Tag Archives: looming bait crisis

Despite a banner year, looming bait crisis leaves plenty of Maine lobstermen anxious

Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, is worried about the severity of herring restrictions imposed by the federal government after the species failed to reproduce in sustainable numbers last year. “It’s about as bad as we can imagine, but we don’t yet know what it’s going to translate to for the fishermen,” McCarron said. McCarron said that Maine fishermen face a shortage of some 50 million pounds of bait in the coming season. “We’re seeing an 84 percent reduction in that particular source of bait, so we’ll have less than 5,000 metric tons, which will probably be caught in a week, in one week,” she said.>click to read<12:04