State and Local

HONOLULU — September 12, 2013 — Thousands of fish are expected to die in Honolulu waters after a leaky pipe caused 1,400 tons of molasses to ooze into the harbor and kill marine life, state officials said.

Hundreds of fish have been collected so far, the state Department of Health said in a statement Wednesday. Many more fish are expected to die and thousands will likely be collected, it said.

The fish are dying because the high concentration of molasses is making it difficult for them to breathe, said department spokeswoman Janice Okubo. Television footage shows some fish sticking their mouths out of the water.

The department has warned people to stay out of the area because the dead fish could attract sharks and other predators like barracuda.

The brown, sugary substance spilled Monday from a pipe used to load molasses from storage tanks to ships sailing to California. The shipping company, Matson Navigation Co., repaired the hole and the pipe stopped leaking Tuesday morning, spokesman Jeff Hull said.

As much as 233,000 gallons of molasses leaked into the harbor, Matson said. That's equivalent to what would fill about seven rail cars or about one-third of an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

Read the full story by the Associated Press at the New Jersey Herald

 

September 12, 2013 — MOREHEAD CITY, N.C. — A second public hearing in Carteret County on the issue of critical habitat designation for the loggerhead sea turtles was a repeat of the first.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Services has proposed related rules that would designate areas along the North Carolina coast as critical habitat for the loggerhead sea turtle, which is listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

Approximately 100 people showed up at the Crystal Coast Civic Center in Morehead City for last month’s public hearing on the proposed “on land” designation and did the same Tuesday night in opposition to the “in the water” proposal.

More than 20 people spoke against the proposal saying the critical habitat designation is unnecessary regulation they fear will impact shoreline and near-shore projects such as dredging, beach nourishment, fishing activity and water access projects when federal permitting, funding or other activity is involved.

“It’s one thing after another after another after another,” said Atlantic Beach resident Robert Freeman.

Read the full story at the Jacksonville Daily News

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. — September 12, 2013 — A campaign to highlight the importance of locally caught seafood will launch during this year's Fishtival at Prescott Park.

The Slow Fish campaign, an international effort to promote community based fishing, raise consumer awareness on the value of “underloved” species of fish and create dialogue on the state of fisheries management, is kicking off in New England with a two-week youth-led program that starts at the fifth-annual N.H. Fish and Lobster Festival.

Known locally as Fishtival, the event runs from noon to 4 p.m. at Prescott Park and invites people of all ages to learn, explore and celebrate the community-based local fishing fleet and its fresh, healthy harvest.

Slow Fish will feature at the Fishtival the first ever youth-led Seafood Throwdown, a cooking competition that highlights the importance of local seafood in restoring a healthy ocean ecosystem.

Read the full story at the Portsmouth Herald 

 

 

September 11, 2013 — Buying a fish at the fish counter in a grocery store is so disconnected from the reality, that it's often hard to imagine why a wild Alaskan salmon might be so much more expensive than a similar looking farmed salmon. But head out to Alaska and take a ride on a fishing boat, and the differences become clear quite quickly. We went to Juneau to get the real story behind Alaskan Wild Salmon.

The life cycle of a salmon begins in fresh water, where they spawn and then incubate for a period of months. They head out to sea for three to five years and then depending on which of Alaska's five species they are — King, Sockeye, Cohoe, chums or pinks — they start coming back between the spring and early fall.

Commercial fisherman are heavily regulated in where and when they can catch salmon. Kirk Hardcastle, a salmon fisherman in Juneau pointed out that, "In the King season time we'll only get one or two day openings. During the sockeye season, when we're getting a lot more fish, we'll be able to fish for three or four days. A lot of people in the Lower 48 might think 'Don't you want to catch all the fish?' No, we don't want to catch all the fish. We want them to reproduce, we want the fish to escape."

Once the fish are caught, it's the handling that can further differentiate the quality — processing is affected by supplier. Higher end suppliers pride themselves on having the fish on a plane and onto your plate within 24 hours. For the majority, since it is seasonal, most year-round salmon is frozen. But since most of the salmon processing is done right when the fish come off the boat within Alaska, they are handled and frozen immediately to maintain their quality.

Read the full story and watch the video at the Huffington Post 

 

MOREHEAD CITY, N.C. — September 11, 2013 — State, county and local government representatives, as well as other coastal residents, spoke out again Tuesday against the proposed critical habitat designation for loggerhead sea turtles.

The National Marine Fisheries Service held a public hearing Tuesday to take comments on its proposal to declare areas of the North Carolina coast as critical habitat for loggerhead sea turtles. The designation would require additional scrutiny of any federal activity, federally funded activity or federally permitted activity going on in these areas. The action could impact activities including dredging and federally permitted commercial fishing.

The habitat designation is part of a joint proposal from both the NMFS and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Fish and Wildlife has made its own critical habitat proposal that covers land on the Atlantic coast, including areas of coastline in North Carolina and Carteret County.

Public comments on this joint proposal will be accepted until Monday. Written comments can be made online by visiting www.regulations.gov, entering the docket ID number “NOAA-NMFS-2013-0079-0002” in the search bar, and clicking the “comment now” button on the search results.

During the hearing, 23 of the roughly 80 attendees spoke, all in opposition to the proposed designation. Opponents said scientific data doesn’t support the proposed requirements, sea turtle protection and restoration efforts are already ongoing in North Carolina, and critical habitat designation would impact the coastal economy.

Read the full story at the Carteret County News-Times

September 9, 2013 — A flawed economic impact statement attached to a habitat designation proposal for endangered sea turtles could up the cost of dredging and nourishment projects, area residents said at a public hearing Monday.

"The whole economic review is kind of flawed, in our opinion," said Kure Beach Commissioner David Heglar. "Assessing the paperwork impact of this doesn't count the direct and indirect cumulative effects."

The hearing – the first of two this week in North Carolina – allowed members of the public to give comments on a recent proposal of critical habitat designation for loggerhead sea turtles, released by the National Marine Fisheries Service. Thirty-six areas throughout the Northwest Atlantic Ocean were named in the proposal, including parcels of water identified as reproductive and overwintering areas adjacent to a handful of area beaches – among them, Topsail Island, Lea-Huttaf Island, Pleasure Island, Bald Head Island, Oak Island and Holden Beach. Each area extends roughly 1 mile from shore, according to Susan Pultz, a biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Office of Protected Resources.

The hearing was separate from previous meetings held by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service regarding critical habitat proposals for nesting areas on shore, including 68 miles of coastline in southeastern North Carolina. Monday's hearing, held by the National Marine Fisheries Service, focused on the proposal relating to waters used by loggerheads for migratory and mating purposes, among other things.

Read the full story from StarNewsOnline

September 9, 2013 — The Obama administration's latest plan for making 14 hydroelectric dams in the Northwest safe for salmon offers no major changes in strategy and continues to rely on habitat improvements to overcome the numbers of fish killed by the dams.

The 751-page draft of the court-ordered plan known as a biological opinion was released Monday by NOAA Fisheries Service.

The last plan was struck down in 2011 for depending too much on habitat improvements that weren't specific. That plan also failed to consider the possibility of breaching the four dams on the Snake River in Eastern Washington _ a move that would return the river to more natural conditions.

The new plan also doesn't consider breaching the four dams. It said current dam operations are working fine, survival of juvenile salmon migrating to the ocean has improved and habitat improvements are on track to be implemented by 2018, when the biological opinion runs out.

The latest plan also noted that scientists can't explain a downturn in the past four years in the numbers of adult fish surviving the reach between Bonneville Dam on the Columbia and Ice Harbor Dam on the Snake in Eastern Washington.

The survival outlook for many threatened and endangered salmon runs remains risky. Landscape-scale habitat improvements are being ramped up on the Columbia Estuary, where spending is increasing from $4 million to $13 million.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Daily Astorian

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — September 10, 2013 — Industry skills will be on display at the 2012 Working Waterfront Festival (September 29-30), a free celebration of commercial fishing culture which takes place annually in New Bedford, the nation’s number one port.

Fishermen are invited to show their skills by competing in a number of contests including net mending, splicing, scallop shucking, link squeezing, and the donning of survival suits. This year many in the industry have stepped up to offer prizes to the winners. Hercules SLR (US) which is sponsoring both the safety demos and survival suit races is offering a $100 gift certificate for the winners of the survival suit races. The Marlinspike Artist is offering a $100 Stop and Shop gift card to the winner of the splicing contest. A pair of XTRATUF boots will be awarded to the winners of the link squeezing contest.

Read the full release from the Working Waterfront Festival

September 9, 2013 — Unalaska doesn't want to close the door on new Pacific cod fisheries.

The town’s Fish and Game Advisory Committee met Saturday. They voted 5-2 to reject a proposed moratorium on new Pacific cod fisheries in state waters until the state comes up with a new long-term management plan for the resource.

The moratorium would also prevent the state from expanding current Pacific cod fisheries for the time being.

Managing Pacific cod is complicated — especially since the federal government put restrictions on the Pacific cod fishery to protect an endangered stock of Steller sea lions in 2011.

Dustin Dickerson has been fishing near Unalaska since the late 80s. He’s new to the advisory board, but he opposed the ban on new cod fisheries with the rest of the majority.

Dickerson said he’s concerned that it would hurt smaller-scale fishermen.

"If, for instance, in the future somebody came along and wanted to open up a state waters fishery for boats 42 feet and under, I’d like to leave the door open for opportunities for true small boat fisherman," Dickerson said.

Read the full story at KCUB

September 7, 2013 — NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Connecticut lobstermen have survived storms and struggled with poor prices, die-offs and a prolonged plunge in the population that they count on for a livelihood. Now the dwindling ranks of aging, full-time lobsterman are removing their traps to comply with the first seasonal shutdown on Long Island Sound.

The closure, which begins Sunday and lasts through Nov. 28, aims to reduce the total lobster harvest by 10 percent this year to give the sound's depleted lobster population a chance to rebuild. Amid skepticism it will reverse their fortunes, lobstermen are tightening their belts, shifting to other fishing, laying off crews, thinking about jobs on shore and wondering how they'll survive the latest challenge.

"You won't find a group of harder-working or more industrious guys," said Michael Theiler, one of about two dozen full-time lobstermen in Connecticut compared to more than 200 a decade ago. "If there is anyone who is going to survive something like this, it's going to be lobstermen. I couldn't tell you how we're going to do it or what it's going to take."

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission required New York and Connecticut to take steps to reduce the total lobster harvest by 10 percent in 2013. The timing was requested by lobstermen to coincide with a drop in wholesale prices to minimize the harm.

"The economic impact should be well less than 10 percent," said David Simpson, director of marine fisheries for the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. "This is just another call for diversification. They've already had to diversify and not just depend on one resource."

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Anchorage Daily News