Daily Archives: April 17, 2018
Norm Peters, the bearded skipper of North Rustico, dies
One of Prince Edward Island’s best known fishermen has died. Norm Peters, known as the bearded skipper, fished lobster out of North Rustico, and ran tours when the lobster season was done. Peters was a common sight on the Island’s tourism promotions. In 2012, he represented the Island at the China Fisheries and Seafood Expo, where he attracted a lot of attention, even appearing on the front page of a Beijing newspaper. >click to read<19:12
The Sting – Houston restaurants, fish markets cited for illegally purchasing game fish
Nineteen Houston-area restaurants and fish markets have racked up more than 150 citations after they were caught illegally purchasing game fish from undercover officers during a recently completed sting, officials announced Tuesday. A two-year operation conducted by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s law enforcement division found that the restaurants and fish markets were willing to bypass legitimate commercial fish dealers and purchase saltwater fish in the black market. Those fish included sea trout, red drum (redfish), red snapper, Southern flounder, black drum, catfish and croaker. >click to read<18:21
THREATENED – Scallop fishing off the coast of Long Island
Scallop fisherman Chris Scola pilots his 39-foot dredging boat out of the port at Montauk, steaming 10 miles out to sea. The bearded 44-year-old captain says if Gov. Andrew Cuomo achieves his dream of creating 2.4 gigawatts of offshore wind energy, fishermen will have to steer clear of any giant turbines placed on top of their rich scallop beds. Scallopers see offshore wind development as a threat to their livelihoods and are suing the federal government to protect their fishery, potentially throwing a wrench in Cuomo’s master plan. 14 photos >click to read<16:56
Iceland company to resume commercial hunting of fin whales
A whaling company in Iceland said Tuesday it is preparing its fleet to bring commercial hunting of fin whales back to the Nordic island nation after a two-year freeze. Whaling company Hvalur hf (Whale Inc.) said it is readying two vessels for the 100-day summer whaling season. Fin whale hunting stopped in Iceland after the 2015 hunt, when Japanese authorities refused to import Iceland’s catch because of unmet health code requirements. Fin whales are the world’s second-largest whales after blue whales, and Iceland is the only country where the marine mammals can be hunted commercially. >click to read<15:24
Trump administration defends Obama’s Atlantic monument – Requests Judge dismiss Fishermen’s lawsuit
The Trump administration on Tuesday defended an underwater monument established by former President Barack Obama to protect marine life in the Atlantic Ocean and asked a judge to dismiss a lawsuit from fishermen trying to eliminate it. The fishing groups sued in federal court in Washington, challenging the creation of the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument by the Democratic former president in 2016. It’s a 5,000-square-mile area off of New England that contains fragile deep sea corals and vulnerable species of marine life, such as right whales. >click to read< 13:22
Get your fresh, wild caught seafood while you can
Get your fresh, wild caught seafood while you can. That’s the message from third generation Bowen-based commercial fisherman Terry Must. Mr Must has been fishing commercially for 35 years. He said in that time his access to fishing waters off Bowen has been cut by 50 per cent. “We’ve lost half of the area we used to be able to fish,” he said. He said governments and green groups had been nibbling away at the commercial fishing sector for the past 20 years. He warns it could reach the stage where the consumption of wild caught seafood in Australia becomes a thing of the past. >click to read<11:19
Green Insanity: Offshore Wind Project Cost Mind-Boggling $10K Per KW
Off of the shore of Block Island on the Rhode Island coast, five wind turbines are operating and supplying power to the island. It took years of state and federal policymaking, environmental impact assessments, and town hall meetings for the 30-megawatt wind farm to come to fruition due to its cost and degradation of vistas. It cost $300 million—$10,000 per kilowatt—about 10 times more than the cost of a new natural gas combined cycle unit. Further, it is 55 percent more costly than what the Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects a first-of-a-kind offshore wind unit to cost—$6,454 per kilowatt. >click to read<09:22
Fishermen fear fallout from proposed wind farm project
Comments surrounding Vineyard Wind’s offshore wind projects filled the Waypoint Convention Room on Monday night and they came from a diverse group ranging from climate change deniers to environmentalists. But the main discussion revolved around jobs. Fishermen strongly criticized the process with one saying he feared Europeans would commandeer all the jobs associated with offshore winds. >click to read<08:43
Series of Public Hearings on Offshore Wind Starts in New Bedford – >click to read<10:02
