I am tired of being misled by big corporations, lectured by elites on what we must be willing to accept, and sold out by our own government, which is all too willing to ship our hard-earned money overseas. I remain deeply concerned that these offshore wind projects are the latest, and perhaps most egregious, example of this sad reality. The recent whale deaths have served as a wakeup call, bringing renewed and necessary attention to potentially the greatest threat our regional economy has faced since we defeated North Jersey casinos. In years past, if several dead whales washed ashore on Atlantic and Cape May County beaches over the course of a few weeks, it would have set off environmental alarm bells. Yet, for some reason, we are told by environmental groups that everything is “fine” and that additional investigations relating to their cause of death are completely unnecessary. >click to read< 12:50
Monthly Archives: February 2023
Blue Harvest doubles down on groundfish, after selling off scallop fleet
Blue Harvest Fisheries announced this week that it has purchased a new trawler, expanding its groundfish operations as the company sells off the last of its scallop fleet. The 91-foot trawler, originally called the Francis Dawn, will be renamed the Nobska. It replaces a different Blue Harvest vessel, also named the Nobska, which burned at sea in 2021. The charred and gutted vessel has been tied to the company’s dock on Herman Melville Boulevard in New Bedford ever since — declared a total loss at an estimated $2.4 million. >click to read< 07:18
Crab Fisherman Who Died Off Donegal Named
The fisherman who lost his life off the Donegal coast last weekend has been named. Madis Letsars (37), a father of two, went overboard the crab vessel, Séimí, while crab fishing about 70 miles north of Arranmore Island, Co Donegal, on February 4th. It is believed he may have got caught in a rope while the vessel was shooting pots. Originally from the Baltic States and living in Co Armagh, he was one of five on board the vessel at the time. Members of the crew of the Séimí are said to be devastated by the loss of the crewman who had been on four or five trips with the crab vessel. >click to read< 15:32
Snow crab prices down by nearly 60 per cent in U.S. market
The snow crab season in Atlantic Canada usually doesn’t get going until mid-April, but that doesn’t mean fresh snow crab is not already hitting the U.S. market. Alaskan fleets finished up their tanner crab season this week. That crab is often marketed under the name “snow crab,” being of similar size and colour. If the Alaskan tanner fishery is a portent of things to come, snow crab catches this year will have much less value than in 2022. The tanner fishery started Jan. 15 with wharf prices at US$3.25 to US$3.35 per pound, according to the latest blog from U.S. seafood analyst Les Hodges. The initial offer from processors was $2.50 a pound, but that offer prompted a strike by the crab fishing fleet, that prompted a bump in the offer from processors. >click to read< 14:04
County, community continues search for missing fisherman
After the U.S. Coast Guard suspended the official search for the missing fisherman from the Ethel May, a fishing vessel that capsized Sunday evening, local agencies and community members continued to scour Willapa Bay for signs of the lost man. On Facebook Tuesday morning, Pacific County Sheriff’s Office said it was searching for a man named Bryson Fitch. Fitch, 25, a longtime fisherman, husband and father of three young children, remained missing after the 46-foot crab boat Ethel May sank in heavy seas near Willapa Bay Sunday night. An extended search by the Coast Guard and state and local agencies was suspended Monday evening. “Please don’t stop searching. He is out there,” McKenzie Salas, Fitch’s wife, wrote on Facebook. “He is a fighter. Please keep looking. We need to bring him home. Anyone and everyone please.” >click to read< 12:34
A portrait of offshore wind companies
All of the prominent offshore wind companies originated in the oil and gas industry: Ørsted (Danish Oil and Natural Gas), Equinor (Norwegian Statoil), British Petroleum, Avangrid (Spanish Iberdrola gas), and Shell Oil (Dutch/UK). These past enemies of environmentalists, now dancing partners, continue to generate revenue from fossil fuels. Ørsted even profited from burning coal this past year. Given the industry’s history of misleading the public about climate change, it’s not unreasonable to question their assertions now. These companies lose money from offshore wind operations. However, backed by generous upfront government subsidies, the ongoing construction of wind farms compensates for these losses. Because federal subsidies will contribute 30% of the capital costs, taxpayers will pay these predominantly foreign-owned, for-profit companies, billions of dollars. Orsted predicts that South Fork Wind will cost $53 million per turbine. >click to read< 11:27
Commercial fishermen rail against Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion plan
Opponents of the state’s controversial plans to construct two large sediment diversions to rebuild coastal land used a Wednesday night public hearing to rail against the upcoming projects, warning of harm to commercial fishing in the area. Representatives of commercial oyster growers, fishers and a variety of community groups objected to plans for the Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion, a more than $2 billion project set to begin construction later this year, as well as the upcoming $800-million east bank Mid-Breton Sediment Diversion. >click to read< 10:28
Urgent research to be undertaken on Bristol Bay Red King Crab
Urgent crab research will be getting underway in mid-March thanks to funds provided by both Alaska Department of Fish and Game and NOAA Fisheries, according to reports from Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers. The research is expected to use two chartered crab vessels with three scientists each, plus crew, to conduct research on Bristol Bay red king crab, including a pot survey, tagging, and gear studies. It will span roughly 25 days and begin in mid-March. The survey will set out to accomplish three main goals that may help inform management decisions in the future and will lay out important groundwork for future studies, >click to read< 08:31
‘People must know how serious fishing offences are’
A Spanish-owned trawler was allowed to leave Castletownbere this week after its owners paid a bond of €245,000 into court. Juan Pablo Docal Rubido (55), master of the German-registered Pesorsa Dos, was brought before a special sitting of Bandon District Court at the weekend following the detention of his vessel by the LE George Bernard Shaw for alleged fishing offences in Irish waters. Mr Rubido, with an address at Ciudad de Lugo 5, Third Floor, Coruna, Spain, was charged with 12 fishing offences on various dates between January 5th and January 24th while fishing within the exclusive fishing limits of the State. >click to read< 07:50
N.S. fisheries loan board sees big demand from new entrants
A rising tide of seafood exports coupled with the retirement of older workers has more young people casting a line into the fishing industry, according to the acting chair of the Nova Scotia Fisheries and Aquaculture Loan Board. Bob Verge was part of a group who appeared before the legislature’s public accounts committee on Wednesday to discuss the most recent reports from the fisheries and farm loan boards. Nova Scotia exported $2.5 billion in seafood in 2021, an increase of 21 per cent from five years ago, deputy fisheries minister April Howe told the committee. Figures from the loan board show just how many new people are trying to reel in a piece of that seawater-soaked pie. >click to read< 19:29
“Looking Back; “Fishery management; best available science, or politics?” 2009. By Jim Lovgren
I wrote this piece at the beginning of the Obama administration, concerning the politization of fishery science, over fourteen years ago. The rash of east coast marine mammal strandings and the governments response to them, eerily reminded me of this article and the reasons I wrote it. If you
change a few words, Bush to Biden, and big oil to big wind, you get pretty much the same thing, the politization of science to benefit wealthy corporations. >click to read< 17:05
SWFL shrimp company pushing on despite seafood industry’s struggles
Shrimpers tell us it’s been an excellent year for pink shrimp, despite Southwest Florida’s struggling seafood industry. We checked in with Erickson & Jensen Seafood, the only shrimp company with boats in the water right now on Fort Myers Beach. With four boats in the water, E&J has been able to bring back about a fourth of their workers. “We’re desperately trying to sell as much as we can wherever we can,” said Grant Erickson, owner of Erickson & Jensen. “It’s very expensive. It’s very devastating. We’ve got problems at all ends in this business.” Video, >click to read< 14:14
Athearn Marine Agency Boat of the Week: 41’x15″ Novi Scalloper, Cat 3306
To review specifications, information, and 20 photos’, >click here<, To see all the boats in this series >click here< 11:18
If You Eat Dungeness Crab, Please Help This Family (or even if you don’t, but can help)
Sunday, February 5th was another day in the long life of the F/V Ethel May, a wooden 46-foot crabber built in 1948 in South Bend, Washington, but it was to be her last. Crews from U.S. Coast Guard Station Grays Harbor and Air Station Astoria responded to the sinking after an emergency beacon was activated and the wife of one of the men called 911 to report an emergency onboard. An MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter from the air station was able to rescue two crewmen from a life raft at about 8:10 p.m. Unfortunately, the Ethel May had a crew of three, so one did not come home, and the official search was called off at 5:30pm Monday after almost a day of looking methodically. The name of the missing fisherman is Bryson Fitch, and he leaves behind a wife and three young children (aged 6, 4 and 4 months). >click to read< 10:03
Despite a pause on new regulations, U.S. and Canadian lobstermen see big challenges ahead
After a two-year hiatus, members of the U.S. and Canadian lobster fisheries met in Portland over the weekend to discuss challenges facing their industry. Top of mind is how the industry will prepare before new federal regulations designed to protect endangered right whales begin in six years. Fisheries in Maine had late last year expressed relief about the years-long delay in the rules change included in a federal spending bill, as it bought the industry more time to research and test new fishing techniques and other measures aimed at protecting North Atlantic right whales. >click to read< 09:10
‘We need help bringing him home:’ Family remains hopeful as search for missing crabber continues
After a crabbing boat with a three-man crew sank near Willapa Bay Sunday night, the U.S. Coast Guard has suspended its search for the one man who remains missing, but his family won’t give up hope. The Coast Guard rescued two of the three men, but did not find 24-year-old Bryson Fitch, a father of three. The Coast Guard on Twitter posted a video and said a helicopter crew from Astoria, Oregon, hoisted two people from a life raft into the helicopter during rough weather and large waves. It was then that Fitch’s family got the call no one wants to hear. >click to read< 07:43
After a highly anticipated start, Kodiak’s Tanner crab season is almost over
Kodiak’s Tanner crab fleet spent the first two weeks of the season tied up at the docks, awaiting better prices from local seafood processors. And after a highly anticipated opener just over a week ago on Jan. 30, the season is nearly over; most of the fishery had closed by the end of the weekend. Fisherman Eddie Perez was selling Tanners from his boat, the F/V Vero Victoria, on Monday morning. He had about 500 crabs on board when he pulled up to the dock – and he expected to sell out by noon. “Everybody’s been really excited, happy that local fishermen are offering to the community and it’s been going really good,” said Perez. >click to read< 15:53
A lament of whales and windmills
So, today my wife and I went to a memorial service for Ms. Corrine Damon (a faithful servant of the Lord). A friend from church (Len Wolfe) asked if I would look into what is going on with the wind turbine generator site exploration and construction and its impacts on marine life and their habitats. Len was mainly concerned with the many Humpback whales washing up on the northeast coastal areas (especially around the New Jersey coastline). It affects the fisheries all the way up through Maine, and politics (and industry money) are the deciding factors in the equation. One website on Youtube named “Will Offshore Wind Harm Marine Life” by a group called “The Maine Reset” shows that some of the construction areas will have “Wind Farms” with as few as a dozen of these rigs set up (with these massive chains intertwined underneath each other). >click to read< 12:19
Bomb disposal team called after fishermen trawl wartime mine off coast
The bomb squad was called to Teesside after a fishing vessel trawled a wartime mine off the coast of Hartlepool. A two-person crew of the fishing boat had trawled the explosive device and were five miles off the coast of the town. The Royal Navy bomb disposal experts were called out to meet the 13m boat shortly after 10.40pm last night. The squad had travelled down from Scotland to carry out the operation but were unable to launch their own boat and the Hartlepool RNLI was called in to assist. >click to read< 11:30
Legal sizes for lobsters trapped off New England could change to protect population
The regulatory Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is considering changing the standards by a fraction of an inch in some of the fishing grounds. The commission said it’s considering the changes because of a worrisome lack of baby lobsters growing off New England. The commission is soliciting public comment on the proposal and plans to hold public hearings about it in March, Starks said. The changes would affect lobster fishers from Maine to the waters off southern New England, and the hearings will be held in those places, Starks said. Changes could be implemented by fall 2024 if they are approved,,, >click to read< 09:09
Catch of a lifetime: Rare blue lobster landed in Belfast Lough
Stuart Brown 28, from Bangor, Co Down, said he could not believe his eyes when he pulled one of his lobster pots up onto the deck of his boat, the Huntress, last Friday. Some marine biologists have estimated the odds of catching a blue lobster at around two million to one. “We were sitting in about 50 to 60 feet of water and the fourth pot came up,” he recalled. “I sort of saw it, but I think I thought, ‘it’s just a lobster’. You could hear the tail going. “I slid the pot down to the crew man who lifted it out and he made a comment: ‘That’s very blue.’ >click to read< 08:21
UPDATED: Search Suspended. Coast Guard, partner agencies save 2, search for missing man near Willapa Bay entrance
The Coast Guard and other agencies are searching for a missing man who was aboard a vessel in distress Sunday off the coast of Washington near the Willapa Bay entrance. Watchstanders at the Thirteenth Coast Guard District in Seattle received an Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon transmission Sunday at approximately 7:30 p.m. from the 46-foot crabbing vessel Ethel May near the Willapa Bay Entrance. Watchstanders at Coast Guard Sector Columbia River in Warrenton, Oregon, were notified that the wife of one of the men aboard the vessel called 911 to report an emergency aboard the vessel. Video, >click to read< 18:50
Updated: Search for Missing Fisherman Suspended – The U.S. Coast Guard and partner agencies suspended search efforts at 5:30 p.m. Monday evening for a missing man in Willapa Bay, Washington. Rescue crews completed 18 different search patterns, covering 290 sq. miles during over 15-hours of searching. >click to read< 13:51
Are NOAA scientists being silenced? By Jim Lovgren
Since the beginning of December there have been at least twelve strandings of whales along the New York and New Jersey shores, all resulting in the death of these animals. An abnormal amount of strandings have been reported in a few southern states as well during this time frame, exacerbating
what NOAA has declared as an unusual mortality event taking place on the East coast that started in 2016. These deaths include, Humpback, Minke, Fin, Sperm, Northern Right Whale, various Dolphins and more since 2016. Many of the Mammals stranded are endangered species, with the Northern Right Whale considered critically endangered having a population of less then 350 animals remaining, which is down from close to 500 only a decade ago. A curious coincidence among these particular marine mammals is that they are classified as Low frequency cetaceans, meaning that they communicate, navigate and feed using low frequency sound. Similar to the frequency most commonly used for sonar mapping or submarine detection by the Navy. >click to read the article< 16:02
South Korea: Five missing crew members of capsized fishing boat found dead
Five missing crew members of a 24-ton fishing boat that capsized off the southwestern coast were found dead inside the vessel, Monday, Coast Guard officials said. Seawater started to flood the ship’s engine room, causing the vessel, the Cheongbo, to overturn at 11:19 p.m. Saturday in waters 16.6 kilometers west of the uninhabited island of Daebichi that lies some 20 km from the southwestern county of Sinan. Nine of the 12 people, including three foreign nationals, on board the ship were missing following the accident, while the other three were rescued by another boat at the scene. >click to read< 13:03
Southeast Alaska communities set to join opposition to lawsuit that threatens king salmon fishery
Ketchikan, Wrangell and Petersburg are set to join a growing chorus of Alaska voices highlighting the impact the suit could have on the region’s fishing fleet. The lawsuit from the Washington state-based Wild Fish Conservancy centers on an endangered Puget Sound population of orcas known as Southern Resident killer whales. Killer whales eat salmon, especially big, meaty king salmon, and the conservation group argues federal officials haven’t properly accounted for the impact the Southeast king salmon fishery has on the Puget Sound orcas. Late last year, a federal judge issued a report that threatens to close the Southeast king salmon fishery until the National Marine Fisheries Service comes up with a fix. >click to read< 11:50
Proposed Snowy Grouper Management Measures Will Harm the Stock and Commercial Fishermen — Help Us Fight
Last fall the [SAFMC] South Atlantic Fishery Management Council approved Amendment 51 to the South Atlantic Snapper/Grouper FMP. Now the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is considering whether or not to sign it into law. Amendment 51 would modify snowy grouper management measures for the worse. It will continue to allow recreational sector over-harvesting, increase recreational dead discards, harm the stock, and deal another devastating blow to commercial fishermen in the South Atlantic. Our commercial fisheries are under attack with a 43% reduction of ACL and Amendment 51 is just the latest salvo with more to come. Now is our chance to stand up for conservation and commercial fishermen. >click to read< 10:45
The New Generation of Hydropower Dams Let Fish Swim Straight Through
The journey between the States and the Sargasso Sea is complicated not only by the trawling nets of fisherman, but the steep concrete walls and sharp steel turbines of hydroelectric power plants, over 900 of which are located within the native range of the American eel. Such dams provide huge amounts of emissions-free energy to the US, making them an essential tool in fighting climate change. Allowing fish to safely pass directly through turbines is a new frontier in making dams fish friendly. Thus far, Natel has completed three hydro installations: in Oregon, Maine, and Austria. >click to read< 09:24
Green groups targeting blue-collar lobstermen are largely funded by dark money
Environmental groups that have led litigation targeting the lobster fishing industry have been heavily funded by various liberal dark money groups that don’t disclose their individual donors, a Fox News Digital review of tax filings found. For example, the Center For Biological Diversity has received millions of dollars from left-wing dark money groups including the Rockefeller Family Fund, the Patagonia Fund and Pew Charitable Trusts. The center has been the recipient of grants worth nearly $8 million from the Sandler Foundation, $1 million from the Wilburforce Foundation, $850,000 from Environment Now and another $815,000 from the Frankel Family Foundation, according to Influence Watch. Video, >click to read< 07:42
Right whale found entangled in Canadian lobster fishing gear in U.S. waters
A right whale found entangled in lobster fishing gear in waters off the southern United States was disentangled by U.S. marine mammal rescue responders last weekend. An investigation by U.S. officials and Fisheries and Oceans Canada has determined the gear was from Lobster Fishing Area 33 in Southern Nova Scotia, according to a DFO release. The adult whale is identified officially as North Atlantic right whale 1218 and known as Argo. According to the release, it is the first entanglement connected to Canada’s lobster fishery in five years. The release said the harvester reported the lost gear to DFO. >click to read< 17:58
9 missing after fishing boat capsizes in South Korea
South Korean coast guard vessels and aircraft on Sunday were searching for nine fishermen who disappeared after their boat capsized off the country’s southwestern coast. The coast guard from the southwestern port city of Mokpo said that three crew members were rescued by a nearby commercial vessel following the accident late Saturday near Daebichi Island in the sea county of Sinan. Survivors said the boat’s engine room had quickly filled with water before the 24-ton vessel tipped over, according to the coast guard. Photos, >click to read< 15:57
