Tag Archives: lobster
Australian Lobster Sector Claws Back Trade After China Ban
Australia’s rock lobster exports are worth half a billion US dollars a year — and in normal times, 94 percent of them go to China. But all that changed a few weeks ago, when Beijing imposed a near-total import ban on lobster, part of a broader politically charged “shadow trade war”. “It has affected us drastically,” third-generation fisherman Fedele Camarda told AFP. “Our income has been reduced considerably.”,,, local authorities recently changed legislation to allow commercial rock lobster fishers to sell large quantities from the back of their boats,,, >click to read< 10:40
RCMP Investigates – Pictou Landing chief says lobster fisher was shot at on the water
RCMP in Pictou County, N.S. have one person in custody after reports of shots fired Sunday in the area of Pictou Landing First Nation. RCMP spokesperson Cpl. Lisa Croteau said RCMP responded to the incident around 5:30 p.m. She said she could not provide an exact location of the incident, only that it was “in the Pictou Landing area.” Croteau said no injuries have been reported and a police investigation is ongoing. >click to read< 06:30
Western rock lobster head to supermarkets across Australia amid China trade woes
It is a deal that would have been unimaginable last Christmas, when Chinese customers were snapping up western rock lobster at jaw-dropping prices and locals in the port city of Geraldton, where they were caught, often missed out. But the fishers’ co-operative has now signed a contract with a supermarket giant to put the prized shellfish on retail shelves across Australia at the relative bargain price of $20 each for a cooked lobster. The coronavirus pandemic and worsening trade crisis with China has seen rock lobster fishers focus on the market closer to home. Video, >click to read< 11:05
Sipekne’katik First Nation Chief frustrated, ceases lobster fishery talks with feds
In a letter sent Wednesday to Fisheries Minister Bernadette Jordan, Sipekne’katik Chief Mike Sack says the department has neither the “desire nor the ability” to recognize and implement the Mi’kmaq band’s constitutionally protected treaty right to fish. Sack expresses frustration with the nation-to-nation discussions and says Ottawa has tried to lump his band’s treaty rights in with regulation of commercial licenses. A spokesperson in the minister’s office was not immediately available for comment. >click to read< 14:31
Opinion: The Reason for No Season – Jim O’Connell
These are 2 females. The black shelled female on the left did not shed this year for the first time skipping the yearly shed. It now has eggs. It was a pound and a half and does not have to shed every year anymore.,,, Canada is not protecting the reproductive potential with it’s seasonal rules. They force the lobstermen to throw the baby out with the bath water. Lobstermen who are trying to make a living for the whole year in two months are targeted on the most important lobster for reproduction.,,, The First Nations have publicly come out and said they want to improve the regulations on the present method for sustainability. Jim O’Connell, >click to read< 15:36
Lobsters to be given away to Mainers in Need Christmas Eve
Nothing says Maine generosity quite like giving away lobsters to those in need. And on Christmas Eve, no less. Local lobsterman, Noah Ames, and his family have been giving away lobster to those in need in the past and now, in the dumpster fire that is 2020, they’re not stopping as the need for food assistance is greater than ever. >click to read< with a message and details from Noah Ames! Merry Christmas!
Delay, Delay, Delay. No Dec. 7 start to LFA 34 commercial lobster season off southwestern N.S.
While there had been a weather window for a possible start to the LFA 34 commercial lobster season later in the day on Monday, Dec. 7, it’s been decided that window wasn’t ideal enough to get things underway, and so the season start has seen another delay. The plan as of Monday morning was now for a conference call at 4 p.m. to discuss a possible Tuesday, Dec. 8 opening. A time of 4 a.m. for a Tuesday opening is being looked at it. The season had originally been slated to start on Nov. 30. >click to read< 12:09
Dec. 7 dumping day on standby off southwestern N.S. – Captains and crews should be prepared to leave
The start of the LFA 34 commercial lobster season off southwestern N.S. remained on standby on Sunday evening, Dec. 6, following a late afternoon industry conference call. But there was a weather window being eyed for Monday, Dec. 7 for the season to possibly start anytime after 10 a.m.,, “If the call (Monday) morning gives the okay, there will be a delayed start, anytime after 10 a.m. Captains and crews should be prepared to leave late morning at the earliest on Monday, Dec. 7.” photos, >click to read< 16:52
Dec. 7 start now being eyed as weather keeps delaying LFA 34 opening
After a very lengthy conference call on Friday afternoon, Dec. 4, it’s still a no-go for the opening of the LFA 34 commercial lobster fishery off southwestern N.S. Boats, which have been loaded with traps since last weekend, won’t head out to the dumping grounds on Saturday or Sunday. The next industry/DFO conference call is slated for 4 p.m. on Sunday to discuss whether a Monday, Dec. 7 season start will be possible. >click to read< 07:07
LFA 33 to open, Monday a no-go for LFA 34: weather forecast leads to split start of commercial lobster season
The fishery in Lobster Fishing Area (LFA) 33, which runs along the province’s south shore will open as scheduled on Monday, with boats leaving at 7 a.m. But that’s not the case for LFA 34 off southwestern Nova Scotia, which, following days of fine weather over the weekend, won’t see boats heading out for dumping day on the traditional last Monday of November. With boats loaded with traps and gear for the start of the season, two industry and stakeholder conference calls held over the weekend,,, “The lobster fishery is vital to our region and our province, and there is a very real anxiety among our community members that this important economic driver is in jeopardy, >click to read< 15:30
‘Bad things can happen on nice days’: Lobster season safety takeaways
Neil LeBlanc still remembers the moment he and a crew member made eye contact after the man had been pulled overboard from their lobster vessel. A rope was clenched in the man’s hand. “I remember him looking right at me. As soon as we made eye contact, he was gone.” LeBlanc knows from experience how fast you can disappear from the deck of a vessel.,, But that calm April day in 2016, LeBlanc says, also shows how things can go wrong at any time. As soon as their crew member Wayne Jacquard had gone overboard that day, as soon as their eye contact had been made, LeBlanc was turning the boat around to retrieve their man. Helping him onboard with the rescue was crew member Alderic DeViller, known to his friends as Beef (his nickname). >click to read< 10:30
Past lobster season openers starts and misses in southwestern Nova Scotia
There are years the opening of the lobster fishery off southwestern Nova Scotia goes off without a hitch, but not always. The season is always slated to start on the last Monday of November, but sometimes the weather says otherwise. The opening day, when fishermen head to sea to set their traps, is known as dumping day. After traps have been set, boats can start hauling their catches at one minute after midnight, when day two gets underway. Here’s a look at some past season openers. 2015: Good start, good price – The lobster season got off to a good start with decent opening day weather and better yet, a better price than in previous years. Fishermen were being paid around $6 a pound for their landings. photos, >click to read< 07:49
Lobster: the last, best fishery – Stocks are healthy, but why?
In the early 2000s, while he was working on one of Clearwater Seafoods’ four offshore lobster boats in Lobster Fishing Area (LFA) 41, Frank – not his real name – was deeply impressed by the incredible lobster catches, and the incredible size of the lobsters. Frank tells the Halifax Examiner that at the time there hadn’t been a lot of lobster fishing in LFA 41, and it wasn’t until 2007 that Clearwater obtained the last of its eight licences, which gave it a 
monopoly on offshore lobster. The boat Frank was on would fish with 27 strings of gear, and each of those had 125 traps for a total of 3,375 traps. They would fish close to the 50-mile line, which divided the offshore from the inshore fishery. Frank remembers when on a single day in the fall of 2005, they landed 28,000 lobsters. Part 1. >click to read< Part 2 – 11:05
Lobsters Are A Prawn In The Trade Wars
American lobster and lobster fishers got caught in a trade war being fought on multiple fronts. The United States is battling China on one major front and the European Union (EU) on another, but as is typical in trade wars, it’s lobster production in another country that’s winning the war. In this case, Canada. If that weren’t enough, tariffs are the root cause of the trade war, but not in the way you might think. China’s tariffs on U.S. lobsters are in retaliation for President Trump’s China tariffs over intellectual property. The EU didn’t raise its tariffs on U.S. lobster, but rather lowered them on Canadian ones as part of their free trade agreement. In other words, U.S. lobsters were never meant to be the target of either Chinese or EU,,, How the lobster trade war started isn’t nearly as interesting as the efforts to stop it. >click to read< 10:28
‘We won’: Clearwater Seafoods deal gives Mi’kmaq control of lucrative ocean stretch
Early this week, leaders of the Membertou and Miawpukek First Nations, both of which are Mi’kmaq communities, reached an agreement to buy Nova Scotia-based Clearwater Seafoods in a deal worth C$1bn (£580m). Heralded as the “single largest investment in the seafood industry by any Indigenous group in Canada”, the landmark deal comes at a critical moment for Indigenous communities in the region, as tensions remain high over their treatied fishing rights. >click to read< 15:48
Number One? Bridlington could officially become the Lobster Capital of Europe
Moves are underway to officially promote Bridlington as the Lobster Capital of Europe. Academics believe the resort could attract thousands of new visitors by making the most of its unique lobster fishery. They say adopting marketing techniques used by similar American and Canadian fishing ports could put Bridlington on the global tourism map with more festivals and merchandising. And they want cafes and restaurants in the town to start putting lobster landed in Bridlington Harbour on the menu. For none of the 300 tonnes of shellfish currently landed there every year is actually available to eat locally. >click to read< 14:48
“There’s something awful fishy going on here”: What about Clearwater and the offshore lobster fishery?
Media attention is trained on St. Mary’s Bay in southwest Nova Scotia, where the Sipekne’katik First Nation led by Chief Michael Sack has been exercising Treaty rights to a “moderate livelihood” fishery since September 17. But what is happening in the offshore lobster fishery is going largely unnoticed. That is absolutely understandable, given the very ugly scenes that erupted,,, But what is happening in the offshore could also have wide-reaching impacts on the Atlantic lobster fishery and independent inshore fishers, and is also worth keeping an eye on.,, Just nine days before Sipekne’katik fishers took to the waters, Membertou First Nation and Clearwater Seafoods announced that they had “reached an agreement for the sale of two of Clearwater’s eight offshore lobster licences” to Membertou. >click to read< 19:52
Australian lobster exports feared latest victim of China trade dispute
Tonnes of live Australian lobster are stranded on the tarmac at a Chinese airport, prompting fears they are the next victim in the ongoing trade dispute between Australia and China. The lobsters are facing Chinese customs clearance issues as exporters run out of time to get them into restaurants and shops before they are spoiled. A rejection of the lobsters or a further delay of more than 48 hours, would send a message that it is another trade strike after a year of rising tensions. In 2018-19 more than 94 per cent of Australia’s $752 million rock lobster exports went to China, >click to read< 08:17
Zone B waits to present recommendation
Even though a deadline to present a state plan designed to minimize potential harm to right whales is fast approaching, members of the Zone B Lobster Management Council asked Department of Marine Resources officials to check numbers for the area 6-12 miles offshore before agreeing to a plan specific to that fishing zone. “The timeline is short,” said DMR Commissioner Pat Keliher,,, While most members of the Zone B council seemed in favor of the subcommittee’s recommendations, there was some hesitation. “I support this; it would work for me,” said Howland. “I’d hate to railroad it if there are some concerns. This is better than it could be, but it doesn’t sound like it’s ideal for some guys.”,, “There’s a side of me that feels like this is getting stuffed down my throat,” said council member James Hanscom after asking if the decision could be tabled. >click to read< 08:09
Despite an uncertain start to the fishery’s season, Maine lobster rolls on as the industry pivoted to new markets
Stonington lobster fisherman John Williams usually hauls his boat out in February for annual maintenance and paint in preparation for the start of the spring fishing season. “Then COVID started,” The health emergency was worsening and the economy shutting down. That included one of the lobster industry’s biggest markets — restaurants. The large cruise ship and casino markets also slammed shut. International freight and shipping to China, emerging as a large consumer of lobster, had nearly stopped. “I got thinking about it and said, ‘This doesn’t look very good. We won’t have any market,’” Williams says. >click to read< 10:31
Trudeau government rejects lobster quota system for commercial inshore fleet
Fisheries and Oceans Minister Bernadette Jordan issued a statement Friday after meeting with commercial fishermen the day before. “As confirmed in that meeting, there is no plan to move to a quota system for the commercial lobster fishery and it is not being considered,” Jordan said. For decades, conservation in the billion-dollar commercial lobster fishery has been maintained by limiting the number of licence holders and traps. Stocks throughout Nova Scotia lobster fishing areas are healthy. Three Mikmaw parliamentarians have proposed the creation of an optional Atlantic First Nations fisheries authority to administer an Indigenous fishery. >click to read< 19:13
Long a lifeblood, South Shore fishing industry faces numerous challenges
Over his more than five decades fishing commercially, Frank Mirarchi has watched the business evolve from thriving and straightforward to complicated and diminished, with skyrocketing costs, foreign competition and changing regulations choking an industry synonymous with the South Shore. In the late 1960s, when he purchased his first of three successive boats, fish was abundant enough to make a solid living off of. “By 1985 or so, fishing was pretty bad,” Mirachi said. With profits dropping, he switched from having two other crew members to one. In 1994, the federal government stared limiting the number of days fishermen can be on the water to combat overfishing. Before, some spent 200 or more days fishing each year. Over the years, it was gradually reduced to 30. Mirarchi said this “wasn’t particularly successful”,,, >click to read< 08:54
Membertou First Nation buys two offshore lobster licences at $25 million
Membertou First Nation has reached an agreement with Clearwater Seafoods for a $25-million purchase of two offshore lobster licences. “We’re very excited here in Membertou First Nation. It’s a historic investment,” said Chief Terry Paul of the announcement made this week. “…It significantly increases our presence in the offshore commercial lobster fishing.” Clearwater Seafoods has a deal with 14 Mi’kmaq communities in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland regarding Arctic surf clams, announced last year. >click to read< 08:47
Sipekne’katik First Nation issuing own lobster licences
After a blessing of its fleet on Thursday morning, the Sipekne’katik First Nation will issue lobster fishing licences at the Saulnierville wharf. On Tuesday, the Potlotek First Nation in Cape Breton sent its plan to begin a rights-based moderate livelihood lobster fishery on Oct. 1 to federal Fisheries Minister Bernadette Jordan. They weren’t asking her permission, but rather for her to consult them on what they intend to do. “We’re tired of waiting and we’re tired of being poor,” Potlotek chief Wilbert Marshall said on Wednesday. >click to read< 08:26
Mi’kmaq planning their own moderate livelihood fishery outside DFO seasons
Canada’s Minister of Fisheries and Oceans is downplaying plans by Nova Scotia Mi’kmaq to create their own moderate livelihood fishery, characterizing the move as part of ongoing negotiations to implement a 21-year-old Supreme Court ruling. “Right now we are working with the First Nations communities to determine what a moderate livelihood fishery looks like. We’re continuing to have those meetings with them,”,, The Trudeau government has managed to get moderate livelihood deals with three bands; one in Quebec and two in New Brunswick. >click to read< 10:55
As the press ignores the real issues, Lobster fisher’s pro-Trump speech sets off political spat
A Maine lobster fisher spoke in favor of President Donald Trump’s trade policies during the Republican National Convention on Tuesday, earning a rebuke from the state’s Democratic party,,, Swan Island lobster harvester Jason Joyce said he was skeptical of Trump in 2016 and didn’t support him then, but has since come around because of the president’s trade deals.,, Trumps trade hostilities with China have taken a valuable market away from the U.S. lobster industry, Maine Democratic Party Chair Kathleen Marra said. But the industry faces numerous challenges, including the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the seafood business, the trade fight with China, a stubborn bait shortage and new protections designed to reduce risk to endangered whales. >click to read< 05:16
Jason Joyce Full speech RNC Day 2, Republican National Convention – an excellent testimonial, Jason. Thank you for being a truth teller. >Click to watch<
Lobster may lead to Coronavirus treatment
A Maine-based researcher and professor is optimistic a treatment for the global pandemic could be hiding in plain sight and Maine waters: in lobsters’ circulatory fluid, analogous to blood. That fluid, called hemolymph, is seen by most as trash — a throwaway byproduct that’s nothing more than production waste in lobster processing after they’re caught by fishermen. Lobsters’ hemolymph holds a protein that’s worked as an antiviral on herpes and shingles and may fight the coronavirus, Robert Bayer said. >click to read< 12:21
Consultation lacking on decision to reactivate licenses for Indigenous communities
The reactivation of dormant lobster fishing licences by the federal government has prompted a terse statement from the P.E.I. Fishermen’s Association (PEIFA) and the Maritime Fishermen’s Union (MFU). The two organizations say they were left out of consultation over the reactivation of 10 lobster licences by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) in the Lobster Fishing Area (LFA) 25, located on the western end of the Northumberland Strait between P.E.I. and New Brunswick.,,, The statement said fishermen were “frustrated” by the lack of consultation prior to the decision and called for the federal government to bring together Indigenous and non-Indigenous fishermen’s organizations. >click to read< 09:54
For New England lobstermen, resilience in ‘a season of uncertainty’
This is a tough season so far for Ms. Rosen, but over her 15 years of lobstering off Vinalhaven, Maine, she’s always been a better fall fisherman, she says. This season is like no other – the lobsters are slow to appear, but more than that, the coronavirus has caused trade to plummet and tourists to stay home. Rosen is selling her lobster for $3.35 per pound – a dollar less than last year – and she’s torn between wanting to catch more and worrying about flooding the market by catching too much. To supplement, she picked up a job with UPS in the afternoons after fishing. Ms. Rosen often fishes for her own bait rather than buying it.,, On Cape Cod, Glen Sveningson has been getting about $5.30 a pound wholesale, but it’s starting to fall. “Last year was one of the best years I’ve seen,” he says. >click to read< 13:17
New Brunswick: Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association says financial support program may not be enough
On Wednesday the federal government announced a $469-million program to help fish harvesters deal with financial burdens amid the COVID-19 pandemic, but the Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association worries it won’t be enough. Melanie Sonnenberg told Information Morning Saint John the program leaves out new fishermen and that’s concerning. “They’re our future, and we have to have some recognition, some special programming or something that we can plug them into to make sure they’re looked after so when we come out of this we’ll have a fishing industry that is every bit as robust as it was.” The fish harvesters benefit covers 75 per cent of income losses over 25 per cent for the 2020 tax year, compared to 2018 or 2019. The maximum benefit is $10,164. >click to read< 11:22
