Daily Archives: January 26, 2016
NOAA Expands Critical Habitat for Endangered North Atlantic Right Whales
Using new information not previously available, NMFS (read the Fed Reg
) is expanding critical habitat for endangered North Atlantic right whales to cover its northeast feeding areas in the Gulf of Maine/Georges Bank region and southeast calving grounds from North Carolina to Florida. This final rule, which was initially proposed in February 2015 and received 261 general comments over a 60-day comment period, does not include any new restrictions or management measures for commercial fishing operations. Read the post here 15:41
PETA – Serving fish at an aquarium would be like serving poodle burgers at a dog show
They’re crazy! Choose the fish!
As construction continues on OdySea Aquarium in Scottsdale, Arizona, PETA sent a letter to the project’s developer this morning with a simple request: Keep fish off the menu at the aquarium’s restaurant, the Lighthouse Café. In its letter, PETA points out that fish caught in huge commercial fishing nets suffer the agony of decompression as they are hauled up from the deep, while farmed fish spend their entire lives in filthy, cramped enclosures, making fish flesh a poor menu choice for an institution intended to teach people to respect and appreciate sea animals. Link 15:00
Study finds shark hotspots overlap with commercial fishing locations
A new study from an international team of scientists found commercial fishing vessels target shark hotspots, areas where sharks tend to congregate, in the North Atlantic. The researchers suggest that sharks are at risk of being overfished in these oceanic hotspots. During a four-year period from 2005 to 2009, the researchers tracked more than 100 sharks equipped with satellite tags from six different species in the North Atlantic while concurrently tracking 186 Spanish and Portuguese GPS-equipped longline fishing vessels. They found that the fishing vessels and sharks occurred in ocean fronts characterized by warm water temperature and high productivity, including the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Current/Labrador Current Convergence Zone near Newfoundland. Read the article here 12:56
‘Charleston Fishing Families’ raising funds, donations for families of lost crab fishermen
The Eagle III sank miles away from its home port in Port Orford but that hasn’t stopped people in the bay area from stepping up to support the families of those who were on board, show the fishing community is truly ‘coast-wide.’ The group is putting on a rummage sale, bake sale and silent auction fundraiser at the Coquille Tribal Community Center this weekend. They say, in a matter of days, hundreds of dollars’ worth of items were donated. “We thought this was going to be a little tiny yard sale and we were going to raise a couple hundred dollars and call it good,” Clemens explains, “and it just ballooned into something so miraculous and amazing.” Video, read the rest here 10:58
Coast Guard medevacs Fisherman off boat near Oregon Inlet, NC
The Coast Guard medevaced a 22-year-old man Tuesday aboard a fishing vessel near Oregon Inlet. Sector North Carolina watchstanders received a call at 5:30 a.m. that a crew member aboard the 43-foot fishing vessel Sea Dog had fallen and sustained an injury to his ear. A Coast Guard 47-foot Motor Life Boat crew launched from Station Oregon Inlet at 5:48 a.m. and arrived on scene at 6:10 a.m. Read the post here 10:26
In the Gulf – Effects of Illegal Fishing on Local Fishing Industry
Over 1,000 pounds of red snapper were seized from a lancha by the U.S. Coast Guard. There were 4 Mexican nationals aboard the boat. They were taken to the U.S. Coast Guard at the island. A charter fisherman said when people fish illegally his profits take a big hit. It can also drain a fishing spot. “Everything changed. We didn’t catch anything in that area, nothing. We didn’t even mark anything on our fish finder. It was absolutely zero,” Michael Walker said. Walker takes people out to fish. If there are no fish to catch, it can result in the loss of a customer. Read the rest here 09:19
Lobster Advisory Council opposes limited lobster licenses
As a Feb. 10 hearing before the Legislature’s Marine Resources Committee nears, Maine lobstermen continue to debate a bill that would tweak the system by which commercial lobster licenses are issued. The proposals included in the bill were first presented to industry members in a round of town hall-style meetings hosted by Department of Marine Resources Commissioner Patrick Keliher during the summer and fall. The ideas have also been discussed in meetings of the state’s seven regional . Read the article here 08:54
State legislators call on Brown to declare crab fishery disaster
A group of nine California legislators sent a bipartisan letter to Gov. Jerry Brown on Monday calling for him to declare a crab fishery disaster in order to help secure financial assistance for the state’s impacted fishing industry. The state legislators’ letter urges Brown to ask U.S. Secretary of Commerce to declare a fishery disaster through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. If approved, the designation would allow the federal government to issue disaster assistance as allowed under two federal statutes — the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and the Interjurisdictional Fisheries Act. Read the article here 08:20
Burgeoning sea otter population in southern Southeast Alaska depletes commercial fishery species
Sea otters enjoy feeding on sea cucumbers, sea urchins, Dungeness crabs and geoducks. Unfortunately, so do people. In southern Southeast Alaska, commercial fisheries for these invertebrate species provide income for local economies. At the same time, a growing population of sea otters is consuming the invertebrates. Predation from the otters is already having an economic impact on commercial fisheries, and the effect is likely to be even greater as the sea otter population continues to increase. Read the post here 07:43
