Daily Archives: October 4, 2016
Reward offered for info leading to arrest in lobster boat sinking
Maine’s Operation Game Thief is offering a $2,000 reward for information that leads to an arrest and conviction of anyone involved in the sinking of Hooper’s lobster boat. “This is a senseless act that has happened to one of our own,” said Operation Game Thief Board of Directors Chairman Greg Sirpis. “The commercial lobstering community has a deep rooted tradition in Maine, and this will simply not stand. The Maine OGT Board of Directors is hopeful that someone will come forward and furnish information that will assist the Maine Marine Patrol in their investigation.” “We’re grateful for the tremendous support of the Operation Game Thief program,” said Marine Patrol Major Rene Cloutier. “While their focus is traditionally on poaching violations, their partnership with the Marine Patrol will help us pursue serious violations that undermine the ability of hard working fishermen to make a living on the water.” Tony Hooper said the whole ordeal is stressful for his family. He said he and his girlfriend just had a baby 10 days ago, and that they have “no money” because he has used up savings repairing the boat and has had limited income since mid-August. Video, read the rest here 18:02
Judge Sets Texas Straight on Oysters
A local navigation board had no authority to issue an oysterman an exclusive lease to grow and harvest oysters in Galveston Bay, as only the state can do that, a Texas judge ruled. Three Galveston-based oyster companies sued Sustainable Texas Oyster Resource Management (STORM) in April 2014, calling the fisherman’s lease a land grab of state resources during a lean time in the oyster industry. Oysters are a $1 billion industry in the United States, and by far the largest share comes from cultivated, not wild, oysters. Tracy Woody, president of STORM and owner of Jeri’s Seafood in Smith Point, a small town on the bay, said his lease from the Chambers-Liberty Counties Navigation District was valid, and that he would use the waters for sustainable oyster harvesting, not for personal gain. “Should I pillage and plunder a public resource for personal gain?” Woody said in an interview Monday. “Or should I try to sustain it, without using any taxpayer money?” But in a 2-page order on Sept. 28, Galveston County Judge Lonnie Cox granted the Galveston companies summary judgment and voided the lease. Read the rest here 16:40
Fisherman pleads guilty to 39 albatross deaths
A commercial fishing boat skipper who caused the death of 39 albatrosses refused to use bird-scaring devices because he had “nothing but f…… trouble with the things”, a court has been told. Daniel Joseph Smyth, 37, admitted in the Greymouth District Court on Tuesday to being the master of a vessel that failed to comply with seabird mitigation measures by ignoring instructions to use a streamer line while fishing with surface longlines. The Ministry for Primary Industries’ (MPI) legal counsel William Jennings said Smyth was fishing for southern bluefin tuna off the West Coast in April and failed to use a streamer line, a mandatory device designed to scare birds away from baited hooks. Read the story here 14:03
Fish-NL – Ryan Cleary challenges FFAW to allow independent audit
Aspiring labour leader Ryan Cleary has issued a challenge to the Fish, Food and Allied Workers union, saying he will walk away from his movement if the FFAW will allow an independent audit of its finances. But the union says that’s already being done. It’s the latest tactic by Cleary in his bid to form a new union exclusively for Newfoundland and Labrador fish harvesters, to be called the Federation of Independent Seafood Harvesters, or FISH-NL, and comes as the head of the Canadian Labour Congress strongly condemns Cleary’s efforts. “I will walk away from Fish-NL, I will walk away from this movement, period, if the FFAW agrees to allow a third party to go in and do a forensic audit of the FFAW, all government money going in, all fees that fish harvesters pay in,” Cleary told CBC News Tuesday. Cleary quickly added it’s a challenge he doesn’t expect will be accepted because “they have too much to hide.” The FFAW responded with a statement saying Cleary’s challenge is mute, because the union is already audited by an independent firm. Read the story here 13:32
Former Oregon Gov. Kitzhaber’s salmon plan a mismatch By Hobe Kytr
Have you ever wondered just how that salmon got to your table at the restaurant, or in the grocery store, or on your barbecue at home? Salmon not only have to swim through a lot of water, both fresh and salt, but a lot of regulations as well. But those regulations protect them, ensuring there will be salmon for future generations.The following outlines how conservation of salmon works, particularly for the Columbia River, the greatest salmon river of them all. It covers a century and a half of how people have coped with changes in the natural environment, fluctuations in fish populations, ocean conditions, pollution, control of fishing operations, as well as a host of other issues, by developing laws and structures that help ensure their survival. Read the op-ed here 12:33
‘This is my life’- 71 years a fisherman and counting
Moving away from the wheel, Alcide Arsenault draws in a chest full of salt air. “This is what I like,” he says. His hands are thrust wide from his hips as he stands proudly on the deck of the Key West One, looking towards the few remaining stars in the first light of day. He’s been out on the water for nearly two hours and his crew, consisting of his son Kenneth and grandson Bradley, has already checked over 30 lobster traps. It’s late in the lobster season, but fishing’s still good and the veteran captain is pleased. He’s used to being in the stern of the boat, but his back has been giving him some trouble the past couple of years so he’s content to run the boat and allow his younger crew to do the heavy lifting. But even what they do is not how it used to be. “When I started fishing it was by hand. You had to pull everything up by hand. It wasn’t a great job but, well, it kept us in pretty good shape,” remarked Arsenault who consistently tips the scales at between 138 and 142 pounds. With 71 years of fishing experience, this 85-year-old Cape Egmont captain knows better than most present-day fishermen how it used to be. “We didn’t have anything then. We had a compass and that was it. Read the story here 11:39
Hurricane Matthew Warnings Shift Toward Florida, Gov. Rick Scott declares a State of Emergency
At 800 AM EDT (1200 UTC), the eye of Hurricane Matthew was located inland Haiti near latitude 18.4 North, longitude 74.2 West. Matthew made landfall near Les Anglais about 700 AM EDT (1100 UTC). The hurricane is moving toward the north near 9 mph (15 km/h), and this general motion is expected to continue today. On this track the eye of Matthew will be back over water in the Gulf of Gonave in the next hour or so, and then move over the Windward Passage later this morning. A turn toward the north-northwest is expected by Wednesday, followed by a northwest turn Wednesday night. Read the rest here The alert warns that Matthew is expected to make a northwestern turn on Wednesday — and that hurricane-force winds are expected to reach up to 40 miles out from the eye of the storm. Meteorologists say Matthew is currently gusting 140 mph winds near its eye wall. Just before the warning was issued, Gov. Rick Scott declared a state of emergency in every county in Florida 09:41
Help for fishing vessels to locate their catch? Why be a fisherman?!!
Big Data means that professional fishermen will soon be getting their own decision-making tool. It will tell them where fish shoals are located, and how their vessels can be operated as economically as possible. Currently, fishermen set out for sea armed with a log book, their experience and intuition. But sometimes this isn’t enough and they return empty-handed. For some time now fishermen have wanted to obtain data that can help them better predict where fish can be found. And success may be just around the corner. Vessel owners Nordnes AS and Havfisk ASA have been in the forefront of work linked to the project called ESUSHI, carried out together with researchers from SINTEF. Fishing vessels, the supply industry, the Norwegian Meteorological Institute (NMI) and the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Centre in Bergen are now supplying massive amounts of the data they have acquired as a basis for a decision-making tool. Read the story here 08:58
Coast Guard reports increase in seizures of Mexican vessels stealing Red Snapper
A recent study by the U.S. Coast Guard states hundreds of thousands of pounds of red snapper is taken illegally out of the waters by Mexican fishermen. U.S. fisherman Stephen Murphy said he knows they are after the red snapper. “You’re out there fishing and you look a mile away… It’s pretty obvious there’s a Mexican in a commercial boat out there with their long lines and gill nets bringing in thousands of pounds of fish,” he said. Murphy said the fishermen also use illegal catching nets. He said there needs to be more done to protect the fish. “There’s nobody out there patrolling… They can go out and fish for one night and get a thousand pounds of snapper,” he said. “(They’re) selling it for almost eight thousand dollars.” Video, read the story here 08:03
