Daily Archives: April 17, 2014

“Hot doggin’ lobsterman.” Small boat capsizes off Cape Elizabeth

CAPE ELIZABETH (WGME) — A small lobster boat capsized off the coast of Cape Elizabeth early Thursday afternoon. The boat broke into pieces, but at the last second, the lone lobsterman on board jumped out, right before it flipped over. Read more here wgme 21:05

Fishermen say impacts still linger from BP oil spill – video

gulf“We believe this disaster has greatly impacted the ability of fisheries to spawn. And that’s why they’re not seeing the fisheries they used to. They’re not catching what they used to. We believe that the spawning ability has been greatly impacted,” said Thao Vo, an advocate for fishing families. Read more here wlox 20:02

Alaska Legislature confirms fish board incumbents

23523_354387901211_7651997_aThree incumbent members of Alaska’s Board of Fisheries were unanimously confirmed, after a Chugiak representative withdraw his objection to the two commercial fishers on the board. Read more here 19:43

Former Minerals Management Service director, Elizabeth Birnbaum,: US ‘on a course to repeat’ Gulf oil spill

In an opinion piece in the New York Times, the former Minerals Management Service director, Elizabeth Birnbaum, says the Obama administration “still has not taken key steps . . . to increase drilling safety.” Birnbaum, who was ousted from her job overseeing offshore drilling just weeks after BP’s Macondo well blew out in the Gulf, penned the op-ed with Jacqueline Savitz, vice president for U.S. oceans at the conservation group Oceana. Read more here NOAA Inaction in the Gulf of Mexico -In her September 21, 2009 twenty-six page response to Lisa Birnbaum, Director of the Mineral Management Service on the Draft Proposed Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2010-2015. Ms. Lubchenco Read more here  18:43

Alewives and Blueback Herring haven’t rebounded

But like many fish, herring face a veritable Pandora’s box of pressure. Habitat degradation, the damming of rivers, overfishing and pollution have cut their numbers drastically, by as much as 95 percent by some esitimates. Read more here capecodonline  13:13

4 icebound CF/V Double N sealers safe after airlift off Fogo Island

double-n-during-rescue-by-cormorantMajor Martel Thompson of the Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Halifax said the Double N was stuck in ice about 125 kilometres off Fogo Island. Read more here cbcnews 10:13

Closely watched Maine elver season marked by slow start, low prices

Tim LaRochelle sat in the bow of a 16-foot canoe, scanning the murky river water by the light of a headlamp and a nearly full moon. “There’s one,” LaRochelle said, pointing at a squiggle created near the water’s surface by a tiny, translucent immature eel – an elver. LaRochelle kept looking, but nearly a minute passed before he pointed to another squiggle. Read more here portlandpress  09:52

BP’s 3 Miles of Bull Bleep: “bringing to a close the extensive four-year active cleanup of the Gulf Coast following the Deepwater Horizon accident.”

BP oil spill cleanup will continue, Coast Guard tells state coastal authority – The Coast Guard has scaled back its clean-up response to the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill, but that scale-back is not as extensive as BP indicated in a news release issued Tuesday, an irritated Capt. Thomas Sparks told the state Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority on Wednesday. Read more here nola.com 09:25

Eastern Caribbean whalers follow a 139-year-old tradition, now under siege – Why? Because the Eco Evangelicals need to feel good.

Gaston Bess, “Whaling is a tradition around Bequia,” he says. “We will continue to whale, and we’ll continue the tradition.” Sue Fisher, an animal advocate with the Washington-based Animal Welfare Institute, hopes St. Vincent’s license won’t be renewed again. “They are not able to demonstrate a long-standing need for whale meat. They like it, they eat it, but it’s not meeting any nutritional subsistence needs. They are not struggling for protein.” Read more here 07:40

The Canadian government recently approved, without fanfare, the world’s first genetically modified fish to be produced in PEI.

Canada quietly made history last November when officials at Environment Canada gave the go-ahead on production of the world’s first genetically modified food fish: the AquAdvantage® salmon. Read more here 06:56

Acadia Parish man face theft of crawfish charge

CROWLEY, La. (AP) — State wildlife and fisheries agents have arrested a 39-year-old man accused of stealing crawfish. Read more here 06:36