No One Would Take Me Fishing, So I Stowed Away on a Commercial Boat

May 4, 2025 Mid Atlantic, National

Fourteen years old and goggle-eyed with excitement, I was fresh from a farm on the Connecticut side of Long Island Sound, and I’d crept aboard the Hilda, a plodding trawler crusted with spray. Rangy, rugged Jake Brannon, a commercial fisherman who moored the Hilda in a tidal river near our village, was the skipper. Though I was aboard the vessel without his consent, Jake and I weren’t strangers. Most of my experience in saltwater fishing up to then had come because I’d helped him pull lobster pots and beam-trawl nets, tong for quahogs, and handle lines for blackfish, fluke, weakfish, and bluefish. I never thought of such activities as work-like hoeing corn and pitching hay. The sea and fishing fascinated me. Jake’s gift for spinning yarns was partly to blame for my stowing away. more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 09:45

By George Heinold, Captain Jake Brannon, commercial fisherman, commercial fishing boat, dolphin, F/V Hilda, fourteen years old, Montauk, New York’s Long Island, Outdoor Life, stow away, weren’t strangers

Leave a ReplyCancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Ocean Resource Privatization

Articles Posted by Date
May 2025

M T W T F S S

1 2 3 4

5 6 7 8 9 10 11

12 13 14 15 16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24 25

26 27 28 29 30 31

« Apr

May 2025
M	T	W	T	F	S	S
	1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30	31

The New England groundfish debacle (Part III): who or what is at fault? Nils E. Stolpe/FishNet

It took me a while to decide how to most accurately describe the situation that has been visited upon the New England fishing communities that are and since colonial times have been dependent on the groundfish fisheries.

NILS STOLPE: The New England groundfish debacle (Part IV): Is cutting back harvest really the answer?

While it’s a fact that’s hardly ever acknowledged, the assumption in fisheries management is that if the population of a stock of fish isn’t at some arbitrary level, it’s because of too much fishing. Hence the term “overfished.” Hence the mandated knee jerk reaction of the fisheries managers to not enough fish; cut back on fishing. What of other factors? They don’t count. It’s all about fishing, because fishing is all that the managers can control; it’s their Maslow’s Hammer. When it comes to the oceans it seems as if it’s about all that the industry connected mega-foundations that support the anti-fishing ENGOs with hundreds of millions of dollars a year in “donations” are interested in controlling. Read the article here

Recent Posts
- Chief William Saulis: RCMP to use sonar in effort to locate missing Nova Scotia scallop dragger
  
  In a news release Tuesday morning, RCMP say the aerial search would resume, weather permitting, after it was paused on Monday, and an underwater recovery team Read More »
- Jarrett Bay unveils new boat lift
  
  Local and state officials joined Jarrett Bay Boatworks management and team members for a ribbon-cutting ceremony June 11 for all who aided in the purchase and Read More »
- Rescue operation off Castletownbere coast brought seven crewmen ashore from sinking fishing trawler
  
  The dramatic rescue of seven crew members from the Ellie Adhamh fishing trawler last Saturday evening off the coast of Castletownbere in stormy conditions was the Read More »
- Multi-million dollar capelin fishery is a bust for eastern Newfoundland
  
  The Lone Wolf is lying idle at the wharf in Hickman’s Harbour, Trinity Bay. The only sound is the lap of water against hull, the occasional Read More »
- Devon fishing port invited to twin with America’s top port
  
  America’s top fishing port has approached Brixham, which was recently crowned the UK’s port of the year for the second year running, to see if it would Read More »
- More than 400 call for new rules on fish farming in Nova Scotia
  
  More than 400 people from community organizations across Nova Scotia turned out for a rally in Halifax on Thursday to issue a joint call for aquaculture Read More »
- Happy Birthday, Ginny! Maine’s ‘Lobster Lady’ celebrates 103rd birthday
  
  Virginia Oliver, affectionately known as Maine’s “Lobster Lady,” is still lobstering at the age of 103. Virginia, or Ginny as her friends call her, celebrated her Read More »
- Sustainable Shark Alliance register’s to lobby with the sole goal of defeating the Shark Fin Trade Elimination Act
  
  The bill, sponsored by Sen. -Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Del. Gregorio Sablan (D-Northern Mariana Islands), seeks to expand on Congress’s ban on shark finning, in which Read More »
- Lobsterman recounts fire that destroyed boat, forced crew to go overboard
  
  Todd Simmons and Damon Crumett were returning late Tuesday afternoon from hauling traps off Port Clyde when the engine to the 38-foot lobster boat Prestige began Read More »
- Gloucester – Fishermen, scientists to assess stock
  
  The most incendiary divide between groundfishermen and fishing regulators in the past two years has been the discrepancy between what NOAA Fisheries says its stock assessments Read More »
- DFO talks huge offshore Vancouver Island Marine Protected Area
  
  Alice Cheung, Oceans Program Regional Manager for DFO gave a presentation on Canada’s Marine Conservation Target’s initiative, where she addressed the proposed Marine Protected Area (MPA) Read More »
- Gloucester fisherman get shout-out at Gotham Awards
  
  Gloucester and one of its fishermen received a shout-out at the 31st Gotham Awards, the annual New York independent film celebration that serves as a boozy Read More »
- Adak Seeks Fish Processing Plant Operator
  
  Last week, the City of Adak and the Adak Community Development Corporation bought $2 million worth of fish processing equipment at auction. Now, they’re looking for someone Read More »
- ‘I love upholding the tradition’ – 1880 history lives on at Shelburne Dory Shop
  
  Not much has changed since John C. Williams opened his dory shop on Shelburne’s waterfront in 1880. Now part of the Nova Scotia Museum, dories are Read More »
- This sucks – Fisherman loses $12,000 he saved for engagement ring
  
  Matthew Camp, of Lower Township, Cape May County, had a recent run of good days aboard a scallop boat, the F.V. Nancy Elizabeth, and things were Read More »
- One day before Brexit and Breton fishermen fear the worst!
  
  “Cataclysm”, “catastrophe”, “brothel without name” … Breton fishermen are on the warpath with the approach of Brexit, which could deprive them of a large part of Read More »
- $300,000+ of Marijuana Seized ‘Floating off the Shore’ of Florida over 27 Days
  
  In a span of 27 days, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, in cooperation with the U.S. Coast Guard, recorded the seizure of nearly 400 pounds of Read More »
- 28 quotes, facts and graphs from the new UN global use of shark products report
  
  The United Nations Food and Agriculture organization just released “fisheries and agriculture technical paper number 590, the state of the global market for shark products” Coauthored Read More »
- Managing Our Nations Fisheries 3, May 2013 JOIN THE WEBINAR LIVE JOIN THE WEBINAR LIVE JOIN THE WEBINAR LIVE
  
  Live Streaming – May 7-9, Washington, DC. Conference agenda Details. To Listen to the Conference Join the Webinar click here 2. Enter the Webinar ID – The Read More »
- Newfoundland fishermen get ‘best news’ on northern cod stocks in a generation
  
  It’s a technical, scientific change: the Limit Reference Point, a key part of the assessment of a fish stock’s health, has been revised. Because of a Read More »
- Letter: Dear BOEM
  
  Your project of installing a wind power farm off the coast of Southern Oregon is in total disregard for the environment, economics, and people therein. The vibrations Read More »
- Comments wanted as GOA trawl bycatch reduction program is crafted
  
  Crafting a program to reduce trawl bycatch in Gulf groundfish fisheries has been underway for three years. In October the North Pacific Council will begin piecing Read More »
- Men at work on the Manin on a muggy Monday morning in Newlyn
  
  Hardly a breath of wind to disturb the tranquil waters of Newlyn this morning as the crew of the Ocean Pride struggle to pull the Sapphire II back into Read More »
- U.S. Coast Guard to honor Jonesport teen who drowned saving father in 1972
  
  JONESPORT, Maine — It’s been more than 40 years since Alvin Beal drowned on Oct. 17, 1972, at the age of 17 while rescuing his father Read More »
- FFAW-Unifor President Earle McCurdy – “What kind of second class citizens do they think fish harvesters are?”
  
  No fewer than three ongoing issues highlight the degree of intrusion on traditional fishing grounds, McCurdy said. He said it is “shocking” that the Government of Read More »