Conservation & Environment

November 17, 2014 — While climate change is being used as one of the main reasons for the decline of cod in New England, a local commercial fish harvester points his finger at seals as the biggest culprit locally.

An Associated Press story recently drew a comparison between the decline of cod in the United States with what happened to the northern cod stocks in the late 1980s and 1990s that impacted Canada’s east coast communities and changed the face of the fishery in this province.

Low cod biomass estimates resulted in closure of cod fishing in parts of the Gulf of Maine and the implementation of a number of restrictions on the fishery.

Bernard Barter, who lives and fishes out of Three Rock Cove on the Port au Port Peninsula, said he can’t speak to the decline in the U.S., but said he’s running into a problem with seals.

While Barter has been fishing for 23 years, while involved in the sentinel fishery this year he’s had a record number of seals caught in his gear.

Read the full story from The Western Star 

 

November 14, 2014 — Beluga caviar from the Caspian Sea has long been regarded as the gold standard, which has had unfortunate consequences for sturgeon. Because of mankind’s longstanding and voracious appetite for caviar, enthusiastic overfishing of both Atlantic and European sturgeon caused the worldwide population to plummet. Both species are now critically endangered, and in most countries, it’s illegal to fish for either of them.

Perhaps because it’s now doubly rarified—not only is it illegal to produce, but it’s also illegal to bring into much of the Western world because of US and European sanctions against Iran—wild-caught Caspian Sea caviar has acquired a reputation for being the best that money can buy (and you need a lot of money to buy it: back in 2005, before the US enacted a ban on all imports of beluga caviar, a kilogram of the stuff fetched about $12,000). But not all caviar connoisseurs give a fuck about it.

“There’s no reason to consider Iranian caviar the best,” said Robert Gardner, the president of and self-appointed “caviar concierge” at American Caviar Company, which sells both wild-caught and farm-raised caviar online and at its New York City store. “Maybe people feel that way because historically, that’s the reputation it’s had. Or maybe it’s that special flavor that all the motor oil gives it,” Gardner joked, referring to the high levels of pollution in the Caspian Sea.

 In Gardner’s opinion, most people who buy caviar have no idea how it’s supposed to taste, but they purchase beluga because they’ve been told that it’s good.

“It’s kind of like, if you’re a man, and you put on a Ralph Lauren suit. You’re all like, ‘Ooooh, I’m wearing a Ralph Lauren.’ But you know what? Ralph Lauren is crap!” he said. “It’s the same thing with beluga caviar. Beluga became all, ‘Oh my God.’ But people don’t know what the hell beluga is.”

Read the full story at Vice

POULSBO, Wash. (AP) — November 17, 2014 — Just hours into the experiment, the prognosis was grim for salmon that had been submerged in rain runoff collected from one of Seattle's busiest highways. One by one, the fish were removed from a tank filled with coffee-colored water and inspected: They were rigid. Their typically red gills were gray.

"He's way dead," David Baldwin, a research zoologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Northwest Fisheries Science Center, declared at the four-hour mark.

This was the fate of coho salmon exposed to the everyday toxic brew of dirt, metals, oil and other gunk that washes off highway pavement after rains and directly into Puget Sound.

When that runoff was filtered through a simple mixture of gravel, sand and compost, however, the outlook was much brighter. Salmon exposed to treated water were healthy and responsive, even after 24 hours.

The research being conducted by scientists with NOAA, Washington State University and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service offers a promising solution to stormwater pollution, a major problem for Puget Sound and other streams and lakes in the nation.

With pollution from industrial pipes closely regulated, cities and states are more often tackling stormwater runoff that results from everyday activities: oils from leaky cars, pesticides from lawns and other pollutants that wash off roads and sidewalks and into streams and lakes.

Read the full story from The Associated Press at MyFoxNY.com

November 13, 2014 — Spring is arriving earlier than it used to in the Gulf of Maine, increasing average water temperatures and affecting the migratory patterns of fish species that are key to Maine’s marine ecosystem and coastal economy, according to a new federal report.

Over the past eight years, the date that scientists use to mark the transition to spring based on water temperature has gotten earlier by roughly two weeks for oceans off the northeastern and mid-Atlantic states. Likewise, the date for the transition to fall is falling later in the year, according to the report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center.

A similar trend is playing out in the Gulf of Maine.

“The spring transition date, currently identified as mid-May, is likely to shift to early April, and the fall transition, currently identified as mid-November, will likely shift well into December,” NOAA oceanographer Kevin Friedland said in a statement about the “Ecosystem Advisory” report. “This implies that the summer portion of the year, based on the transition temperatures, will increase by nearly two months to about 240 days. The extended summer period will have a significant impact on the living marine resources on the shelf. Organisms living in the Northeast Shelf ecosystem will have to deal with the challenges of a longer summer and competition from warm tolerant species entering their habitats.”

Released every six months, the NOAA report attempts to show how changes in water temperatures are affecting fisheries from North Carolina to Maine.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

November 9, 2014 — The Massachusetts Audubon Society rescued nine very cold Kemp’s ridley turtles, a critically endangered species, in Cape Cod Bay over the weekend.

The turtles were taken to the New England Aquarium’s Animal Care Center in Quincy for rehabilitation from hypothermia, said Tony LaCasse, an aquarium spokesman.

The weekend rescues brought the aquarium’s current number of turtles in its care up to 11. LaCasse pointed to that as a sign the turtle numbers would be normal this year despite low numbers of hatched sea turtles.

“The number of eggs from the nesting season was disappointingly low this year,” he said. “We’ve been debating whether there would be a lot of turtles this season or not. The folks who bet on low numbers are starting to sweat a little.”

Read the full story at the Boston Globe

November 7, 2014 — Populations of the cold-water species are down across their normal range as warming seas affect their ability to reproduce.

Marine scientists see the collapse of local shrimp stocks as part of a global pattern reflecting the impact of rising sea temperatures.

Regulators canceled the Maine shrimp season Wednesday, citing dwindling shrimp populations in the Gulf of Maine. But the implosion of northern shrimp stocks here is part of a larger trend across the North Atlantic. Stocks within fishing grounds from Labrador to Norway are in sharp decline, indicating that warming ocean temperatures are affecting the species’ abundance and ability to reproduce, according to fishery biologists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Populations of northern shrimp, a cold-water species, are down across their range, including in the Flemish Cap, Newfoundland’s Grand Banks, and waters off Greenland, Iceland and southern Norway, said Anne Richards, a fishery biologist at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

Richards serves as an adviser to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which met in Portland to cancel the upcoming winter shrimp season for the second year in a row. Regulators say the region’s population of northern shrimp in the Gulf of Maine plummeted from 2011 to 2012.
“All of a sudden, everything was gone,” Richards said. “It was almost like a vacuum came and sucked up all the shrimp.”

Read the full story from the Portland Press Herald

 

 

November 4, 2014 — A very large storm, the largest Alaska has seen in many years, is heading toward the Bering Sea.  KDLG’s Thea Card spoke with the National Weather Service and filed this report.

It’s currently brewing on the coasts of Japan.  It’s small right now but, by the end of the week, the storm will be absorbed by the jet stream in the Pacific and form Super Typhoon Nuri.  NWS meteorologist Matthew Clay says that super typhoon is expected to hit the Aleutians by the end of the week. He says this has the potential to be the biggest storm the Bering Sea has seen in a very long time.

“We’re looking at the low deepening potentially into the 920 millibar range which will likely bring hurricane force winds to the Aleutian Islands.  One of the bigger impacts we’re worried about is as that low moves further eastwards towards to Pribilof Islands, we’re going to start seeing southwest winds extended across the Bering Sea and in the Bristol Bay area which will drive seas anywhere from 20 to 30 feet for multiple days which could lead to a minor storm surge as well as coastal erosion.”

However, Clay says those in Bristol Bay, especially in Dillingham, shouldn’t panic.  Although the seas are going to be very high, he predicts between 10-15 feet, the bigger weather change in Bristol Bay due to this storm will be rain.

Read the full story and listen to the audio at KDLG

SEAFOODNEWS.COM by John Sackton with material from Ocean Trust  — November 5, 2014 –NEW ORLEANS — Senior scientists and fishery managers from leading fishing nations concluded three days of talks on the status of fisheries and sustainability of seafood at the fourth annual Science and Sustainability Forum (SSF) and called for the re- evaluation of seafood ecolabeling guidelines.  Many guidelines are being misapplied in small scale fisheries and coastal communities. A major concern expressed is that ecolabeling is creating market barriers for coastal fisheries and communities.

“What we have seen is that many of these [ecolabeling] schemes are eliminating access of small scale fisheries particularly in developing states to international markets, ” said Fabio Hazin, Chair of the UN Food & Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) Committee on Fisheries. “This is a very worrying trend and we have to come up with a solution for that. ”
 
Forum participants noted that even in developed countries there are many well-managed fisheries which simply do not have funds to go through a private third-party ecolabeling schemes.  Some of the scientists and managers and government officials at the forum questioned the need and additional costs of ecolabeling especially when many management systems already have a thorough scientific review process.
 
Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on fisheries management which involves extensive data collection, stock assessments, and teams of scientists and managers. Several forum participants discussed new programs at the national and state level to provide assurances that fisheries in their juristictions are sustainably managed and in conformance with the principles within the FAO guidelines for ecolabeling.
 
"Only ten percent of global fisheries have gone through private ecolabeling programs, " said Thor Lassen, president of Ocean Trust a co-convener and principle organizer for the forum. "There simply is not enough money to certify all fisheries in the world, nor does it make sense. We have to be more pragmatic when it comes to the ecolabeling of seafood products. "
 
Lahsen Ababouch, FAO’s Division Director for Policy and Economics presented a global review on the management and status of fisheries and aquaculture. Globally, fish production has been steadily increasing for many decades and per capita fish consumption has more than doubled since 1973 with an estimated average 8.3% yearly growth in aquaculture during the period 1970 – 2010, making it the fastest growing food production system.
 
Ray Hilborn, University of Washington School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences reported that where we have data and fisheries are actively managed, stocks are being managed sustainably refuting many claims expressed by environmental Non-governmental Organizations (eNGOs). As Hilborn noted, “In each case, science supports the ability of the existing management systems to sustain food from the sea:
 
– Overfishing is declining where fisheries are managed
– Marine Protected Areas do not improve fisheries yields where fisheries are well managed
– Environmental impacts of fishing are less than alternative food production systems
– Certification no longer seems to be about sustainability, but eNGO values of “acceptable” environmental impact”
 
In light of this progress, John Sackton, SeafoodNews.com asked: “Why are the public and media so wrong about fisheries?"
 
Steve Cadrin, president of AIFRB noted, “Misinformation needs to be corrected because an imbalanced agenda threatens the human aspects of sustainability”.
 
Several speakers challenged misleading information from NGOs regarding menhaden fisheries, the status of stocks, and bycatch in particular Oceana’s 2014 bycatch report which the Regional Fishery Management Councils said should be retracted and Benny Gallaway, LGL Ecological Research Associates suggested should be “carefully evaluated, especially when many of the claims are complete fabrications without any basis in fact”. 
 
NOAA's by catch reduction data process was highlighted, including monitoring bycatch in 573 US fisheries by 2017, and a substantial committment of funds. By contrast, many certified fisheries in other parts of the world have no by-catch reporting mechanisms whatsoever. At the conference it was pointed out that the Regional council's had asked Oceana to withdraw its bycatch report as being seriously wrong.
 
The councils said Oceana should retract the report until it has the time and/or resources to develop a better understanding of the data summarized in the National Bycatch Report and that Oceana should consider adopting a standardized peer review process to ensure reports like this accurately and objectively represent the best available science.
 
Defining sustainability is a large part of the problem. As Brian Rothschild, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth School for Marine Science and Technology pointed out “the language of sustainability is fuzzy…a concept that is constantly changing rather than a well-defined goal. What we need”, Rothschild continued “is a concrete definition with clear performance measures and minimum ambiguity that tracks environmental change.”
 
Dick Beamish former AIFRB (American Institute of Fisheries Research Biologists)  president and Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada scientist expanded upon in the link between macro changes in the environemnt and fish abundance.   His discussion focused on the link between Pacific salmon abundance and climate regime shifts in the ocean.  The Cohen Commission, which spent upwards of $40 million investigating why the 2009 Fraser River Sockeye run was the lowest in decades, only to be followed by a record run the next year, actually concluded "that marine conditions in both the Strait of Georgia and Queen Charlotte Sound in 2007 were likely to be the primary factors responsible for the poor returns in 2009. Abnormally high freshwater discharge, warmer-than- usual sea surface temperatures, strong winds, and lower-than-normal salinity may have resulted in abnormally low phytoplankton and nitrate concentrations that could have led to poor zooplankton (food for sockeye) production.”
 
Most NGO evaluations of fisheries have no mechanism to address large scale climate factors.
 
How we measure sustainability was further discussed by many speakers who pointed out that sustainability is a process more appropriately tracked by evaluating the management and stock assessment system rather than the status of a stock (overfished) or fishing level (overfishing) at any given point in time. Programs for assessing the conformance of management systems to FAO sustainability criteria where presented by Ocean Trust, NOAA and others.
 
Speakers also noted the mismatch of standards developed for data-rich, large-scale, single- species fisheries and small-scale, coastal, mixed fisheries often characterized as highly productive, short-lived and environmentally driven.
 
“Many sustainability standards in the National Standard 1 Guidelines of the Magnuson Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and many guidelines for the ecolabeling of fishery products developed for large-scale, commercial fisheries are not suited for small-scale, coastal fisheries”, concluded Steve Cadrin, AIFRB. “These mismatched standards jeopardize all aspects of sustainability. Alternative standards that reflect and recognize the successful cooperative management of coastal fisheries are needed”.
 
The forum also reviewed the status of Gulf of Mexico fisheries and management systems that are producing sustainable seafood. “The overall status of stocks in the Gulf are in the best shape they have been in the last 20-30 years, ” said Roy Crabtree, Regional Administrator of NOAA Fisheries Southeast Regional Office. “The stocks seem to be responding to management and are coming back. ”
 
At the state level, Louisiana presented an innovative approach to sustaining its coastal fisheries. Randy Pausina, Assistant Secretary for Fisheries at the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (LDWF) and his staff illustrated through several presentations how coastal states can integrate international sustainability criteria and tools into a comprehensive program for the sustainability of its seafood products and fisheries though partnerships, public outreach, product assurance, professionalism and traceability.
 
The Ocean Trust Science and Sustainability Forum was the fourth in a series, and was sponsored by Ocean Trust, American Institute of Fishery Research Biologists, Bonefish Grill, Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, Gulf States Marine Fisheries Commission, Omega Protein and Sea Port Products.
 
A number of the international scientists attending had participated in the conference for multiple years.

This story originally appeared on Seafood.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

November 5, 2014 (Saving Seafood) — On yesterday’s broadcast of NPR’s “The Diane Rehm Show,” a panel of environmental experts assembled to discuss the effects of discarded waste on the world’s oceans. This panel also examined some of the ways in which this problem is being addressed, including how environmental education programs and the cooperation of fishermen will continue to play vital roles in ocean conservation. 

Capt. Charles Moore, pollution expert and founder of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation, is one panelist who has seen, firsthand, the devastating effects that discarded plastics and fishing tackle can have on an oceanscape. Capt. Moore has sailed through and even walked on enormous accumulations of trash in remote portions of the Pacific, which are altering ocean ecology and harming marine life. 


Callum Roberts, a marine scientist and conservationist at the University of York in England, explains that plastics present perhaps the biggest challenge in the fight to keep our oceans clean. Difficult to recycle and unable to fully degrade in water, discarded plastics are broken down and consumed by birds and marine life. In addition to the harm that plastics inflict on wild animals, the consumed micro-plastics manage to work their way up the food chain and into the seafood that we consume.



People like Nancy Wallace, director of NOAA’s Marine Debris Program, are exploring ways to address these issues. During a 5-week-long marine debris removal program in the northwest Hawaiian Islands, NOAA removed 50 tons of derelict fishing nets and 7 tons of plastic from Pacific waters.

In regards to long-term solutions to marine debris issues, the panelists stressed the importance of working with school groups to establishing an ocean conservation ethic early on, and cited successful programs that have gotten fishermen involved in the cleanup process.

You can learn more about the Diane Rehm Show’s discussion of these issues by listening to the following audio clips below:

Listen to Nancy Wallace, Director of NOAA’s Marine Debris Program, discuss NOAA’s 5-week-long marine debris removal program in the northwest Hawaiian Islands. Ms. Wallace talks about how 57 tons of debris were removed during that 5 week period, and how NOAA plans to work with fishermen and school groups to reduce the buildup of marine debris in the future.

Listen to Callum Roberts, a marine scientist and conservationist at the University of York in England, discuss how micro plastic particles in products are making their way into our oceans and then back into our bodies through seafood.

Listen to Callum Roberts discuss the challenges of reducing marine litter on an international scale.

Listen to Charles Moore, founder of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation, discuss how marine debris is changing the ecology of the ocean. Capt. Moore is also joined by marine scientist and conservationist Callum Roberts, who discusses how fishermen in Europe have partnered with the European Commission to develop a program in which plastics caught in nets, as well as recovered tackle, are brought back to shore and recycled.


Read NPR’s story and listen to the full audio from The Diane Rehm Show on WAMU 88.5

 

November 4, 2014 — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) has adopted a new resolution regarding purchases from its Proactive Vessel Register (PVR) and has amended two past resolutions related to vessel capacity and illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU) in order to broaden existing coalition policies. The three resolutions, along with their timelines for implementation, are summarized below:
 
Resolution 14-06: To Amend Resolution 12-02 Capacity Reduction

“We continue to be concerned that there are too many boats on the water and we need to remove incentives for the construction of new vessels if we are to reduce this number,” said ISSF President, Susan Jackson. “Resolution 14-06 is to help RFMOs manage capacity reduction in line with the 2011 recommendation by the Third Joint Meeting of Tuna RFMOs.”
 
Resolution 12-02 adopted a conservation measure that processors, traders, importers, transporters and others involved in the seafood industry beginning January 1, 2013, refrain from transactions in skipjack, bigeye and yellowfin tuna caught by large scale purse seine vessels that are not actively fishing for tuna, or under contract for construction, as of December 31, 2012 or a replacement for an existing vessel. For the purpose of supporting this conservation measure, ISSF established a Record of large-scale purse seine vessels fishing for tropical tunas globally. The Record, which is publicly available, draws upon the information available in the tuna RFMO vessel registers, as well as information provided by the fishing industry. Resolution 14-06, which replaces Resolution 12-02, includes new stronger provisions for controlling the addition of large-scale purse seine vessels to the ISSF Record. In addition, Resolution 14-06 is explicit that a large-scale purse seine vessel not on the ISSF Record, will not be eligible for listing on the ISSF ProActive Vessel Record (PVR).

For more details on how this Resolution 14-06 will be implemented, click here.
 
Resolution 14-05: Regarding PVR Purchases

“The ISSF Proactive Vessel Register is an effective, credible and verifiable way for vessel owners to highlight, for purchasers to see, the sustainability efforts they have taken,” said Susan Jackson. “Resolution 14-05 will make sure that purchasers and processors are purchasing tuna from vessels that are taking steps to adopt best practices as demonstrated by the PVR checklist.”

ISSF adopts Resolution 14-05 so that, by December 31, 2015, processors, traders, importers, transporters and others involved in the seafood industry that source skipjack, yellowfin and bigeye tuna from large-scale purse seine vessels, must source 100% of that tuna from vessels that are registered in the ISSF PVR. And that, during 2015, those commercial stakeholders who traditionally source skipjack, yellowfin and bigeye tuna from large-scale purse seine vessels will progressively increase sourcing that tuna from vessels that are registered in the ISSF PVR, in line with the sourcing guidelines each Participating Company published in 2014.

The purpose of Resolution 14-05 is to enhance the implementation of purse seine fishing best practices via vessel participation on the ISSF ProActive Vessel Register (PVR). The PVR can help processors, traders, importers, transporters, and others involved in the seafood industry identify those vessels that are undertaking meaningful sustainability efforts and supporting ISSF commitments.
 
Resolution 14-04: To Amend Resolution 09-01 on IUU Fishing

“The IUU lists maintained by RFMOs identify fishing vessels engaged in illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing activities broadly described, and include not just fishing vessels but also vessels involved in transshipment,” said Susan Jackson. “Recognizing that IUU fishing activity is aided through high seas transshipment activities, adopting a conservation measure that ensures traders, importers, transporters and others involved in the industry refrain from transactions in tuna transported by transshipment vessel(s) on the IUU Vessel List of any RFMOs is the appropriate next step to our IUU measures already in place.”

Resolution 14-04, which replaces Resolution 9-01 in its entirety, expands the scope of the existing conservation measure, which addresses fishing vessels, to call on traders, importers, transporters and others involved in the seafood industry to also refrain from transactions in tuna transported by transshipment vessel(s) on the IUU vessel list of any tRFMO.