State and Local

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — October 24, 2013 — The first board meeting of the fledgling advocacy group calling itself the Center for Sustainable Fisheries on Wednesday elected former U.S. Rep. Barney Frank as chairman and retired UMass marine scientist Dr. Brian Rothschild as its president and CEO.

Former Mayor Scott Lang, who has been steering the organization, said that with both of those men retiring, it was the "perfect opportunity" to bring them into a group that wants a "rational plan" for fisheries management.

The group, which hopes to have national reach, has raised $105,000 in three weeks, Lang said. But as it sets out to be a counterweight to environmental groups that have millions of dollars of foundation money at their disposal, fund-raising will be a major issue for the new center.

Read the full story by Steve Urbon at the New Bedford Standard-Times

SEAFOOD.COM NEWS (Kodiak Daily Mirror) by James Brooks — October 24, 2013 — The Alaska Board of Fish declined to substantially change the allocation of state-waters cod in a meeting that ended Tuesday.

During its five-day meeting in Anchorage, the fish board heard several proposals that would have reallocated cod quota from the federal waters fishery to the state. Other proposals would have diverted quota from the Kodiak area to the Chignik area or altered start dates, gear limits or fishing behavior.
 
The Board of Fish did approve housekeeping changes to the definition of “estimated total allowable harvest” and allowed Chignik pot fishermen an earlier chance at unused jig quota.
 
Its most substantial actions, however, came in the Western Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea. The board created a new Bering Sea pacific cod fishery for pot vessels less than 58 feet long, in Area O. The fishery will take 3 percent of the region’s allowable catch.
 
In the western Gulf, the board voted to give the South Alaska Peninsula 30 percent of the allowable catch established by federal fisheries managers for the western Gulf. That area currently receives 25 percent of the allowable catch.
 
According to arrangements between the state and federal government, National Marine Fisheries Service scientists set an “acceptable biological catch” each year for regions across Alaska. The state takes a share of that catch for a state-waters fishery in waters nearer than 3 miles offshore. The remaining quota goes to the federal fishery, which operates between 3 miles and 200 miles offshore.
 
Apportionment issues became even more complicated last year, when the state subdivided its catch quotas among different gear types and vessel sizes.
 
Proposition 2, brought forward by Kodiak fisherman Alexus Kwatchka, would have increased the state-waters quotas in Kodiak, Chignik and the Cook Inlet to 35.8 percent of the allowable biological catch in the central Gulf of Alaska.
 
The fish board turned down the proposal 0-7, echoing the arguments of Kodiak fisherman Seamus Hayden, who said in a letter: “the proposal is founded on allocative and special economic interest rather than any scientific data.”
 
Proposals 3 and 4, brought forward by Aloys Kopun Jr. and Raechel Allen, respectively, would have granted the Chignik area a larger percentage of the central Gulf’s acceptable biological catch.
 
Currently, Chignik receives 8.75 percent of the ABC; the proposals would have increased that to 17 percent or 17.5 percent.
 
As with proposal 2, the fish board shot down both proposals.
 
It did accept proposal 7, which forces fishing boats to deliver their catch before switching between federal and state seasons. Also passed was proposal 13, brought by the city of Chignik, which allows pot fishermen to begin using unused portions of the jig fishing quota after Aug. 15.
 
The board of fish next meets Dec. 5 in Anchorage as it addresses Chignik finfish issues. Lower Cook Inlet finfish issues are scheduled for consideration starting Dec. 8 in Anchorage, and the fish board comes to Kodiak on Jan. 7 to talk Kodiak finfish.

This story from the Kodiak Daily Mirror appeared on Seafood.com, a subscription site. It has been reprinted with permission.

ASBURY PARK, N.J. — October 23, 2013 — More than 700 bottlenose dolphin deaths have been recorded in the mid-Atlantic since July, including 129 in New Jersey, but strandings have dropped a bit recently, experts said Wednesday.

"Hopefully, we'll continue to see this decrease in strandings, but we are prepared if it picks back up again for any reason," said Mendy Garron, marine mammal stranding coordinator for the Northeast at National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries in Gloucester, Mass.

Officials "really don't know" if dolphin deaths will continue into next spring, although that's what happened during the last large East Coast die-off in 1987-88, she said.

Robert Schoelkopf, longtime director of the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine, said, "We're hoping with this cold front coming through and the storm offshore that that might trigger (the dolphins) to move farther south."

More than 800 bottlenose dolphins have been found stranded from New York to North Carolina this year through Monday, and measles-like morbillivirus remains the most likely cause, according to NOAA Fisheries.

Read the full story at The Leaf Chronicle 

 

 

October 23, 2013 — The Chesapeake Bay winter crab dredge fishery will be closed for yet another year after Virginia Marine Resources Commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to give the bay's depleted stock of iconic blue crabs time to rebuild.

The 7-0 vote in Newport News rejected a proposal that would have reopened the dredge fishery as a pilot program with tight limits and restrictions, and closed it outright for another winter.

The latest stock survey showed the blue crab population has plummeted to less than half what it was the previous year.

"I can see us in the future having a crab dredge fishery," said associate commissioner Ed Tankard. "But abundance is too low now."

"The timing is wrong," said associate commissioner Ken Neill. "I just don't think this is a good year for this."

The move was praised by a senior scientist with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, who called it a tough decision by commissioners.

"CBF remains hopeful that with conservation-minded management in place, the blue crab population will rise to consistent and sustainable levels where Virginia can consider options for increasing harvest and maximizing the economics of the fishery," said Chris Moore of the CBF's Norfolk office.

Read the full story at the Daily Press

FAIRHAVEN, Mass., — October 22, 2013 — A derelict boat, long an eyesore in the New Bedford harbor, is being dismantled for removal, according to the owner of the dock space.

"I can't wait till it's done," said Jeffrey Linberg, Jr., owner of Linberg Marine, Inc., 50 Middle Street, where the F/V Challenge occupies a 92-foot dock space.

On Tuesday morning, a crane tore out the rusty mast, oil tanks and rotted wood from the scalloper which has been lying on the bottom on its port side at the dock for almost five years, Linberg said.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times 

October 22, 2013 — It's been a horrible year for Chesapeake Bay blue crabs, which plunged to less than half their overall population in the past year, and the state is set to decide Tuesday what to do about it.

The Virginia Marine Resources Commission is expected to vote in a public hearing at its offices in Newport News on whether to reopen the winter dredge season for blue crab, close it for the sixth year in a row to help the stock rebuild, or allow dredging with strict limits and oversight.

"If it is reopened, it will not be anything like what it used to look like," VMRC spokesman John Bull said Monday. "This plan would have tight controls."

But environmentalists say tight controls aren't enough to help salvage the bay's dwindling supply of its iconic blue crabs.

Stock surveys conducted by the Virginia Institute of Marine Science and others indicate the overall abundance of blue crabs dropped from 765 million last year to about 300 million this year, said Chris Moore, Hampton Roads senior scientist at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. As a result, commercial watermen saw a "very poor" harvest this year.

The current blue crab population is only slightly better than the 298 million recorded in 2008, which was deemed a federal disaster and prompted alarmed officials in Virginia and Maryland to partner in a science-based stock management plan. Virginia began banning winter dredging that year.

Read the full story at the Daily Press

October 21, 2013 — A group of Maryland watermen has filed suit seeking to overturn the state's catch limit on menhaden, arguing that it violates state and federal law and that the forage fish is not in need of conservation.

In a filing Friday in Dorchester County Circuit Court, two founding members of the Harvesters Land and Sea Coalition ask for a temporary restraining order blocking the state from enforcing catch rules on menhaden imposed this year. A spokesman for the group contends in a statement that Maryland's catch limit is unscientific and unfair, noting that 80 percent of all the menhaden allowed to be caught along the Atlantic coast would go to one company, Omega Protein in Reedville, Va.

Watch the video and read the full story at the Baltimore Sun

ANCHORAGE, Ak. — October 21, 2013 — Alaska’s Board of Fisheries left the Cook Inlet Pacific cod fishery unchanged, although other areas of the state will see increased state waters harvest in the future.

The board unanimously voted against motions that would have increased the fishery limits in Cook Inlet and allowed longline gear after significant public testimony at its statewide Pacific cod meeting this weekend.

The South Alaska Peninsula will see an increased limit, however, and the board created a new state waters Pacific cod fishery in the Bering Sea.

The state manages fisheries from Alaska’s coast to three miles from shore, as well as in rivers and lakes, while the federal government is responsible for management from 3 to 200 miles offshore. The state manages both a guideline harvest level fishery, which the catch increase addresses, and a parallel fishery, which operates in state waters but generally follows the federal regulations.

The board is responsible for making certain fisheries management policy decisions for the state, including setting seasons, bag limits, methods and means for fisheries, and making allocation decisions. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is responsible for day-to-day fisheries management, based on the direction provided by the board.

Fish and Game’s Jan Rumble said the Cook Inlet fishery has hit record catch and participation levels in recent years, but has not yet reached the guideline harvest in any year, with about 4.4 million pounds taken in 2011, and 4.2 million in 2012.

Read the full story at the Peninsula Clarion

CHESTERTOWN, Md. — October 21, 2013 — Harvesters land and sea coalition, a recently created group of watermen and farmers, has filed a lawsuit against the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.

In a press release, the group stated that recent regulations that cut the Menhaden quota were taken so that Maryland could receive a federal grant.

Captain Robert Newberry, the spokesperson for the group says the Chesapeake Bay should not be regulated the same way the Atlantic Ocean is.

Read the full story from WBOC

ANCHORAGE — October 21, 2013 — Alaska’s Board of Fisheries is considering changes to the commercial Pacific cod fishery in Cook Inlet, but Kenai Peninsula residents have mixed views on the proposals.

At the board’s Pacific cod meeting in Anchorage, which began Friday and is expected to end Tuesday, the board is considering an increase to the allowable state waters Pacific cod catch in Cook Inlet and allowing longline gear in that fishery, both proposed by fishermen.

The board is likely to make a decision Sunday.

Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Jan Rumble said the state waters fishery has hit record catch and participation levels in recent years, but the Cook Inlet catch has not yet reached the guideline harvest in any year, with about 4.4 million pounds taken in 2011, and 4.2 million in 2012. The catch those years had a value of about $1.6 and $1.7 million, respectively. About 40 vessels prosecuted the fishery in 2011 and 2012. Currently, only pot and jig gear is allowed.

The board, or BOF, is responsible for making certain fisheries management policy decisions for the state, including setting seasons, bag limits, methods and means for fisheries, and making allocation decisions. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game, or ADFG, is responsible for day-to-day fisheries management, based on the direction provided by the board.

The board has 37 Pacific cod proposals to consider at the meeting. The majority are focused on increasing the state waters catch. Increasing the state waters fisheries would shift management from the federal government to the State of Alaska.

The state manages fisheries from Alaska’s coast to three miles from shore, as well as in rivers and lakes, while the federal government is responsible for management from 3 to 200 miles offshore. The state manages both a guideline harvest level fishery, which the catch increase addresses, and a parallel fishery, which operates in state waters but generally follows the federal regulations.

Read the full story at the Peninsula Clarion