Daily Archives: May 6, 2022
Slashed shrimp quotas cause worries for Newfoundland and Labrador captains
A couple weeks ago Brad Genge made a million-dollar bet on the future of shrimp. He bought another shrimp licence. Now he can only hope it pays off. Genge has been fishing out of Flower’s Cove, a community on Newfoundland’s Great Northern Peninsula, with his father Ren for about three decades. This is the 16th season for their longliner, B and B Mariner. And when another captain decided to retire and sell his enterprise, Genge saw it 
as a chance to grow his own. These days the only way to get more shrimp quota is to buy it from someone willing to sell. Genge has invested heavily to secure three shrimp quotas in the Gulf, in an area near Port aux Choix, and four in the northern zone, off St. Anthony. It comes with risk, considering the shrimp biomass and the quotas have been declining. >click to read< 15:15
Why Lennox Island First Nation is launching a treaty fishery without federal approval
Prince Edward Island’s Lennox Island First Nation is set to launch its first moderate livelihood fishery, or treaty fishery on Saturday. The fishery is not authorized by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, after negotiations to reach an agreement were unsuccessful, but the First Nation says it doesn’t have to be. To understand the significance of the decision to proceed without a nation-to-nation agreement in place, it’s important to know the history of the ongoing debate and the unique treaty rights held by the Mi’kmaq as the original inhabitants of the Maritime region. >click to read< 11:13
Another big Maritime fishery quota cut looming
Another Maritime fishery is facing a big quota cut this year. The only question is how big. This time it is the large herring fishery in southwestern Nova Scotia and the Bay of Fundy. The stock is in the critical zone where serious harm is occurring, but the fishery employs hundreds of people in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. What happens next will again test how far Canada’s fisheries minister is willing to go to rebuild a depleted stock. >click to read< 09:35
New England’s founding fish, may be returning to local waters
Atlantic cod, once a mainstay of the region’s economy, is being fished at historically low levels, but a research scientist whose past findings opened up a tightly regulated scallop fishery says cod may be staging a comeback. Before he heads out to sea, commercial fisherman Raymond Lees stops by Reidar’s Trawl Gear & Marine Supply in New Bedford to buy custom-designed fishing nets. The shape of the net, the width of its mouth and the size of its holes all help him target certain species of fish and, perhaps more importantly, avoid others. “I’ve spent so long running away from codfish that I’ve gotten better at running away from codfish,” Lees said during a recent run to Reidar’s. “I have specialized gear and I’m good at what I do.” “We went from a huge fishing business, as far as the groundfishing fleet’s concerned, of 300 boats down to 20 boats,” Bendiksen said. “It’s pretty much a 90 percent loss of what the fleet was.” >click to read< 08:10
