State and Local

December 30, 2014 — According to the New England Historical Society, as many as 11,000 fishermen have died. This Fishermen’s Memorial Monument, also known as “The Man At The Wheel,” was unveiled in 1925 to honor them.

In February of 1879, 249 fishermen from this Massachusetts city disappeared at sea.

It may have been the deadliest month, but it’s just a fraction of the total casualties by sea this community has seen over the centuries. According to the New England Historical Society, as many as 11,000 fishermen have died.

This Fishermen’s Memorial Monument, also known as “The Man At The Wheel,” was unveiled in 1925 to honor them. The 8-foot-tall bronze statue depicts a fisherman looking out over the harbor as he steers a ship.

The memorial was begun in 1923 as part of the city’s 300th anniversary. It was created by sculptor Leonard Craske and based on a 1901 painting by an artist from the same city where it stands named A.W. Buhler.

Read the full story from The Boston Globe

December 23, 2014 — The state’s Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs has given its approval to Gloucester’s new Harbor Plan, backing a plan aimed at giving the city and developers more flexibility along the waterfront, while also protecting the fishing industry and maintaining the rule under the state’s Designated Port Area.

In a letter to Mayor Carolyn Kirk dated Friday, Dec. 19, Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Maeve Vallely Bartlett also placed conditions on future uses around the harbor, requiring that the city continue to generally maintain its Designated Port Area as noted in the amended plan, and follow the DPA’s development guidelines.

“In my approval,” Barlett wrote, “I find that the final 2014 Plan … serves to promote and protect the core marine and water-dependent industrial composition of the DPA, while providing for the local goals of enhanced support of the commercial fishing industry, expansion of water-dependent industry, and continued allowances for flexibility in supporting DPA uses.

“On balance,” she said, “I am confident that it will function as a clear and effective framework for achieving the city’s goals in harmony with state policy governing stewardship of tidelands, including those located within a DPA.”

Bartlett and the agency granted the approvals with a series of conditions — including that the state’s Department of Environmental Protection “not license commercial DPA supporting uses within the Gloucester DPA … in the following areas: on the State Fish Pier; the U.S. Coast Guard (Station Gloucester); or within or on any DPA roadway or pile-supported pier.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

December 19, 2014 — Gloucester Mayor Carolyn Kirk is urging the New England Fisheries Management Council to keep in mind the perilous plight of the Gloucester and Northeast groundfishing fleet as it maps out habitat protection areas as part of a major NOAA ocean zoning project.

In remarks submitted in writing to the council — and presented on the city’s behalf by City Council President Paul McGeary to the fishing panel when it hosted one of several regional hearings Wednesday night at Cruiseport Gloucester — Kirk called on the council to “remember the responsibility under the Magnuson-Stevens Act to carry out these protections in a way that doesn’t further damage the groundfish fleet, and gives fishermen the best opportunity to harvest allocations that remain available to them.”

The Gloucester hearing was one of 10 being hosted by the regional fisheries panel throughout December from Maine to Virginia on a plan referred to as NOAA’s Draft Omnibus Habitat Amendment 2. The hearing here was one of just two scheduled for Massachusetts, with the council also having hosted a hearing Tuesday night in New Bedford.

There, New Bedford Mayor John Mitchell expressed concerns similar to Kirk’s.

“As the Council considers additional habitat protections through the Omnibus Amendment, it needs to be mindful of both the economic as well as the environmental impact of the proposals before it,” Mitchell told the panel. “Consistent with its duties under the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the Council needs to balance the needs of habitat protection and restoration with the preservation of access to fishing grounds vital for the future of fishing communities.”

Kirk said Thursday that the remarks she submitted to the regional council were developed in concert with the city’s Fishery Commission and with the Gloucester-based Northeast Seafood Coalition.

“We want to be sure our concerns are on the table — our concerns as a fishing community,” Kirk said Thursday.

Read the full story from the Gloucester Daily Times

 

December 18, 2014 — The following was released by The Maine Department of Marine Resources:

A meeting hosted by the Maine Department of Marine Resources to discuss an Addendum to the interstate striped bass fishery management plan recently approved by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) has been re-scheduled.
 
The meeting, originally scheduled for December 9, 2014 has been re-scheduled for January 5, 2015 at 5 p.m. at the Yarmouth Log Cabin at 196 Main Street, Yarmouth.
 
The addendum directs coastal states to reduce the harvest of striped bass by 25 percent from 2013 beginning in 2015.
 
The meeting will provide an opportunity for department staff along with Commissioner Patrick Keliher to discuss and solicit input on management options approved by the ASMFC designed to achieve the reduction.
 
Maine has a year-round recreational only striped bass fishery. There are special regulations in effect from December 1 through June in the Kennebec, Sheepscot and Androscoggin Rivers and tributaries. Current regulations in Maine allow a person to take and possess 1 fish per day. The fish may be from 20 to 26 inches in total length, or 40 inches or greater in total length. 
 
Options approved by the ASMFC for discussion will include a range of bag and size limits that would result in harvest reductions between 26 and 31 percent. After receiving input the Department will bring a preferred option out for public hearings in January.
 
The Addendum responds to results of the 2013 Atlantic striped bass benchmark assessment which indicated that mortality in 2012 was above the target, and female spawning stock biomass (SSB) has been steadily declining below the target level since 2006.

According to the ASMFC, this means even though the stock is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring, SSB is approaching its overfished threshold and stock projections show SSB will likely fall below the threshold in the coming years. In addition, a similar decline has been observed in total harvest.

The ASMFC Striped Bass Technical Committee will review proposals by the states and present their findings to the ASMFC Striped Bass Management Board which will review and consider approval of those proposals at the Commission’s Winter Meeting in February.

For more information on the meeting, contact Bruce Joule at 633-9505.

December 17, 2014 — At least five workers at a city fish company were fired Tuesday morning after conducting a work stoppage and giving management a list of demands that includes a $15 minimum hourly wage, according to advocates.

"I'm going to continue struggling for the workers that are still in the company, despite the fact that (I was let go)," said Antonia Cruz, a mother of three who was one of the workers leading the protest.

On a blistering cold Monday night, some 25 workers and "allies" gathered at Northern Pelagic Group's Fish Island facility with candles in hand, waving placards and chanting slogans in Spanish and English.

"This is based on a history of complaints that the workers have had with the company about working conditions," said Lisa Maya Knauer, an activist with Centro Comunitario Trabajadores and UMass Dartmouth professor. Knauer said 15 of the workers agreed to participate in the stoppage.

NORPEL processes mackerel and herring with capacity for freezing more than 2,400 metric tons per week, according to its website. A man who answered the phone at NORPEL on Tuesday declined to identify himself, saying he had no comment. A subsequent email to the company received no response.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard Times

December 16, 2014 — Today, Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Secretary Robert Barham announced a closure of the fall shrimp season in most state inside waters and in a portion of state outside waters effective Monday, Dec. 22, 2014 at official sunset.

Specifically, those waters that will close to shrimping include:

-All state inside waters from the Mississippi/Louisiana state line westward to the Louisiana/Texas state line except for the following waters located east of the Mississippi River:

-Lake Pontchartrain, Chef Menteur and Rigolets Passes, Lake Borgne, Mississippi Sound, Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO), and the open waters of Breton and Chandeleur Sounds as described by the double-rig line in R.S. 56:495.1(A)2

-The portion of state outside waters extending a distance of 3 nautical miles seaward of the inside/outside shrimp line from the Atchafalaya River Ship Channel at Eugene Island as delineated by the Channel red buoy line westward to the western shore of Freshwater Bayou Canal at -92 degrees 18 minutes 33 seconds west longitude.

Read the full story at KATC

December 15, 2014 — Commercial fishermen are once again harvesting Gulf seafood off the coasts of Elmer's and Grand Terre islands, an area that's been closed due to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries reopened state waters surrounding the islands, some of the areas most significantly oiled, near Grand Isle Dec. 10.

Dean Blanchard, owner of Dean Blanchard Seafood in Grand Isle, tells The Courier it's a very big deal.

When Blanchard's vessel captains heard of the news, they immediately made arrangements to get out to their old, reliable fishing area to test the waters.

Read the full story from The Sun Herald

 

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — December 14, 2014 — Nashawn Neves is a a typical 8-year-old boy. He likes to run around, play and watch TV.

And, in typical second-grade fashion, he'd rather be running around outside that sitting in a classroom in front of a textbook.

"Sometimes he says he doesn't like school," his mother, Nuria says. "And I tell him, 'you want to come work in a fish house like your mother?'"

Nuria started working at MarLees Seafood on North Front Street after graduating from New Bedford High School in 1999. It was her first stint at the North End seafood facility; she went back a few years ago after spending years working at a North End textile mill and as a personal care assistant in a nursing home.

"I've never stopped working," Nuria says. "Work, work, work, that's me."

She wouldn't be able to pay the rent without working. She receives $300 a month in food stamps for herself and the three children — Destiny, 10, Nashawn and Nasir, 4 — but receives no other public assistance to help with the $800 per month rent, car insurance, clothes, day care for her youngest son, or other necessities.

Read the full story from the New Bedford Standard-Times

December 12, 2014 — The following was released by North Carolina Sea Grant:

North Carolina Sea Grant is accepting applications from North Carolina graduate students for the 2015 National Sea Grant College Program/NOAA Fisheries fellowship. This opportunity is open to U.S. citizens who are doctoral students in academic institutions in the United States and its territories.
Applications are due by 5 p.m., Jan. 29, 2015.

This program provides real-world experience and fosters the careers of graduate students interested in population and ecosystem dynamics and stock assessment, or in marine resource economics. Each fellow will be assigned a mentor from NOAA Fisheries who will serve on the fellow’s committee, and provide access to research data sources and to NOAA Fisheries working/laboratory space.

Research conducted by a current North Carolina-based fisheries fellow focuses on the black sea bass population. Photo by Greg McFall/NOAA.
Two categories of this joint fellowship are available, each offering $43,500 in annual stipends. Cost sharing by the institution of higher education is required. Funding begins in Aug. 1, 2015.

Prospective population and ecosystem dynamics fellows must be admitted to a doctoral program in population dynamics or a related field — such as applied mathematics, statistics or quantitative ecology — at the time of application. Funding is for up to three years.

Applicants for the marine resource economics fellowship must be admitted to a doctoral program in natural resource economics or a related field at the time of application. Funding is for up to two years.

North Carolina currently has two population dynamics fellows: Ian Kroll from the University of North Carolina’s Institute of Marine Sciences and Meagan Dunphy-Daly from the Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University.

At least two new fisheries fellows will be selected nationwide in both categories. The successful fellows will work on problems relevant to NOAA Fisheries. They will participate in summer internships at corresponding NOAA Fisheries science centers or laboratories. Population and ecosystem dynamics fellows will be expected to spend 10 to 20 days at sea per year.

North Carolina Sea Grant will nominate candidates enrolled in a North Carolina academic institution. Students must be U.S. citizens. Students should follow the application instructions in Section IV of the original federal announcements for population and ecosystem dynamics and marine resource economics. Sea Grant forms can be downloaded here.

The application must be submitted to North Carolina Sea Grant, no later than 5 p.m., Jan. 29, 2015. Email each application component as a separate file attachment to Mary Beth Barrow at marybeth_barrow@ncsu.edu.

For more information, read the FAQs or contact John Fear, Sea Grant deputy director, at 919-515-9104 or jmfear@ncsu.edu. More details about the fellowship also are available here.

Original Federal Funding Opportunity Numbers:

Population and Ecosystem Dynamics Fellowship, NOAA-OAR-SG-2015-2004339

Marine Resource Economics Fellowship, NOAA-OAR-SG-2015-2004341

Read the release online 

 

December 12, 2014 — The Yadkin River is by no means a tributary of the Caspian Sea. About the only thing the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Black Sea have in common is the reference to color in their names. And yet, in Caldwell County, you’ll find the only farm on the continent that produces one of the world’s most expensive delicacies.

The farm is an anonymous compound of long red sheds nestled behind a cornfield on the outskirts of Lenoir just off Indian Grave Road. "This is the last place you’d expect to find a sturgeon farm right?" jokes Elisabeth Wall. And she's right. Yet this is a fish farm in the foothills of the Blue Ridge. The only one in North America that produces not fish roe but high quality real caviar. What makes this real? "If its not from sturgeon its not caviar," says Wall who runs marketing and sales for Atlantic Caviar and Sturgeon. The company was dreamed up by four friends back in 2000. "One of them was a cargo pilot. And he was flying in and out of Russia where he would refuel his jets and also himself on a little bit of caviar."

But, says Wall, he was more than just a consumer. He was also a realist and a conservationist who saw what over-fishing and the dramatic jump in caviar production after the fall of the Soviet Union would create. "He could see that pretty soon most of the fish were going to be endangered. And today all sturgeon are."

Read the full story and listen to the audio from WFAE