Tag Archives: Little Cranberry Island
Boatbuilding program launches dory this Saturday
Bouncing back from the COVID-19 shutdown last year, Islesford Boatworks is celebrating the launch of its 16th boat this Saturday. The 20-foot dory will be used by a local lobsterman, Rick Alley, to net groundfish for bait. Like their other boats, the dory was completed in summer boatbuilding school for children ages 6 to 16. Islesford Boatworks was founded in 2006 on Little Cranberry Island to use wooden boatbuilding to help preserve the local maritime legacy and to teach children woodworking, island ecology and island history. Each year, a group of kids and adults completes a wooden boat and launches it in August in a pirate-themed gala. >click to read< 07:55
Cranberry Isles Fishermen’s Co-op celebrates 40 years
In 1978, Bruce Fernald and Dave Thomas went to consult with an attorney about starting a fishermen’s cooperative and left the attorney’s office with a contract. “We had a purchase and sale agreement and away we went,” said Thomas. They were purchasing an existing lobster buying business, one that had been operated by Lee Ham for nearly two decades. Ham put the dock up for sale just as Thomas, Fernald and other fishermen from the island were contemplating creating a member-owned cooperative. The co-op began with about 25 members, Thomas said, and the first couple of years of the operation were bumpy. >click to read<11:35
Tiny American town Little Cranberry Island, Maine is staking its future on Chinese foodies
The long journey from this remote island of free-spirited fishermen to the most populous country in the world began, as it does most mornings, at just about sunrise. Bruce Fernald, a sixth-generation fisherman, loaded his 38-foot fiberglass boat with half a ton of bait and set out in search of Maine’s famed crustacean: the lobster. One by one, Fernald checked the 800 traps he had placed along 30 square miles at the bottom of the Gulf of Maine. He quickly hauled each wire cage onto his boat, reached a gloved hand inside and plucked out the lobster lurking within. The young ones, the breeders and the crusty old ones were thrown back into the water. The rest were dropped into a saltwater tank to keep them alive and energetic on their 7,000-mile trip to China. Read the story here 20:45
