Conservation & Environment

July 11, 2014 — The following was released by the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES):

COPENHAGEN — The regulation of fisheries in the Northeast Atlantic is to a large extent based on advice provided by the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES). ICES assessments of the status of fish stocks are now easily available via an interactive map. The map displays the so-called popular advice for each fish stock within the various ICES ecoregions and enables users, via hyperlinks, to gain access to more in-depth information on each stock.

The popular version, an easy-to-read digest of the official ICES advice, aims to reach a broader audience by describing the different fisheries in the Northeast Atlantic and the fish stocks that support them.

This digest of the ICES advice is now available for 194 fish stocks, including those in the Barents Sea, Norwegian Sea, Baltic Sea, the Bay of Biscay and Iberian waters, the Celtic Sea, the North Sea, around Iceland, around the Faroes, and East of Greenland.

In the future, ICES plans to supplement the information on the map with overviews of marine ecosystems. These overviews will feature descriptions of the ecoregions and provide brief accounts of the state of their marine ecosystems.

The map is available on the ICES website along with further information about the ICES advisory process and ICES work on integrated ecosystem assessments.

For further information, please contact:
Simon Cooper, Communications Assistant
International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES)
Copenhagen, Denmark
E-mail: simon.cooper@ices.dk Tel. +45 33 38 67 65

 

Read the PDF of the release here

 

 

 

July 11, 2014 — The NOAA and US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) as of Thursday officially granted the threatened loggerhead sea turtle a vast expanse of critical habitat along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts – possibly the biggest protective move in US history.

Officials announced Thursday two final rules designating this critical habitat, which consists of 685 miles of beaches as well as 300,000 miles of ocean. The turtles use these beaches – stretching from North Carolina to Mississippi – for nesting and breeding, and the ocean includes areas used by the species for reproduction, as well as migratory corridors off North Carolina and Florida.

The change comes after environmentalists sued the government in 2013, forcing them to protect the area. Their efforts proved victorious for the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta), but the move has more far reaching effects as well.

"The fate of more than just the loggerhead sea turtle rests on the health of Atlantic coastal environments," USFWS Director Dan Ashe said in a statement. "Coastal communities from North Carolina to Mississippi are also intrinsically tied to these shorelines and waters. By conserving the turtle and protecting its habitat, we are helping preserve not only this emblematic species, but also the way of life for millions of Americans."

 

Read the full story at Nature World News

 

 

WASHINGTON — July 10, 2014 –- The following was releaed by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF):

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) is pleased to launch its new guidebook platform, ISSFguidebooks.org. The site offers virtual manuals that share the latest guidance on responsible tuna fishing operations – all in an interactive platform for ease-of-use and centralized access. New to the portfolio of ISSF guidebooks is the Observer Training Guidebook, a sustainability review for observers on purse seine tuna vessels.

“Data collection and research is one facet of ISSF’s work toward improved sustainability of tuna stocks and the greater marine ecosystem,” said Dr. Victor Restrepo, ISSF’s VP of Science. “ISSFguidebooks.org represents the practical application of this information in real-world terms, and is meant for an audience of fishers, observers and other stakeholders on the front lines of tuna fishing – individuals that may have the greatest impact in realizing the goal of sustainable tuna fisheries.”

Along with the newly designed ISSFguidebooks.org, ISSF is pleased to release the first edition of its Observer Training Guide, which provides observers on large-scale purse seine tuna vessels an overview of the skills necessary for effective observing, particularly as they pertain to sustainable fishing practices. Although regional or national observer programs will benefit from the guidebooks, the manual is designed to complement rather than substitute such programs. Effective observer coverage is one of the ISSF Conservation Measures, which calls for 100 percent observer coverage for purse seine vessels that fish for tropical tunas. The guidebook also summarizes other ISSF Conservation Measures for the management of tropical tuna and bycatch species that vessels are to follow if they intend to sell to ISSF participating companies. In addition, the new guide includes sections on “Purse Seine Operations”, “Tuna ID”, “Bycatch”, “Scientific Sampling and Data Collection”, and “Fisheries Management”.

ISSFguidebooks.org also presents the existing ISSF Longline Skippers’ Guidebook and Purse Seine Skippers’ Guidebook in an improved, easier-to-use online format with illustrative graphics and videos for one-click guidance and information. The longline manual provides a guide to best practices in responsible longline tuna fishing operations, reviews the reporting requirements and other obligations to RFMOs, and informs readers about the relevant ISSF Conservation Measures for the management of tuna and its larger marine ecosystem. It includes sections on “Bycatch Mitigation & Handling” and “Fisheries Management”, among others. Similarly, the Purse Seine Skippers’ book reviews best practices in purse seine tuna fishing and includes sections on “FADs” or fish aggregating devices, “Bycatch Mitigation & Handling” and “Fisheries Management”.
 
All guides are also available on the site as an ePub and a printable PDF. Because the tuna industry and conservation community are global, ISSFguidebooks.org will soon include all guidebooks in a variety of languages in addition to the English editions currently available.

About the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation
 
The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) is a global coalition of scientists, the tuna industry and World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the world’s leading conservation organization, promoting science-based initiatives for the long-term conservation and sustainable use of tuna stocks, reducing bycatch and promoting ecosystem health. To learn more, visit their website at iss-foundation.org.

NEW ORLEANS, La. — About 685 miles of beaches and nearly 200,000 square miles of the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico have been declared critical habitat for threatened loggerhead sea turtles.

It was the largest such federal designation in history, according to environmental groups that went to court to make the government designate habitat necessary for the turtles to recover.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed 88 nesting beaches in six states.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's fisheries service listed marine areas including waters just off beaches, winter habitat in North Carolina, breeding areas in Florida and narrow migration corridors between the two. It also listed mats of Sargassum — also known as sea holly and Gulf weed — in the western Gulf of Mexico and in U.S. waters within the Atlantic Gulf Stream.

Two beaches totaling 37 miles of coast were deleted from the original proposal because officials already had plans in place to protect the turtles, agency spokesman Charles Underwood said.

A federal agency that names a critical habitat must be consulted before federal permits or contracts are issued there. The designation does not affect land ownership or create wildlife preserves or refuges.

Read the full story from the Miami Herald

WASHINGTON — July 7, 2014 — Each year scientists and natural resources mangers study the size and duration of so called "dead zones" in the Chesapeake Bay in an effort to figure out the impact on life in the Bay.

But the dead zones in the Chesapeake are growing. Scientists who predicted the increase aren't surprised. Tom Parmham, a scientist with the Maryland Department of a Natural Resources, says, "It's nothing to be alarmed about. It's slightly higher than average."

Dead zones are areas deprived of oxygen and that means crabs, fish, oysters and other Bay life can't survive there.

"Dead zones are caused by excessive nutrients from farms, sewage plants, fertilizer and sewage plants," says Parmham.

Read the full story at WTOP

July 3, 2014 — The federal government today listed four key populations of scalloped hammerhead sharks under the Endangered Species Act.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, for the first time in history, gave a shark species federal protections under the Endangered Species Act.

The scalloped hammerhead shark is considered globally endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The species is targeted primarily for its fins but is also killed as "by-catch" in fisheries targeting other species.

NOAA Fisheries listed scalloped hammerhead sharks inhabiting the Eastern Atlantic Ocean and Eastern Pacific Ocean as "endangered." The agency listed scalloped hammerhead sharks living in the Central and Southwest Atlantic and Indo-West Pacific as the less-serious status of "threatened." The federal agency declined to list scalloped hammerhead sharks that inhabit the Northwest Atlantic or Central Pacific.

Read the full story at First Coast News

July 1, 2014 — Fish seem like chummy enough creatures, often schooling with fish they’re familiar with to avoid predators and increase the chances of finding a mate. But as carbon dioxide levels rise worldwide, they could lose their ability to recognize each other, in effect becoming “friendless” wanderers who will hang out with just about anybody.

That’s the short version of new research on climate change and fish behavior out of James Cook University in Queensland, Australia. A team led by Lauren Nadler wanted to know how fish will react to ocean acidification caused by more and more human-generated CO2 in the atmosphere. So they created two experimental setups, one with regular ocean water and the other enriched with CO2, and into them dumped a bunch of tropical damselfish. Here’s what those guys look like out on the reef:

Juvenile damselfish ordinarily take about three weeks to bond to the point that they’ll recognize each other. And that is indeed what happened with the control-environment fish, who later chose to school with their childhood buddies. But in the altered one, which had CO2 levels comparable to what the IPCC estimates for 2100, the fish showed signs of developmental impairment: When put among schools of fish they grew up with and with ones they didn’t, they displayed no preference for hobnobbing with their old tank mates. They’d just as soon swim with strangers.

Read the full story at Grist

July 1, 2014 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries: Today, Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada launched an aerial search for a severely injured North Atlantic right whale, believed to be in Canadian waters. The whale, spotted on June 29 by NOAA Fisheries Northeast Fisheries Science Center aerial survey team, appeared to be entangled in multiple lines and in poor overall condition.

It was among a group of about two dozen right whales, approximately 180 nautical miles east of Provincetown, Mass., too far for a U.S. ship-based disentanglement team to respond.

June 30, 2014 — Plastic junk is floating widely on the world’s oceans, but there’s less of it than expected, a study says.

Such ocean pollution has drawn attention in recent years because of its potential harm to fish and other wildlife.
The new work drew on results from an around-the-world cruise by a research ship that towed a mesh net at 141 sites, as well as other studies. Researchers estimated the total amount of floating plastic debris in open ocean at 7,000 to 35,000 tons.
Andres Cozar of the University of Cadiz in Spain, an author of the study, said that’s a lot less than the 1 million tons he had extrapolated from data reaching back to the 1970s.
The new estimate includes only floating debris, not plastic that may reside beneath the surface or on the ocean floor.

Of the plastic pieces caught by the ship’s net, most were less than about a fifth of an inch long. Some floating pieces start out small, like the microbeads found in some toothpastes and cosmetics or industrial pellets used to make plastic products. Other small pieces can result when wave action breaks up larger objects, like bottle caps, detergent bottles and shopping bags.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Recorder

PORTLAND, Maine — June 30, 2014 — A new state commission this summer is gearing up to study ocean acidification and its impact on shellfish. The commission – the first of its kind on the East Coast – was created this year by the Maine Legislature. The 16-member panel was announced Friday at a news conference on the Portland waterfront that included U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree and state Sen. Chris Johnson, D-Somerville.

Pingree, who last month introduced a bill that would require federal officials to study the effects of ocean acidification on coastal communities around the country, said scientists don’t fully understand how acidification would affect the lobster fishery.

“We know what’s causing ocean acidification but now we need to better understand how hard it is going to hit coastal economies,” she said.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that about one-third of carbon pollution is absorbed by the ocean. However, local sources of nitrogen pollution make matters worse, said one of the commission’s members, Joe Payne of Friends of Casco Bay.

Runoff from city streets and fertilized lawns, sewage and stormwater overflow send nitrogen into the ocean, where algae blooms release even more carbon dioxide into the water and mud, he said.

Payne said waters near shore that are habitat for shellfish have the highest levels of acidity. He has identified 50 mudflats in Casco Bay that have elevated acidity levels. Some of them have acidity levels so high they can dissolve baby clams, he said.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald