State of Maine: Real consequences of whale rules

June 28, 2019 New England

Here we go again. Federal fisheries regulators have been tightening the screws on Maine lobstermen for decades. Now they are planning to take another turn in an effort to reduce “the risk of death or injury” to right whales by 60 percent. In the late 1990s, a trap limit was introduced in the fishery for the first time. It was controversial on the coast, though many lobstermen were willing to go along. The initial limit was set at 1,200, which even the fishermen said was too high, but anything lower was likely to fail in a skeptical Legislature. Shortly after the passage of that,,,By Jill Goldthwait >click to read<09:57

By Jill Goldthwait, EDITORIAL, State of Maine, whale rules

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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

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