched to the shrimp fishery rather than compete with fixed gear boats that were buying trawl permits and entering the trawl individual fishing quota (IFQ) fishery. It is difficult to generalize the business plan of each individual trawl vessel as each has a different set of circumstances, such as the amount of quota they have and the other fisheries they participate in.

However, when you match the individual stories of difficulty in executing a viable fishery given sablefish limitations with the overall data of a diminished fishery, a clear picture emerges. The lost yearly bottom trawl catch is about what one would expect for the amount of sablefish that has been lost from the trawl fishery. To return the fishery to pre-IFQ program catch levels and allow the stability the program affords to make even more gains, the coastwide sablefish quota allocated to the trawl IFQ program would need to be caught by trawl vessels to facilitate the catch of other groundfish species.

This story originally appeared on Seafood News, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission

NOAA Fisheries Removes the Northern and Southern Windowpane Flounder AMs for all Trawl Vessels

August 31, 2017 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

Effective tomorrow, September 1, 2017, until February 28, 2018, non-groundfish trawl vessels fishing with a codend mesh size of 5 inches or greater are no longer required to use approved selective trawl gear (haddock separator trawl, rope separator trawl, or Ruhle trawl) in the large southern windowpane flounder Accountability Measure (AM) areas. For more information, read the permit holder bulletin and the emergency rule as filed in the Federal Register.

Through a previous action, groundfish vessels may also fish in the AM areas without selective gear, effective September 1 2017 through April 30, 2018. While we were able to remove the accountability measures for the groundfish vessels through existing regulatory processes, an emergency rule was required to remove the accountability measures for non-groundfish trawl vessels. This emergency rule is intended to minimize economic harm to the fluke and scup fisheries.

Electrofishing: Saviour of the sea or fracking of the oceans?

August 17, 2017 — The Netherlands is testing a new technique to fish – using electric currents. Electrofishing is controversial and is banned by the EU, but can be used on an experimental basis. Critics argue it is cruel because it breaks the backs of some larger cod. But advocates say it is less damaging for the environment than traditional beam trawling. James Clayton reports for BBC Newsnight.

Watch the video from BBC Newsnight on YouTube

Stony Brook University Wins NOAA Research Grant

August 8, 2017 — Stony Brook University has received a nearly $170,000 grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to support marine science and fisheries research. The money will be used to improve management of protected species of fish and marine mammals within what is called the Northeast United States Large Marine Ecosystem.

The grant will support the use of state-of-the-art climate models to develop tools to assist the commercial fishing industry in reducing bycatch of marine mammals and fish in long-line and midwater trawl fisheries, according to a statement by Lesley Thorne, a Stony Brook University assistant professor. This, Dr. Thorne said, will increase the efficiency and profitability of marine resources.

Read the full story at the East Hampton Star

New Study Puts Hard Numbers on Impacts of Bottom Trawling

July 24, 2017 — Roughly a fifth of all fish eaten globally are caught using nets towed along the bottom of the ocean. There’s long been concern that this method – known as trawling – destroys or severely damages the ecosystems where it’s used. Now, a new meta-analysis of the science available on this topic offers some quantification of the impacts of different type of trawls.

Previous studies have found that the mud plumes from some trawls can be seen from space, and that “bottom trawling related to commercial fisheries leaves a greater physical footprint on the seafloor than the combined effects of all other human activities, including scientific research, fossil fuel recovery and waste disposal.”

While it is undeniable that dragging metal gear across the seafloor impacts the ecosystems there, a new analysis of seventy different studies finds that not all trawls are equal, and that some do significantly less damage than others.

In particular, otter trawls – the type most commonly used in New England – have the least impact of the four types compared. Otter trawls scrape, on average, just under an inch off the seafloor and remove about six percent of the animals living there. In contrast, hydraulic dredges squirt water into the sediment to release buried animals, reaching about six inches into the sea floor and removing more than forty percent of animals.

Read the full story at WCAI

University of Washington: Bottom-trawling techniques leave different traces on the seabed

July 18, 2017 — The following is excerpted from an article published yesterday by the University of Washington:

Fishing fleets around the world rely on nets towed along the bottom to capture fish. Roughly one-fifth of the fish eaten globally are caught by this method, known as bottom trawling, which has been criticized for its effects on the marine environment.

An international group has taken a close look at how different types of bottom trawling affect the seabed. It finds that all trawling is not created equal — the most benign type removes 6 percent of the animal and plant life on the seabed each time the net passes, while most other methods remove closer to a third. A University of Washington professor is among the main authors on the study, led by Bangor University in the U.K. and published July 17 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The meta-analysis looks at 70 previous studies of bottom trawling, most in the Eastern U.S. and Western Europe. It looks across those studies to compare the effects on the seabed of four techniques: otter trawling, a common method that uses two “doors” towed vertically in the water or along the bottom to hold the net open; beam trawls, which hold the net open with a heavy metal beam; towed dredges, which drag a flat or toothed metal bar directly along the seafloor; and hydraulic dredges, which use water to loosen the seabed and collect animals that live in the sediment.

“We found that otter trawls penetrated the seabed 2.4 cm (0.94 inches) on average and caused the least amount of depletion of marine organisms, removing 6 percent of biota per trawl pass on the seabed,” first author Jan Geert Hiddink at Bangor University said in a statement. “In contrast, we found that hydraulic dredges penetrated the seabed 16.1 cm (6.3 inches) on average and caused the greatest depletion, removing 41 percent of the biota per fishing pass.”

Depending on the type of fishing gear, penetration depth and environmental variables such as water depth and sediment composition, it took from 1.9 to 6.4 years for the seabed biota, or marine plants and animals, to recover.

“These findings fill an essential science gap that will inform policy and management strategies for sustainable fishing practices by enabling us to evaluate the trade-off between fish production for food, and the environmental cost of different harvesting techniques,” said Ray Hilborn, a UW fisheries professor and one of four co-authors who designed the study.

“There’s a common perception that you trawl the bottom and the ecosystem is destroyed,” Hilborn said. “This study shows that the most common kind of trawling, otter trawling, does not destroy the marine ecosystem, and places that are trawled once a year really won’t be very different from places that are not trawled at all.”

Read the full report here

NORTH CAROLINA: Public comment to be taken on petition impacting shrimp trawling

January 16, 2017 — A meeting set for this week will put the issue of resource protection versus gear restrictions on the shrimping industry up for debate.

The five advisory committees to the North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission will meet jointly on Jan. 17 at the New Bern Riverfront Convention Center to receive public comment on a petition for rulemaking that would, if adopted, impact shrimp trawl fishing in most North Carolina waters.

The North Carolina Wildlife Federation submitted the petition on Nov. 2, and the commission has 120 days from that date to grant or deny the request that calls for stricter regulations for shrimp trawling and the shrimp season as a means to better protect habitat for juvenile finfish.

The petition asks the commission to designate all coastal fishing waters not already designated as nursery areas as special secondary nursery areas, including the ocean out to three miles. It also calls for establishing clear criteria for the opening of shrimp season and defining the type of gear and how and when gear may be used in special secondary nursery areas (SSNAs) during shrimp season.

Jerry Schill, president of the North Carolina Fisheries Association, a nonprofit organization for the state’s commercial fishing industry, said the restrictions sought through the petition would have severe impacts on the state’s shrimping industry.

NORTH CAROLINA: Opponents line up in showdown over limits to shrimp trawling

January 12, 2017 — Hyde County Commissioners, along with local stakeholders and seafood advocates, have issued strong opposition to proposed rules that would result in major changes to the state’s commercial trawling industry. They say the restrictions could ultimately end the state’s access shrimp.

A petition for the changes was submitted to the North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission on Nov. 2 by The North Carolina Wildlife Federation. It asks the state to designate coastal fishing waters in the sounds and 3 miles into the ocean as primary nursery areas for various fisheries.

The petition was discussed at the commission’s November meeting. On Jan. 17, five joint advisory committees will meet and hear public comment on the issue in New Bern. Then, the commission will review comments and take action at its February meeting.

Other rule changes outlined in the 99-page NCWF petition are: Limiting shrimp trawling to three days a week; limiting trawling to daytime only; limiting the total head rope (the span of the nets) to 90 feet; establishing 45-minute tow times; define type of gear and how it can be used in special secondary nursery areas;and opening the season based on a 60 shrimp per pound.

Last week, Hyde County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution opposing the rules. Dare County and its towns are also taking up resolutions. Groups such as North Carolina Catch and the North Carolina Fisheries Association have taken stands against the petition and an individual effort has started a counter-petition.

The Hyde resolution says that hundreds of local businesses and families depend on catches from trawlers. Shrimp catches represent paychecks for the captain, crew and seafood industry, as well as products to market to visitors. The affects range across the 20 coastal North Carolina counties that boast a commercial fishing history.

“This petition would obviously cripple the state’s shrimp fishery, which is the second most valuable in our state and supports a number of other valuable industries such as gear design and manufacture, boat building and repair, refrigeration and repair, mechanical engineering, marine propulsion dealers, fuel distribution, seafood processing and a vibrant restaurant industry,” said Lauren Salter of Williston.

Salter serves on the board of directors for North Carolina Catch, a statewide group that works with several localized fishing partnerships to educate consumers about the importance of buying local seafood.

“This goes beyond shrimping,” said Salter, who is also the daughter of a down-east commercial fisherman. “If special interest groups continue to successfully limit access to our seafood by skillfully sidestepping the established fisheries management process, no seafood will be safe.”

Read the full story at The Outer Banks Voice