Saving Seafood

As climate change sends fish to colder waters, some boats follow

December 14, 2018 — Flipping through his captain’s log, Larry Colangelo looks at the water temperatures off Atlantic City’s coast this past summer. Unusually warm 70- and 80-degree days are jotted down inside the record-keeping book he’s had for nearly two decades.

For $800 a day, he takes tourists and professional anglers alike onto his 31-foot ship. But in recent years, he said, certain fish have become more challenging to catch and keep.

Climate change and outdated regulations are partially to blame, researchers say, and it’s affecting some local fishermen in drastic ways.

“I only know what I see, and what I see is that the water definitely seems to be warmer… We have to work a little harder now,” said Colangelo, who owns a charter boat docked at Kammerman’s Marina in Atlantic City.

A November report in the ICES Journal of Marine Science looked at how fishermen are reacting to the migration of fish north as the ocean’s temperature gradually increases. It reports dramatic shifts in the distances large, commercial Atlantic Coast fishing operations have been traveling over the past 20 years.

But for some commercial fishers in South Jersey, it’s been business as usual.

Dotted with outdoor seafood restaurants, Cape May’s commercial fishing industry brought in $85 million in 2016. The city boasts one of the largest local fishing markets in the country.

Jeff Reichle, president of Lunds Fisheries in Cape May, said his 19-boat fleet has been buying permits off North Carolina and Virginia for decades.

In recent years, he said he’s noticed more summer flounder and sea bass near Connecticut and Massachusetts, but said his boats continue to travel along the entire coast both to maximize the number of fish caught and due to higher quotas in Virginia and North Carolina.

“You follow the fish where they go,” Reichle said. “This is why boats float and have propellers.”

Read the full story at the Press of Atlantic City

 

Virginia Beach business owners rush to fight Trump administration’s approval of seismic testing

December 7, 2018 — When the Trump administration OK’d seismic testing along the Atlantic coast to explore the possibilities of offshore drilling, business owners in Virginia’s largest city condemned the approval and scrambled to plan how to oppose it.

The exploration carries risks, such as damage to marine life and Virginia’s coasts, and could threaten the tourism and fishing industries, the port of Hampton Roads and even the military, opponents here said.

Laura Habr is co-owner of Croc’s 19th Street Bistro in the ViBe District and a founding board member of the Business Alliance for Protecting the Atlantic Coast, an organization that represents roughly 43,000 businesses and 500,000 commercial fishing families from Maine to Florida.

For her, the next several days will be filled with meetings and conference calls, where a community on high alert will work to decide how to push back against the decision.

Read the full story at The Virginia-Pilot

 

Virginia conservationists blast approval of seismic testing for oil, gas in Atlantic

December 4, 2018 — Virginia conservationists are blasting the Trump administration’s decision to reverse course and approve seismic air gun surveys along the Atlantic coast to search for buried oil and gas reserves.

The groups cite widespread public opposition to seismic blasting and offshore drilling, as well as the harm posed to marine life and coastal economies that rely on healthy waters and wetlands.

“This action flies in the face of massive opposition to offshore drilling and exploration from over 90 percent of coastal municipalities in the proposed blast zone,” said Diane Hoskins, campaign director at the D.C.-based advocacy group Oceana. “President (Donald) Trump is essentially giving these companies permission to harass, harm and possibly even kill marine life.”

“Offshore drilling in our region would pose far too many risks to the health of coastal waters and the Chesapeake Bay, fishing, aquaculture, tourism and all jobs that depend on clean water,” said Lisa Feldt, vice president for environmental protection and restoration at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. “We need to run away from offshore drilling, not move towards it.”

Read the full story at the Daily Press

Maryland oyster restoration project remains stalled by lack of federal funds

November 29, 2018 — Oyster restoration work in Maryland’s Tred Avon River appears likely to remain on hold for at least another year, as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers still has no funding allotted through next September for reef construction in the Chesapeake Bay.

Restoration work in the Eastern Shore river began in 2015 and has so far relied overwhelmingly on federal funds. The Trump administration did not request funding for the project in its budget proposal for fiscal year 2019, but the Corps’ Baltimore District did ask for support through discretionary funds authorized by Congress.

While the Corps decided to provide $13 million in additional funding for various projects in the Bay region, including the use of dredged material to restore two vanishing Bay islands, it did not give the Baltimore District money to continue work in the Tred Avon.

“The District is certainly committed to continuing the program,” said Sarah Lazo, spokeswoman for the Baltimore District. But until funding becomes available, she said, it can’t go forward.

It’s not clear whether the oyster restoration funding request was denied by Corps headquarters or by the White House Office of Management and Budget, which has final say on the Corps’ workplan for spending its discretionary funds. Corps headquarters provided no explanation for why District funding requests were not included in its workplans.

Since 2015, the Corps and its state, federal and nonprofit partners have completed the initial restoration of nearly 81 acres of river bottom in the Tred Avon, at a combined cost of $4.6 million. They have planted a total of 380 million hatchery-spawned seed oysters on reefs that are protected from harvest.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

Blockages gone, fish back in post-Sandy projects in Mass., 5 other states

November 26, 2018 — Billions of dollars have been spent on the recovery from Superstorm Sandy to help people get their lives back together, but a little-noticed portion of that effort is quietly helping another population along the shoreline: fish that need to migrate from coastal rivers out to the sea and back.

After the 2012 storm, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spent nearly $11 million on a series of projects to remove dams and other blockages from coastal waters in six states, partnering with local environmental groups. Fish species that were scarce or entirely absent from those waterways for years soon began showing up again.

The so-called “aquatic connectivity” projects in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland and Virginia were part of a $105 million effort not only to fix what was damaged by Sandy, but also to improve environmental conditions in places where recreational benefits could help tourism and the economy, as well. While the storm did its worst damage in New York and New Jersey, its effects were felt in many states along the East Coast.

“The idea was not only to do good things for fish and wildlife, but to provide community benefits and make communities more resilient,” said Rick Bennett, a scientist with the Fish and Wildlife Service in Massachusetts. “By removing dams, you also reduce flooding, especially upstream.”

Aquatic species benefiting from the work include the Eastern Brook trout, sea run brown trout, sea lamprey, American eel and river herring.

One of the first and most successful projects happened in Spring Lake, New Jersey’s Wreck Pond. For years, the conflicting goals of protecting the environment and some of the New Jersey shore’s priciest real estate from storms have bedeviled the pond.

Storms sometimes open a channel between the 48-acre tidal pond and the ocean, but governments keep sealing it shut to protect homes from flooding. The result was poor water quality and much narrower access to the ocean, which hurts fish that travel from ocean to pond to breed.

The American Littoral Society oversaw construction of a concrete culvert between the pond and the ocean to make it easier for fish, including herring, to reach the sea. In addition to letting fish in and out more easily, the culvert can be opened or closed as needed during storms to control flooding.

It succeeded at both goals, said Tim Dillingham, the group’s executive director.

“The restoration of connectivity to allow fish to return and spawn has been a great success,” he said. “We’re seeing fish come back in numbers we hadn’t seen before. And it has also added to the resiliency of the area during storms, by adding capacity to deal with flooding.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at Boston.com

COOKE SEAFOOD USA INVESTS IN ITS SUFFOLK, VIRGINIA FACILITY

November 16, 2018 — The following was released by Cooke Seafood:

Cooke Seafood USA has announced additional capabilities, investments, and hires at its Wanchese Fish Company operation located in Suffolk, Virgina. The Wanchese Fish Company facility in Suffolk was purchased by Cooke Seafood USA in 2015 and has quickly become an important asset to the overall company and is providing new growth opportunities with expanded corporate roles and production responsibilities.

Over the next three years, Cooke plans to hire approximately 70 new employees at the Suffolk facility. These new positions include the establishment of the new corporate operations for Cooke Seafood USA and production jobs for new retail seafood production lines. These expansions will include over $2,800,000 in investment at the Suffolk, Virginia location.

“We are excited to further expand our operations here in Suffolk as we solidify our position as a global seafood leader. This new investment will enhance our current capabilities but also provide us with the opportunity for future growth,” said Cooke Seafood USA CEO Ross Butler. He continued, “We would also like to thank the Commonwealth of Virginia and City of Suffolk for its positive business environment that encourages investment.”

Since its acquisition by Cooke Inc. in 2015, Wanchese Fish Company has invested millions of dollars upgrading its facility in Suffolk to be able to process an increased amount of seafood coming into the facility from a variety of the Cooke family of companies around the world. As a result, the company continues to increase its exported products through the Port of Virginia and increased imports into the Port of Virginia from Cooke’s other South American businesses

“Cooke’s investment in Wanchese and in Suffolk generates a tremendous amount of pride for our entire community,” added Mayor Linda T. Johnson. “It is wonderful to see the Suffolk facility and the people employed there become such a valuable asset to Cooke Seafood’s global footprint.”

Cooke Inc. is a family-owned, vertically integrated sea farming and wild fishery corporation. Cooke’s head office is in Blacks Harbour, New Brunswick, Canada, and ships fresh, sustainable seafood products to 65 countries from divisions such as The Wanchese Fish Company. The company has been recognized for its loyalty to employees – who are deeply valued for their hard work and determination. Seafood Source named Cooke as the top-ranked company on the 2018 list of Top Seafood Suppliers in North America, having earned the spot two years in a row. More information can be found at www.cookeseafood.com.

New study: Chesapeake oyster decline not due to overfishing

November 14, 2018 — Warmer winters, rather than overharvesting, caused the steep decline of oysters and other commercially valuable shellfish in the Chesapeake Bay and elsewhere along the Atlantic coast, according to a controversial new study that’s getting pushback from some scientists.

The study, which appeared in Marine Fisheries Review, a quarterly journal of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, says that multi-year stretches of mild temperatures in normally weather months altered the food web in coastal waters. That impaired the growth and reproduction of oysters, quahogs, soft-shell clams and scallops, scientists said. It also led to increased predation on shellfish larvae and outbreaks of diseases.

“The temperatures got warm and that changed the whole environment, so [the oyster diseases] MSX and Dermo could flourish,” said Clyde MacKenzie, Jr., the study’s lead author and a longtime researcher at NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center at Sandy Hook, NJ. Mitchell Tarnowski, who runs the annual fall oyster survey for Maryland’s Department of Natural Resources, is the co-author.

The paper’s conclusions, especially its dismissal of overfishing as a factor in Chesapeake oyster declines, came under fire from scientists with the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science and Chesapeake Bay Foundation. Its publication comes as the DNR prepares to release a first-ever stock assessment of the oyster population in the Upper Chesapeake, including an evaluation of whether current harvest levels are sustainable.

The scientific consensus has long been that overharvesting, disease and habitat loss over the decades devastated the Bay’s oyster population, with some estimates putting it in recent years at 1 percent or less of historic levels of abundance. From an annual commercial harvest of nearly 17 million bushels in 1880, landings have trended downward, hitting historic lows in 2003-04 of just 50,000 bushels. The harvest has rebounded some since then, though much of the gain has come via private oyster farming, especially in Virginia.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

 

NOAA drafts habitat maps for wind lease zones

November 1, 2018 — After years of mapping, NOAA, WHOI, UMass Dartmouth, and Howard Marine Research Laboratory researchers have created bottom, or benthic, habitat maps for the eight Wind Energy Areas (WEAs) in the Northeast. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management funded the mapping project, which included areas in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina. A report from the habitat-mapping project titled “Habitat Mapping and Assessment of Northeast Wind Energy Areas” describes concerns with disturbing benthic environment in the process of assembling wind turbines. “Topics range from bottom water temperatures, bottom topography and features, types of sediments and ocean currents,” a NOAA release states, “to animals that live in and on top of the sediments and in the water column in that area either seasonally or year-round.”

Some of the details given in the release covered aspects of Massachusetts wind farm sites.

Read the full story at the Martha’s Vineyard Times

Omega Protein disputes article ‘attacking’ menhaden fishing

October 22, 2018 — US menhaden harvester Omega Protein has disputed the accuracy of recent statements made by a conservation group that wants to end commercial fishing of the species.

Paul Eidman of the group Menhaden Defenders recently wrote an essay, “Trouble comes to town”,  describing a fishing trip that an Omega vessel recently took to New Jersey and New York waters. That trip, Eidman asserted, harvested menhaden that otherwise would have been consumed by whales.

“This event sparked an outpouring of renewed interest in menhaden, and now local folks want to stop the harvest completely since Omega Protein is removing all of the whales’ food from the area,” Eidman wrote.

The company wrote in a Oct. 18 press release that all of its fishing, including the recent trip up north from its usual more southerly fishing grounds, complies with state and federal regulations and that Eidman’s piece got “key facts wrong”.

A limit on menhaden fishing was established by the Atlantic States Fisheries Management Council and Omega is in compliance with this limit, the company, which is owned by Canada’s Cooke Aquaculture, said.

“This limit ensures that the menhaden fishery is not taking a harmful amount of fish from whales’ diets. Last year, an analysis  using data from the 2017 Atlantic menhaden stock assessment found that current management leaves 92% of menhaden in the water to fulfill their role in the ecosystem,” the company said.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Harris Teeter shoppers may have bought mislabeled and ‘distressed’ crabmeat for years

October 19, 2018 — Harris Teeter is contacting members of its VIC loyalty-card program this week to offer refunds involving crab meat sold between 2010 and 2015.

The crab, supplied by a Virginia company called Casey’s Seafood, is part of a massive federal fraud case over the mislabeling of seafood.

The Washington Post reported Sept. 26 that Casey’s owner James Casey, 74, pleaded guilty in September to relabeling and reselling “distressed” crab meat from other countries as fresh crab meat from the Chesapeake Bay. Distressed crab meat is crab that was recalled, returned or out of date. Casey will be sentenced in January and is facing up to five years in prison, according to the Post.

The charges involved more than 360,000 pounds of crab sold between 2012 and 2015, although prosecutors believe the crab meat switch may have dated to as early as 2010, the Post reported.

The crab meat was valued at millions of dollars, and was sold to stores and restaurants in multiple Southeastern states, including North and South Carolina, Florida, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, the District of Columbia and Tennessee, according to the Associated Press.

Checks by The Observer of other supermarket chains, including Publix, Food Lion, Bi Lo, Earth Fare and Whole Foods, didn’t find other companies in North Carolina involved in the sales of the Casey’s crab meat.

Multiple news reports about the case say that federal agents were notified by a tip and did DNA tests on samples of the product in several states, including North Carolina.

Danna Robinson, communications manager for Harris Teeter, wouldn’t say how many customers were contacted or how much it is providing in refunds.

Read the full story at The Charlotte Observer