Tag Archives: whale protections
Annual fisheries meeting tackles lobster lawsuits, whale protections
Tuesday in Washington D.C., key players from Maine’s lobster fishery tackled what it considers its most pressing issues. The first issue was an update regarding Judge James Boasberg’s July ruling in the U.S. District Court case involving the Center for Biological Diversity versus Secretary Raimondo and the Maine Lobstermen’s Association. This case made the news in early July after Boasberg ruled regulators aren’t doing enough to protect the right whale. Just days after, he sided with environmental groups in another lawsuit to allow Area 1 to close again to fishermen this coming fall and winter. Another issue was a proposal to shrink the size limit for lobsters over the course of five years in order to replenish the declining population of young lobsters. Also, reduced boat speeds and the future of ropeless lobster traps. >click to read< 20:15
DMR Commissioner Patrick Keliher: NMFS didn’t give the state’s plan credit for all of its whale protections
The state Department of Marine Resources believes that its right whale plan, with its range of lobster fishing restrictions meant to avoid gear entanglements, clocks in right around the 60 percent risk reduction target sought by the National Marine Fisheries Service. Federal regulators – who determined that the state plan reduced risk by just 52 percent – failed to give Maine credit for all its proposed protection measures, as well as those enacted since the last federal right whale review in 2014, Marine Resources Commissioner Pat Keliher said Wednesday. >click to read< 07:15
Maine Lobstermen Dismayed By Fed’s Push For More Gear Changes To Protect Endangered Whale – >click to read<
Halving the number of vertical lines – Finding consensus on whale protections a tough call in Maine
Federal regulators have given Maine’s lobster industry its marching orders: Find a way to cut the number of surface-to-seabed fishing lines by 50 percent to help prevent the injury or death of even one of the endangered right whales that pass through the Gulf of Maine. The National Marine Fisheries Service is allowing each lobstering state to develop its own plan to protect the whale, whose numbers have fallen to a little more than 400 in recent years. But it will be hard to find one way to make it work in Maine, where the $485 million-a-year fishery is known for its diversity. >click to read<07:29
