Category Archives: Featured
In nearly 50 years as a fisherman Arnold Locker has seen it all – ‘crews will be worse off in 2021 than before they left the EU’
The outcome of the Brexit trade deal has left him and many others bitterly disappointed. Mr Locker, chairman of Locker Trawlers in Whitby, and former chairman of the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations, believes Environment Secretary George Eustice should resign. He says this time the betrayal of fishing communities is worse, because politicians like Mr Eustice, Michael Gove and Prime Minister Boris Johnson “knew exactly what they were doing when they devastated coastal communities.”>click to read< 11:43
One year after the F/V Scandies Rose sinks: Family honors the victims
December 31, 2020 marks one year since a mayday call that changed lives. The F/V Scandies Rose fishing boat issued the call off the coast of Kodiak, during a sinking some crew members would not survive. Family members of a few of the victims said they will commemorate the lives lost at sea Thursday evening at 9:50, the time the mayday call went out. Please >click to read, and watch the video< . 11:49
DFO has a new plan for northern cod stocks. It doesn’t include more fishing
The rebuilding plan, made public with little fanfare on Dec. 21 after years in development, outlines the Department of Fisheries and Ocean’s objectives to boost fish numbers and the management techniques it intends to use to measure any progress starting in 2021. Northern cod numbers have ticked upwards since the 1992 moratorium brought harvesting and processing to a screeching halt. A small stewardship fishery now exists, with 1,865 licence holders allotted a maximum harvest of around 12,000 tonnes of cod in 2020. But 28 years later, stocks remain well below pre-moratorium levels, and in DFO terminology, remain squarely in a “critical zone.” >click to read< 11:15
Coast Guard medevacs an injured fisherman 80 miles northeast of Dutch Harbor, Alaska
An MH-65 Dolphin helicopter crew based out of Air Station Kodiak and deployed aboard Cutter Alex Haley, hoisted the man from the vessel Magnus Martens after he suffered a severe leg injury. He was flown to Cold Bay and placed in the care of awaiting Guardian Flight Alaska personnel for further transport to Anchorage. The crew of Coast Guard Cutter Alex Haley, also based out of Kodiak, received initial notification about the injured man while on patrol in the Bering Sea in the vicinity of Unimak Island. >click to read< 09:09
Brexit: What does the trade deal mean for fisheries? All the Fish related bits in the Brexit deal to read at your leisure: Articles 1-19
Contrary to many dire predictions, we finally have a Brexit trade deal, and with it an agreement on how the UK and EU will manage shared fisheries into the future. The fishing industry has experienced an unusually high profile since the Brexit referendum, but this reached dizzy heights over the last few months of 2020, as disagreements over fishing quotas and access were said to be the final barrier to a wider agreement. So now that the deal has been landed, how does the catch measure up? >click to read< All the Fish related bits in the Brexit deal to read at your leisure: Articles 1-19. – Article FISH.1: Sovereign rights of coastal States exercised by the Parties. The Parties affirm that sovereign rights of coastal States exercised by the Parties for the purpose of exploring, exploiting,,, >click to read< 08:40
17 fishermen feared dead, two rescued after Russian trawler sinks in the Barents Sea
The fishing boat Onega, sank near the Novoya Zemlya archipelago with 19 people on board, local news outlets reported, citing the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations. The ministry attributed the incident to the formation of too much ice on the vessel. >click to read< , 17 fishermen feared dead after boat sinks in Arctic Russia – Seventeen fishermen were missing and feared dead on Monday after a Russian boat capsized during a storm and sank in the freezing waters of the Barents Sea. Officials said that two people had been rescued during a search-and-rescue operation, but that bad weather conditions had complicated efforts to find survivors. >click to read< 06:23
Lifelong Ucluelet fisherman Doug Kimoto shares his thoughts on restoring fisheries
Doug Kimoto’s livelihood begins with a 42-foot commercial salmon troller named ‘La Perouse.’ The wooden fishing vessel has been a member of his Japanese-Canadian family for 70 years. “I started commercial fishing with my father when I was about 13-years-old,” His father, Tom Kimoto, lost about 10 years of his life as a result of being forced into a Canadian Japenese internment camp, Kimoto recalls. “These last few years, it’s been a disaster,” he says. “Years ago you could make a decent living, but now it’s down to what you’d call not even a minimum wage for most fishermen.” >click to read< 07:03
Crab fishing is delayed over price negotiations; no one wants under $3 a pound, will not go
Disputes between Bay Area fishermen and seafood company Pacific Seafood Group over crab prices are causing more delays to the start of the commercial crab fishing season. California allowed commercial crab season to begin Dec. 23 after a month delay over environmental concerns to whales and other marine animals. However, the fleets in Half Moon Bay and the entire Bay Area remain at an impasse,,, Fishermen want at least $3 a pound for crab, while Pacific Seafood Group is only offering $2.25 a pound. Until an agreement is reached, commercial fishermen from the Bay Area will not go out to fish. >click to read< 08:59
Unexploded Ordnance May be Cause of Fishing Vessel Blast
The Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) has launched an inquiry into a blast aboard a fishing vessel off Norfolk, UK on December 15, which injured all seven crewmembers on board. The explosion aboard the crabbing vessel Galwad-Y-Mor,,, “The hauler was being used to heave in the back 
rope, and the crew had let the skipper know that there was a lot of tension on the line, when there was an unexpected explosion. Galwad-Y-Mor was thrown up from the sea surface, then landed heavily back down; all propulsion and electrical power was immediately lost. The skipper was injured and dazed, but conscious, and saw that the wheelhouse had been completely wrecked.” >click to read< 16: 32
Crab-22: how Norway’s fisheries got rich on an invasive species
The Norwegian fishing village of Bugøynes, 310 miles north of the Arctic Circle and a frigid, dark place for much of the year, was on the edge of ruin. Work was scarce. Years of overfishing and mismanagement had stymied cod quotas. Boats lay idle in cold waters. Those who chose to stay were forced to rely on what meagre wages they could still muster from fishing and processing. That is, until the crabs arrived.,, Unknown to the fishermen, the crustaceans had traveled from Russia, where scientists had introduced red king crabs on the Murman coast during the 1960s with the goal of establishing a new, lucrative fishery. Slowly, the crabs scuttled the 60 or so miles over the border,,, >click to read< 07:39
Please Contribute to Chief William Saulis Families Fund
Charles “Hot Dog” Roberts, Leonard “Layback Lenny” Gabriel, Aaron Cogswell, Eugene “Geno” Francis, Dan Forbes, Mike Drake. These six men were tragically lost while returning to port from a trip fishing for scallops aboard the Chief William Saulis on the morning of December 15th 2020. So far, only Mike Drake’s body has been recovered. Any funds collected from this GoFundMe will be added to that account and will then be provided to the families of these men. Please >click to read< and donate if you can. Fundraiser organizer is Alain D’Entremont. Thank you, Alain. 22:14
An Fundraiser – Help for the Family of Mike Drake of Fortune, NL
Mike Drake at the age of 48 from Fortune, NL was among the crew of six on the Chief William Saulis, a scallop dragger, that sank in the Bay of Fundy this past Tuesday, December 15, 2020. Mike’s body was recovered late Tuesday from the frigid waters off the coast of southwestern Nova Scotia. At this time Mike remains at a funeral home in Nova Scotia while he awaits a flight home to Newfoundland to be returned to his family who are all anxiously awaiting for his arrival back home to give him a proper burial and hopefully give the family some closure to this great tragedy and loss. >click to read the rest<, and, please! Donate if you can. Thank you Joan Caines 20:56
F/V Chief Williams Saulis: ‘Hearts are extremely heavy’ as search for missing N.S. fishing crew ends
The Maritime Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre said late Wednesday afternoon that it is suspending the search for five missing fishermen in the Bay of Fundy. The news comes after 36 hours of searching for the crew of the Chief Williams Saulis, a scallop vessel based out of Yarmouth, N.S. The RCMP will now handle the investigation as a missing persons case. The JRCC said the search covered 260 nautical miles by sea and air. One body was recovered on Tuesday night, but had not yet been publicly identified. >click to read< 07:16
Body of Newfoundland Fisherman Recovered, Search for Others Called Off in Nova Scotia – Residents of the Town of Fortune are rallying around the family of a man whose body was recovered,,, The man, Michael Drake, was one of six crewmen on board the Chief William Saulis,,, >click to read<
RCMP suspend search for Chief William Saulis fishermen due to impending storm – Chief Deborah Robinson of Acadia First Nation also expressed her condolences in a statement on Thursday morning. Eugene Francis, nicknamed Geno, was a community member who lived on the Yarmouth reserve, growing up in Milton, N.S., where his parents and son still live. “We were devastated to hear that Geno was among those on board and our thoughts and prayers are with his family and all the families, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, who are impacted by this tragic event,” Robinson said. >click to read<
Search continues for 6 fishermen aboard missing fishing vessel in Bay of Fundy
An emergency signal from a scallop fishing vessel, the Chief William Saulis, came in at 5:51 a.m. Debris was spotted from the air around 8:22 a.m. Two life-rafts washed ashore but no one was on board, said Lt.-Cmdr. Brian Owens, with the JRCC. “We’re going to continue the search into the rest of the evening and as long as it takes to make sure that we make all possible attempts to find these individuals,” he said. At 5 p.m. on Tuesday, he confirmed that the search would continue throughout the night. >click to read< 17:09
U.S. Coast Guard crew tows New Bedford fishing vessel 5 days, 160 miles
The crew of Coast Guard Cutter Tahoma safely towed a disabled fishing vessel located 160 nautical miles East of Nantucket, Massachusetts, Friday. Tahoma received a report at 10:26 p.m. Sunday night from Coast Guard First District Command Center. Fishing vessel F/V Fearless was reported to be disabled with the crew requesting assistance. Tahoma’s crew conducted the tow of F/V Fearless over the course of 5 days, taking the vessel into tow Monday and rendezvousing with a commercial towing company near Buzzard’s Bay on Friday. Video, photos, >click to read< 10:54
Ben Platt: Whales aren’t at risk from crab fishing along California’s coast
Anyone who lives in or near California’s many historic fishing communities like Morro Bay, Monterey, or Half Moon Bay, has probably heard the term “ropeless” crab fishing gear. That’s the new buzzword for equipment being promoted by environmental groups to solve the perceived problem of whale interactions with fishing gear.,,, Both the East Coast Lobster fishery and the West Coast Dungeness crab fishery, each of which are made up of thousands of independent fishermen, have tested the pop-up “ropeless” gear and found it to be faulty. Meanwhile, strikes by large ships likely cause 50-150 whale deaths a year off the West Coast,,, >click to read< 07:31
From the “Where the Rubber Meets the Road” Department: Automobile Tires Are Killing West Coast Salmon, Not Climate Change
Just last year, PBS and Popular Science were screaming about “climate change” being the cause of salmon deaths with headlines like “Climate Change is Killing Salmon in the Pacific Northwest” and “Climate change is cooking salmon in the Pacific Northwest.” It seems they were wrong. Dead wrong. New research from the University of Washington published December 3 in the journal Science, exonerates “climate change” in the salmon-killing caper and finds a surprise villain: an additive to automobile tires, not “climate change.” In fact, the researchers specifically ruled out climate change-driven water temperature increases as a cause. >click to read< 09:35
Chesapeake Bay Says Goodbye to a Classic Virginia Deadrise Boatbuilder
Edward Diggs, an iconic builder of deadrise workboats, left the Chesapeake Bay for good on Thanksgiving after a long, well-lived life. He was 93 and had lived for many years in the home he built with his family on Mobjack Bay in Redart. Diggs began building boats with his father and later built with Alton Smith,,, Diggs boats were large (44-50’), high-sided, and built stout. Mr. Edward’s last large boat is a good example: Dutch Girl is 50’ x 15’, built in 1992 at Horn Harbor for Capt. Dave Thompson. Thompson took her to New York,,, >click to read< 18:20
Opinion: The Reason for No Season – Jim O’Connell
These are 2 females. The black shelled female on the left did not shed this year for the first time skipping the yearly shed. It now has eggs. It was a pound and a half and does not have to shed every year anymore.,,, Canada is not protecting the reproductive potential with it’s seasonal rules. They force the lobstermen to throw the baby out with the bath water. Lobstermen who are trying to make a living for the whole year in two months are targeted on the most important lobster for reproduction.,,, The First Nations have publicly come out and said they want to improve the regulations on the present method for sustainability. Jim O’Connell, >click to read< 15:36
No legal basis for the UK’s distant-waters vessels to fish cod in Norwegian waters from the end of this year
Britains latest state-of-the-art trawler, the £52 million Kirkella, has been laid up in Hull as the Government failed to negotiate new fishing quotas with Norway in time for Brexit Day on 1 January. Instead of ‘taking back control’ with the revival of the UK’s fishing industry, trawlermen in Hull face losing their jobs and the country faces the demise of the distant-waters fishing industry. >click to read< 11:05
Lobster fishermen call for ‘dumping day’ changes
Repeated delays to the start of the lobster fishing season in part of Nova Scotia’s most lucrative fishery have some harvesters calling for a change to the rules to prevent the money-burning setback in years ahead. The launch of the season, known as dumping day, happens on the last Monday in November for Lobster Fishing Areas 33 and 34, two large fishing regions that wrap around the southwest coast of the province.,, Lobster fisherman Michael Larkin said he’d like to see some flexibility added to the rules around dumping day,,, >click to read< 07:56
Australia: Cheap lobsters on Christmas tables as prices plummet due to China import ban
Commercial fishers operating in Victoria, Tasmania, and South Australia are supplying record volumes to the domestic market after China’s ban on Australian live lobster imports. With the crustaceans removed from restaurants and markets in China, (you know the drill),,,Tasmanian commercial fisher Jason Hart this week sold his catch directly to the public at the Strahan wharf. “I’ve never had to worry about selling them from the wharf before,” Mr Hart said. “Even when our markets have been bad you can still on-sell the fish. But I’ve never seen it like this,,, >click to read< 13:48
Relief and disappointment: Bristol Bay reacts to Army Corps of Engineers Pebble permit denial
Pebble Mine has been stopped, likely for good. The debate around the mine has consumed Bristol Bay for more than a decade. Now the people who live here are coming to terms with the news. “I was ecstatic. I was elated. I was so happy to hear that it was finally over,” said Billy Trefon, Jr. from Nondalton,,, But for those who backed the project, the decision comes as a harsh blow. Sue Anelon works for the Iliamna Development Corporation. Iliamna is another community close to where the mine would have been. Anelon says the area is economically depressed. She sees the Army Corps’ denial as a bad decision for the state as well as the Lake Iliamna region. “I’m very worried right now, because there’s a lot of people without jobs — they’re depending on the government,” she said. >click to read< 11:31
25 years after the Florida net ban – “When they take your gear from you and they tell you that you can’t fish,,,
Generational islander Rhonda Dooley has a burning desire that no one forget the Florida net ban. She says many people still don’t realize what it was really about, and how it continues to affect the island and the families who made their living on the water. “When they take your gear from you and they tell you that you can’t fish,,, She said commercial fishermen are food producers. “There were over 300 fishing families on the island back in the day,” she said, referring to life before the net ban. “Everyone had their hand in fishing — that was all they did and all they talked about.” >click to read< 13:04
Blue collar fishermen deserve to make a living, not persecution from weak minded politicians and wealthy enviros
Austen Brown started fishing commercially with his father off California’s coast when he was only 8 years old. By the time he was 13, Austen was making his own living as a fisherman, and he has spent the past few decades fishing for everything from codfish to shark. But perhaps his favorite target is the elusive swordfish.,, The swordfish is also a favorite catch for Chris Williams, who has spent more than 40 years plying his commercial fishing trade off the California coast, including targeting swordfish with drift gillnets. Tragically, California’s drift gillnet ban comes at the expense of the fishermen and their families who will be put out of business for no good reason. Video, >click to read< 08:34
Friends and family raise nearly $100,000 for F/V Emmy Rose fishermen lost at sea – Please donate if you can.
A campaign to help the families of four fishermen lost at sea last week was approaching $100,000 Sunday night. The fundraising effort on the for-profit crowd funding platform called GoFundMe had raised just over $95,000 to ease the financial burdens of the four crewmen’s families. The Portland-based fishing vessel F/V Emmy Rose sank off the coast of Massachusetts during the early morning hours of Nov. 23. The fishermen who lost their lives at sea have been identified as (Captain) Robert Blethen Jr. of Georgetown, Jeff Matthews of Portland, Ethan Ward of Pownal, and Mike Porper of Gloucester, Massachusetts. >click to read< 10:18
There are four gofundme pages our readers should be aware of for the Families of F/V Emmy Rose – >click to read<
Pretty Rugged: Camden author’s book spotlights women of the fishing industry
For the past two years, Camden author Ali Farrell has poured her all into her second book, a book showcasing the strength of Maine’s female fishermen, entitled Pretty Rugged: True Stories From Women of the Sea. Originally slated to be released in June, the book is finally available for preorder with shipments anticipated in time for Christmas after the pandemic delayed some photoshoots and tagalongs on fishing boats. As the book nears its release, Farrell is abundantly thankful to the lobstermen allowed her and her team to document their lifestyle, and for her team, including many photographers traveling hours to wharf locations to withstand various conditions on the water. photos, >click to read< 11:09:34
Fishermen vow to prevent construction of Saint-Brieuc offshore wind farm – would rather die than allow it to go ahead
French fishermen have declared that they would rather die fighting than allow a fully approved offshore wind farm to be built off Brittany, and have vowed to take direct action to prevent construction. The row has led the French wind industry to write to President Emmanuel Macron, warning that it is being “held hostage to sterile debates’ led by organisations “stirring up false fears’ about renewable energy. The fishermen’s association from the nearby British island of Jersey is supporting their French counterparts’ opposition to Saint-Brieuc, arguing that the project would push French fishing boats out of their territorial waters and into UK waters. >click to read< 08:47
F/V Joanna C: Search for two missing Brixham fishermen is called off
HM Coastguard has confirmed that the search operation was called off this afternoon, November 22, at 2.30pm. The search began at 6am on November 21, when HM Coastguard received an EPIRB alert located three nautical miles off the coast at Seaford near Newhaven, from the EPIRB (emergency beacon) from the vessel. No further official information has been provided about the missing men who were on a 45 foot scalloping vessel, Joanna C sank when it sank off Newhaven in East Sussex yesterday. >click to read< 07:27 Former fisherman Tony Rowe, 40, of Brixham, was shocked to not only hear of the news but to discover the boat was one has previously owned, and has started a gofundme page, >click to donate< Prayers and wishes pour in for Brixham fishermen – >click to read<, Two day search for two fisherman missing at sea is called off after their ‘scallop wars’ boat sank off the Sussex coast – >click to read<
EPIRB Alert: One fisherman rescued as frantic search for two fishermen is underway after boat sinks off Newhaven
Fishing boat Joanna C sank at about 6am this morning off Newhaven in East Sussex with three crew members on board. One man was rescued from the water by Newhaven lifeboat after he was found clinging to a lifebuoy. He has been transferred to hospital for treatment. However the search continues across the south coast for the two other missing fishermen. The search began at 6am this morning, when HM Coastguard received an EPIRB alert located three nautical miles off the coast at Seaford near Newhaven, from the vessel’s emergency beacon. The>fishing vessel Joanna C is a 45 foot scalloping vessel< registered in Brixham and three people were on board at the time of the sinking. >click to read< 07:08
