Conservation & Environment

April 26, 2012 – It’s not easy counting river herring. Occupational hazards include eye strain from staring at the same spot of water for 10 minutes, boredom when the fish aren’t there, and panic when they surge past in such high numbers that counting seems impossible. There’s also the occasional aggressive swan or swooping seagull to contend with.

Being a herring is no piece of cake, either. Bowing to nature’s imperative, the fish migrate in the spring from the ocean back to their birthplaces in freshwater ponds up and down the East Coast – a course studded with such obstacles as hungry striped bass and cormorants, low water, trawlers’ nets, human poachers, manmade dams, and pollution.

“It certainly is a gantlet they have to run through,’’ said John Sheppard of the state Department of Marine Fisheries. “It’s almost like a war of attrition just to get to the spawning grounds.’’

This year, however, the herring are winning that battle, with record numbers of counters reporting thousands of fish.

At Weymouth’s herring run in Jackson Square, for example, the count was up to 200,000 as of April 20, and the season has weeks to go, according to town Herring Warden George Loring.

While far lower than the peak of 860,000 fish recorded in 1995, the count is on track to overtake last year’s approximately 260,000, he said. And that number was up from 80,000 in 2005.

“There have been some spectacular pulses of fish coming through [in Weymouth]. It’s just been shoulder-to-shoulder fish, if fish had shoulders,’’ said Scott Dowd, a freshwater biologist at New England Aquarium and member of the Weymouth Herring Committee.

The high numbers in Weymouth and elsewhere along the coast south of Boston are welcome news to those who have been watching the river herring population dwindle in years past.

While there have been some fluctuations, the number of herring declined so much that the state has banned river herring fishing and sales since 2006 to allow the stock to rebuild, according to Sheppard.

Read the full story at the Boston Globe.

 

 

April 18, 2012 – Have you had your menhaden today? No?

Well, you probably have – you just didn’t know it. Don’t worry, you’re not alone! Most of us know nothing about this little guy, but he’s been in our daily lives for well over a hundred years now…

The problem is… you guessed it! Overfishing. Menhaden is actually America’s second largest fishery, just behind Alaska Pollock – which was on the verge of collapse but is thankfully starting to rebound. Or not! Turns out it depends on who you listen to – but this PDF report shows that while production is down pollock is still not listed as ‘overfished’.

The Omega Protein company harvests thousands of tons of menhaden every year. They literally vacuum them out of the water with specialized ships – entire schools at a time. To their credit, they have abided by (and even extended!) harvesting limitations to provide the menhaden time to rebound… but is it enough?

The problem with overfishing in this case is that menhaden are forage fish – bigger fish eat them. Basically, menhaden are a vital part of the food chain. They eat algae and tidbits of phytoplankton, and are in turn eaten by the fish WE eat.

Read the full story here.

Analysis: While the article states that overfishing is currently a problem with Atlantic menhaden. However, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC), the body that oversees the Atlantic menhaden fishery, determined in its 2010 stock assessment that menhaden were not overfished, and that overfishing had occurred only once in the last 10 years. They also concluded that it is most likely environmental, not fishery-related, factors that have the most influence on the size of the menahden population.

 

 

April 2012 – With your help, our work to conserve menhaden—a fish critical to the Chesapeake and Atlantic coastal ecosystems—continues.

The process for increasing protections for this important fish is now in phase two. Last fall in phase one, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) adopted new standards for managing the menhaden fishery that will require cutbacks in the catch in an attempt to more than triple menhaden numbers coastwide. Phase two involves drafting a new fishery management plan laying out how to achieve the new standards. Next fall in phase three, the ASMFC will formally adopt the new plan, which will describe the catch restrictions that will take effect in 2013.

Once the subject of a book entitled, The Most Important Fish in the Sea, menhaden play a key role in the Chesapeake and Atlantic coastal ecosystems. Much like oysters, they feed by filtering the water and removing plankton which are often overabundant in polluted estuarine waters. Somehow the menhaden converts this input into biomass rich in omega-3 oils which makes them in turn highly nutritious prey for a wide range of marine fish, birds, and mammals.

Striped bass, for example, normally feed heavily on menhaden, but the amount in their diet has gone down dramatically as menhaden numbers declined over the last 20 years. Lack of menhaden in their diet may be a primary reason why Chesapeake stripers suffer from the disease Mycobacteriosis. Similarly, ospreys' success in finding menhaden to feed their young has gone down sharply in recent decades, and the survival of nestlings in the lower Bay is now less than during the DDT era.

New scientific advice in 2010 drove ASMFC to act after 10 years of slow progress protecting menhaden. The science indicated that numbers of menhaden population had been overfished in 32 out of the previous 54 years and was at its lowest level on record. The ability of the coastwide population to reproduce was only 8 percent of what it had once been. Even a panel of independent scientists advised that this was too low and called on ASMFC to better protect the stock and increase the spawning potential.

Read the full story at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.

Analysis: The Chesapeake Bay Foundations states, "menhaden population had been overfished in 32 out of the previous 54 years and was at its lowest level on record." However, as the most recent stock assessments from the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) show, overfishing has only occurred once in the last 10 years, and the menhaden population is currently not overfished. Environmental factors, rather than commercial fishing, are also much more likely to influence the size of the menhaden population, with the ASMFC concluding that "non-fishery sources" are likely responsible for fluctuations in population (pg. 91).

The CBF also writes, "much like oysters, they feed by filtering the water and removing plankton which are often overabundant in polluted estuarine waters." The results of several recent studies have cast doubt on this claim. These studies have shown that adult menhaden do not consume most kinds of phytoplankton, and instead consume mostly zooplankton. And while juvenile menhaden do consume phytoplankton, they do not do so at a rate that contributes to improving water quality in a significant way.

Finally, the CBF writes, "lack of menhaden in [striped bass] diet may be a primary reason why Chesapeake stripers suffer from the disease Mycobacteriosis." There is no widely agreed upon answer for what causes mycobacteriosis in striped bass. However, the answer is just as likely to be the result of environmental factors in the Bay as a result of dead zones. These dead zones, caused by algal blooms fueled by excess nutrient runoff in the Bay, create low-oxygen (hypoxic) areas in the water that bass usually inhabit. They are forced instead into warmer, shallower waters for which they are ill-suited. As a result of the thermal stress this causes, the bass are not able to feed properly, making them more susceptible to diseases.

 

 

The following was released by the Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers:

BRUSSELS, BELGIUM -­‐ April 23, 2012 — From the floor of the 2012 European Seafood Exposition, the Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers and the Alaska Crab Coalition join the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute in welcoming the news that the Bering Sea/Aleutian Islands crab fishery has been

certified to the standards set forth in the United Nations FAO-­‐Based Certification Model for Responsible Fisheries Management. Alaskan crab will now stand alongside Alaska salmon, halibut, black cod, and pollock, each of whom has previously been certified by the independent, third-­‐party organization Global Trust as adhering to the FAO standards.

While today’s announcement is certainly welcomed by the Alaskan crab industry, sustainability is not a concept we are just now embracing. Alaskan fisheries have been at the forefront of sustainable fisheries management since it was mandated in the State Constitution over 50 years ago. Longtime Bering Sea crab fisherman Kale Garcia, in accepting the certification, noted “sustainability is not new to Alaskan Bering Sea crabbers and our families. We support it. We have lived it for many years under Alaska’s cutting-­‐edge management and we are the ones who pay the direct cost when quota reductions are necessary to ensure the health of the resource. We are also the ones who gain long term by having a renewable resource that will provide a livelihood for generations. The FAO sustainability certificate does not change anything in practice or management, but it does help tell the world what we in Alaska already know about sustainability. Now our buyers in the marketplace can have one more layer of comfort knowing the Alaskan crab they are buying is from a sustainable, well-­‐managed source.”

Alaskan crab is managed jointly by the Alaska Department of Fish & Game and the National Marine Fisheries Service. Annual quotas are set very conservatively and reflect the need to manage the fishery for long term sustainability, rather than short term gain. Today’s modern crab gear incorporates the latest in conservation technology. And crab fishermen coordinate their harvest activities to make sure the crab is harvested at the peak of its quality and with minimal environmental impact! This is what sets Alaskan crab apart from other crab fisheries around the world. All Alaskans can take comfort in knowing that their resources are being managed with future generations in mind. And crab lovers everywhere can take comfort in knowing that genuine, certified Alaskan crab will be there for them to enjoy now and into the future.

 

April, 2011 – Reedville, Virginia is like most small fishing villages along the Atlantic Coast. The town has a couple churches, some bed and breakfast inns, an annual fishing contest, and even a fishing museum. However, Reedville is strikingly different than most other fishing towns. It is completely dependent on one fish and one fishing company – the menhaden and Omega Protein, Inc. Despite the town’s quaint appearance, Omega Protein’s dominance over the menhaden fishery  “reduction” industry has led Reedville to become the second largest port in the country in terms of total poundage. At one point, the menhaden industry made Reedville the wealthiest town in the country per capita, but today the historic Victorian mansions that line Reedville’s main street are the only surviving testaments to the heyday of the once vibrant fishing town.

To understand the ecological significance of the menhaden, it is important to have a basic understanding of the Bay ecosystem. The Chesapeake Bay is the country’s largest estuary and is home to over 350 species of fish, shellfish, and plants. However, their survival is threatened by the declining water quality of the Bay. The poor health of the Bay ecosystem is mainly contributed to the excessive levels of nutrients, particularly nitrogen and phosphorous. These nutrients come primarily from discharged wastewater, air pollution, and urban and agricultural runoff from fertilizer and livestock waste. As the Bay region’s population has increased over the years, the land surrounding the Bay has been transformed from forests to farms and residential areas. These forests that once prevented excessive levels of these nutrients from reaching the Bay are now gone, and the menhaden is now one of the Bay’s last natural defenses.

The menhaden’s filtering capabilities enable them to consume large amounts of these excess nutrients. According to the Chesapeake Ecological Foundation, a single menhaden can filter one million gallons every 180 days, and the entire Atlantic menhaden population has the potential to remove 25% of the Bay’s nutrients in one year through its consumption of plankton. By consuming such vast quantities of these microscopic plants, menhaden help to prevent the growth of algae blooms and allow sunlight to reach plants growing at the bottom of the Bay. As these bottom-dwelling plants grow, they increase the water’s oxygen levels, making conditions healthier for the rest of life in the Bay.

Read the full story at Penn Elements.

Analysis: While the article discusses menhaden's role as a filter feeder in the Bay, the amount of phytoplankton that menhaden consume is not universally agreed upon. There are several studies, including a recent 2010 study from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, that conclude menhaden have little, if any, net impact on improving water quality in the Chesapeake Bay. These studies have found that adult menhaden, rather than consuming phytoplankton, consume mostly zooplankton. While juvenile menhaden consume phytoplankton, the amount they consume is not enough to significantly influence Bay water quality, especially considering the amount of nutrient imputinto the Bay, one of the causes of excessive phytoplankton growth.

 

 

 

April 23, 2012 – More than a century ago, Delaware Bay was one of the world’s biggest centers for caviar production. Back then, “this would have been a small one. The average female in the 1800s was 350 pounds,” said Matt Breece, a DSU graduate student, as he prepared to anesthetize the fish before extracting a tissue sample and implanting a tracking device.

At the height of the spring migration, New Jersey fishermen are catching, tagging and releasing up to two dozen Atlantic sturgeon every day off the Delaware beaches, helping to track the endangered species and build a body of scientific data so five East Coast breeding populations can be better protected.

The Delaware may have had a native population of 700,000 sturgeon in the 1800s, compared with today’s estimate of 500 animals, Fox said.

“It was the largest sturgeon producer in the world,” Fox said. “When the fishing was at its peak (in the 1890s) they were shipping caviar and sturgeon all over the world.” At a processing center dubbed Caviar — today’s Bayside in Salem County —“they built a railroad spur and shipped 12 to 15 cars to the markets in a day, and four to five cars of caviar.”

After taking that huge hit, sturgeon suffered from pollution as industry grew along the Delaware. The sturgeon’s own life cycle means any recovery is a slow process, said Ellen Pikitch, a professor and executive director of the Institute for Ocean Conservation Science at Stony Brook University on Long Island.

Read the full story at the Daily Record.

 

 

April 19, 2012 – Defenders of Wildlife and the National Audubon Society are choking off the lifeblood of communities that depend on North Carolina's Cape Hatteras National Seashore Recreational Area. In 2008, the National Park Service — the federal agency responsible for the popular 70-mile-long world-class sport fishing and tourist destination — caved in to the two environmental groups' lawsuit claiming human access to the area harms nesting birds.

NPS officials signed a consent decree — locals were not given a choice — and began closing huge swaths of the recreation area's beaches to motorized traffic for bird protection.

Within a year, Cape Hatteras villages — Rodanthe at the north end and everything down North Carolina Highway 12 to Ocracoke at the south — saw their businesses shrivel as longtime customers failed to reappear at the Avon Motel, Froggy Dog Restaurant, Frank & Fran's tackle shop, Teach's Lair Marina and John Couch's Carquest Auto Parts, among many others.

Couch and 15 other local business owners each signed their own affidavits swearing the consent decree was destroying their lives and the lives of employees they had to let go. Families were losing their life savings, their college funds and their homes.

At the time, Defenders' president, Rodger Schlickeisen, scrimped along with his $295,641 salary and Audubon boss John Flicker got by on $322,422 — not counting their handsome $30,000-plus benefit packages.

The consent decree was only temporary, awaiting a "final rule." Last month that rule went into effect with closures even more restrictive than those in the consent decree.

Read the full story at the Washington Examiner.

 

 

April 21, 2012, GLOUCESTER, Mass. — Standing on the deck of his rusted steel trawler, Naz Sanfilippo fumed about the latest bad news for New England fishermen: a decision by Whole Foods to stop selling any seafood it does not consider sustainable.

Area fishermen, including Denis Martins, disagree with Whole Foods's decision.
Starting Sunday, gray sole and skate, common catches in the region, will no longer appear in the grocery chain’s artfully arranged fish cases. Atlantic cod, a New England staple, will be sold only if it is not caught by trawlers, which drag nets across the ocean floor, a much-used method here.

“It’s totally maddening,” Mr. Sanfilippo said. “They’re just doing it to make all the green people happy.”

Whole Foods says that, in fact, it is doing its part to address the very real problem of overfishing and help badly depleted fish stocks recover. It is using ratings set by the Blue Ocean Institute, a conservation group, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California. They are based on factors including how abundant a species is, how quickly it reproduces and whether the catch method damages its habitat.

“Stewardship of the ocean is so important to our customers and to us,” said David Pilat, the global seafood buyer for Whole Foods. “We’re not necessarily here to tell fishermen how to fish, but on a species like Atlantic cod, we are out there actively saying, ‘For Whole Foods Market to buy your cod, the rating has to be favorable.’ ”

The company had originally planned to stop selling “red-rated” fish next year but moved up its deadline. The other fish it will no longer carry are Atlantic halibut, octopus, sturgeon, tautog, turbot, imported wild shrimp, some species of rockfish, and tuna and swordfish caught in certain areas or by certain methods. (Whole Foods has already stopped selling orange roughy, shark, bluefin tuna and most marlin.)

Read the full story at the New York Times.

 

 

April 22, 2012 – Seafood counters used to be simpler places, where a fish was labeled with its name and price. Nowadays, it carries more information than a used-car listing. Where did it swim? Was it farm-raised? Was it ever frozen? How much harm was done to the ocean by fishing it?

Many retailers tout the environmental credentials of their seafood, but a growing number of scientists have begun to question whether these certification systems deliver on their promises. The labels give customers a false impression that purchasing certain products helps the ocean more than it really does, some researchers say.

Backers respond that they are helping transform many of the globe’s wild-caught fisheries, giving them a financial incentive to include environmental safeguards, while giving consumers a sense of what they can eat with a clear conscience.

To add to the confusion, there are a variety of certification labels and guides, prompting retailers to adopt a hybrid approach, relying on multiple seafood rating systems or establishing their own criteria and screening products that way.

As of Sunday, for example, Whole Foods stopped selling seafood listed as “red” by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Blue Ocean Institute — including octopus, gray sole and Atlantic halibut — because these species are overfished or caught in a way that harms ocean habitat or other species. The move has sparked criticism from New England fishermen, who are now barred from selling to the upscale chain. Whole Foods also sells only pole- or line-caught canned tuna, which harms fewer species than conventional tuna-fishing methods.

Target no longer sells farmed salmon — which has come under fire for consuming a disproportionate amount of forage fish and creating several other problems — and has pledged that by 2015 it will sell only fresh and frozen fish that are “sustainable and traceable.” Wegmans said it will not obtain seafood from the Ross Sea in the Antarctic, which many environmentalists say should be off-limits to fishing, and this fall it will start selling oysters from plots it has leased in the Chesapeake Bay as part of a fishery restoration project. Beginning in June, Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest seafood retailer, will require all of its fresh and frozen wild-caught and farmed seafood to be certified by a third party as sustainable or have a plan in place for suppliers to be certified. At this point, 76 percent of its suppliers are certified.

Read the full story at the Washington Post.

 

 

April 20, 2012 – Two years ago an explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico took the lives of 11 men and spewed nearly 5 million barrels of oil into the Gulf. It took 9,700 vessels, 127 aircraft, 47,829 people, nearly 2 million gallons of toxic dispersants, and 89 days to stop the gush of oil. But the work to restore the ecosystem and Gulf economy has only just begun.

The regional oil and gas industry hasn’t skipped a beat despite claims from Big Oil and drilling advocates in Congress that the moratorium on deepwater drilling imposed in the wake of the spill devastated the Gulf economy. The New Orleans Times-Picayune found that oil-fueled economies in the Houma area are humming along just fine. And according to a recent Reuters analysis, Gulf drillers will be busier this year than at any point since the spill, adding eight new deepwater rigs and bringing the total count to 29, just shy of pre-spill levels.

But even though BP’s slick new ads show sparkling beaches and flourishing marshes, the perception that everything is fine in the Gulf is far from the truth. Last week Garret Graves, top coastal advisor to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, said the state “still has 200 miles of oiled coast,” including “very clear, retrievable oil in coastal areas,” and called the current conditions “unacceptable.”

Read the full article at the Center for American Progress.