Tag Archives: Atlantic Ocean
Atlantic herring suffering in warming Gulf of St. Lawrence
Decades of research show a slow decline in herring stocks in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and scientists are linking that decline to waters that are warming with climate change. Recent research from NASA found that about 90 per cent of global warming is occurring in the ocean. In the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Joël Chassé, an oceanographer with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, said 11 of 12 months last year had warmer than normal surface temperatures, and he expects a similar pattern this year. “Fishermen in northern New Brunswick, the Baie des Chaleur region, were having difficulty finding the fish,” said Jacob Burbank, a researcher in fish ecology with Fisheries and Oceans Canada. “They weren’t seeing Atlantic herring where they normally would see Atlantic herring. They kept waiting for them to come in for their spawning and they just didn’t see them.” more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 11:40
Sea Harvest fishing trawler had ‘excellent’ record: Families of lost fishermen pray for miracle
The Sea Harvest fishing trawler that sunk with 20 crew on board had been serviced before it rapidly took water and sunk offshore from Hout Bay. The families of two fishermen still missing at sea remained hopeful yesterday for their loved ones’ return, after the search for 11 fishermen was called off on Sunday. Sea Harvest spokesperson Anthea Abraham said the vessel went for mandatory service. Faadiel Groenewald, 27, and Wilfred Swiers, from Pella near Atlantis, are among those presumed drowned after the trawler, FV Lepanto, sunk at around 35 nautical miles offshore. more, >>CLICK TO READ< 08:11
No hope for 11 missing fishermen
Hopes of finding the remaining 11 fishermen aboard the sunken MFV Lepanto owned by Sea Harvest were dealt a major blow when the search-and-rescue operation was called off on Sunday. The SA Maritime Safety Authority (Samsa) launched an investigation after the vessel sank about 34 nautical miles offshore of Hout Bay on Friday afternoon. At least five fishing vessels reached the search area, locating and recovering nine of 20 local fishermen from a life raft. “The nine survivors were not injured and they were brought to the Port of Table Bay aboard a fellow fishing vessel during the night. They are in the care of their fishing company. more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 07:52
Biden administration plans to tee up offshore wind across the nation’s coastlines
The Biden administration is planning to boost offshore wind energy production, announcing up to a dozen opportunities for industry to bid on chances to build wind turbines in U.S. oceans over the next five years. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland is slated to announce the lease sales at a conference in New Orleans. The 12 potential opportunities Haaland is announcing include sales in the central Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Maine, Gulf of Mexico, the New York Bight and off the coast of Oregon, California, Hawaii and a yet-to-be-determined U.S. territory. These sales were described as potential sales that could occur rather than ones definitely slated to happen, and if former President Trump wins election, he may want to cancel them. more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 14:56
Offshore Wind Lease Areas Impede on Historic Fishing Grounds
In announcing its decision Monday (the initial deadline for comment), BOEM said it received requests from tribal nations and stakeholders to provide more time to review and comment on the lengthy environmental document. The decision also came on the 40th anniversary of COA’s incorporation. “When we started in 1984, the ocean was the dumping capital of the world. We worked really hard to clean it up and in 2000 we ended ocean dumping. (That’s) the power of the people,” Cindy Zipf, COA executive director, said. Since then, the Atlantic Ocean has thrived, she added. “We’ve seen majestic animals and (the) bounty of what she (the ocean) provides (us) free,” Zipf said. “What’s the return now? There’s a bunch of people that want to industrialize the ocean to claim some green energy revolution, but the facts aren’t there. We don’t see them.” more, by Gina G. Scala, >>click to read<< 10:41
Seal overpopulation having ‘significant and damaging impact’ on Canadian fish stocks: report
Canadian parliamentarians are warning that seal populations pose a danger to fish stocks and are upsetting marine ecosystems in the Pacific, Arctic and Atlantic oceans. A bipartisan report from the House of Commons standing committee on fisheries and oceans says urgent measures are needed from the federal government and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, including an increase in the humane seal harvest. “This report’s objective is to draw the attention of DFO, relevant departments and the Canadian government to important observational and empirical evidence that the overpopulation of pinnipeds on Canada’s three coasts is having a significant and damaging impact on the health and conservation of fish stocks and is creating an imbalance in our marine ecosystems,” the study concludes. more, >>click to read<< 18:00
Shrimp Alliance request fisheries disaster declaration
There’s no other way to put it if you ask Aaron Wallace. Despite a decent catch by the eight shrimp boats that supply Anchored Shrimp Co. in Brunswick, the prices fishermen are getting for their hauls aren’t what they should be. “It’s been one of our toughest years,” Wallace said. He and his father, John Wallace, own Anchored Shrimp and operate the Gale Force, one of the boats that serve the company’s retail and wholesale business. The Southern Shrimp Alliance, for which John Wallace serves as a member of the board of directors, is calling the flood of imported shrimp a crisis. The alliance asked the governors of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas in a letter on Aug. 25 to collectively request a fisheries disaster determination by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce for the U.S. shrimp fishery. >>click to read<< 11:06
‘Tragedy of the Commons’ Will be the Fate of Marine Environment in Atlantic Offshore Wind Farms
Like the English commons, the Atlantic waters could take just so much ‘grazing’. The Canadian government finally recognized the cod fishery had crashed and closed it;,, Recognizing that fish could not be owned until they were caught, government regulators attempted to at least partially privatize fishing rights. So too, the waters in which they swim (Hague Line dividing CN and US waters in the Gulf of Maine and on Georges Bank.) It was that bottom and those waters that wind farm builders wanted “rights”.,,, So, the question arises “why don’t the fishing interests move to protect these sensitive marine habitats?” They have tried without much success. >click to read< 18:43
A Chesapeake blue crab turned up on Dollymount Strand in Ireland
While the crab is not much to look at in terms of alien invaders, the National Biodiversity Data Centre has warned it is larger and more competitive than native crabs, and the female can lay up to six million eggs a year. Once in competition with the smaller Irish native crabs the American version – also known as the American blue crab, would be likely to take over, scientists fear. The appearance of the crab on Dollymount strand, where it was photographed last month by Ruth McManus, is the first recorded appearance of the crab on these shores. How it got here is a bit of a mystery, the centre says it hopes the “Dollymount One” is something of a one-off. >click to read< 15:40
Stone crab season opens Oct. 15 with new regulations in place
For roughly a week now, armadas of Floridian crabbing fleets and their deckhands have boated miles offshore into the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean to lay their traps on the depths. Come Thursday, Oct. 15, 2020, these crabbers will venture out again to launch Florida’s stone crab season, hauling in anticipated bounties of Menippe mercenaria and their treasured claws. “We’re putting them out right now,” Richard Stiglitz, owner of the Homosassa-based Salty Bones Fisheries, said about 650 of his 10,000 traps. It’ll take some time before crabbing crews know what kind of season they’ll have. >click to read< 10:05
Maine lobstermen spray-paint trap lines for whale entanglement study
Stores up and down the coast special-ordered quantities of purple paint this winter in anticipation of a state-inspired data collection effort, spearheaded by the Maine Department of Marine Resources. With approximately 4,500 commercial lobstermen in the state setting up to 800 traps each, that is a lot of purple spray paint. For those who got a jump on the lobster season, the job was underway in late February, indoors, amidst fumes of acetone and toluene. For others, it has been an outdoor project, long and messy. But the lobstermen mostly agree that at least the state and National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration will gather definitive evidence indicating whose lines — U.S., Canadian, from Maine or other states — are entangling the endangered North Atlantic Right Whales in the Gulf of Maine and Atlantic Ocean. photos, >lick to read< 17:57
Hibernia platform shut down after oil spill off Newfoundland into the Atlantic Ocean
Production has stopped aboard the Hibernia oil platform off the coast of St. John’s after an undetermined amount of oil spilled from a storage cell into the water. An oil sheen was spotted Wednesday, and the company said in a news release that the spill was an “isolated activity.” In a separate release issued about six hours later, the company announced the rig had halted activity. >click to read< 09:13
Death by Killer Algae
They didn’t think much of the first dead whale. Dwarfed by the rugged cliffs of Patagonia’s high green fjords, the team of biologists had sailed into a gulf off the Pacific Ocean searching for the ocean’s smaller animals, the marine invertebrates they were there to inventory. That night, while hunting for an anchorage in a narrow bay, the team spotted a large, dead whale floating on the water’s surface. But for the biologists, death—even of such an enormous animal—didn’t seem so unusual. Not so unusual, that is, until they found the second whale, lying on the beach. And a third. And a fourth. In all, they found seven in that bay alone. Over the next day, they counted a total of 25 dead whales in the fjord. click here to read the story 15:42
Roll the tape! Click on the image to watch.Atlantic Ocean temperatures continue above normal: report – record highs on Grand Banks
Warmer ocean temperatures are continuing in Canada’s Atlantic Ocean zones, according to the latest released by Fisheries and Oceans Canada. Almost no sea ice made it to the Scotian Shelf off Nova Scotia for the fourth consecutive winter, while ice was near normal on the Newfoundland and Labrador shelves. Read the rest here 23:59
BOEM (the ocean destruction agency) targets fishing impacts
The US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has complied ‘best management practices’ (BMPs) to reduce fishing impacts by offshore wind energy development in the Atlantic Ocean. The agency and offshore wind leaseholders will use the recommendations in individual development plans. Read the rest here 20:05
