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For 83 years, the Gloucester Fisherman’s Memorial has towered over the city’s main boulevard. Fishermen and their families consider it a holy place, and the bronze statue – which depicts a fisherman holding a boat’s wheel out at sea – is a magnet for tourists and locals. Even Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes shed tears when he saw the memorial, and its inscription inspired by the 107th Psalm, "They that go down to the sea in ships."

Massachusetts residents also feel the memorial has deep meaning. Last month, citizens voted overwhelmingly online to recommend a depiction of the memorial be minted on the back of a US quarter. The memorial – known by locals as the Man at the Wheel – received more than 100,000 votes, and bested sites such as the Lowell National Historic Park, the House of the Seven Gables in Salem, and the USS Constitution.

"This is an honor and to all of the fishermen," said Grace Favazza. Favazza’s brother, Vito Misuraca, was lost at sea on Sept. 8, 1978. Favazza frequently spends time at the memorial and considers it a sacred area.

Read the complete story at The Boston Globe.

Sixteen years after it was first proposed, the United Nations (U.N.) has notified Oceana of its official resolution to designate June 8 as World Oceans Day.  Both the U.N. and Oceana are preparing events to honor the inaugural celebration of the planet’s oceans.

The U.N. decision comes after thousands of supporters of Oceana and other conservation organizations, aquariums, universities, and agencies, signed petitions asking the international body to establish an official day for the oceans.   World Oceans Day was first proposed in 1992 by the Government of Canada at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro.

“We applaud the United Nations for formally establishing a day for the other 71 percent of the planet,” said Andrew Sharpless, C.E.O. of Oceana.  “Making World Oceans Day official will help us and other ocean groups to engage more people and to increase public support for efforts to reverse the declining health of marine ecosystems.”

Read the complete story at Trans World News.

Bottomfeeder: How to Eat Ethically in a World of Vanishing Seafood by Taras Grescoe opens with a horrifyingly poetic description of a monkfish as the “Quasimodo of the Atlantic” whose “uncooked flesh, especially the liver can be virtually ambulant with marine worms”.

The book goes on in squirm-inducing detail to educate readers about why we shouldn’t be eating the fish we are eating and how, if we want to save our oceans, we’d all be well-advised to become bottomfeeders.

Expertly written, enthralling and suspenseful, this book goes deep into the reasons most top-of-the-food-chain fish aren’t sustainable and also lays out the facts about heavy metal contamination in many popular fish, like tuna and swordfish.

Read the complete review at Ecosalon.

MARINE FISHERIES OBSERVERS Company: AIS, Inc. is hiring, please read the complete details at Environmental Career.

When William Hogarth visited New Bedford in January 2005, the city was reeling from the loss of five fishermen who had perished at sea when their scalloper sank off Nantucket in rough weather.

Hogarth, then the top federal fisheries administrator, listened to frustrated fishermen complain about rigid fishing rules that were responsible for tragedies such as the Northern Edge sinking.

Hogarth’s visit led to federal funding that helped then-Mayor Frederick Kalisz establish the city’s now successful safety training program for commercial fishermen. Prior to Hogarth’s visit, he had pledged his support for changing scallop fishing rules blamed for sinking the Northern Edge. The rules penalized fishermen for breaking fishing trips to avoid bad weather, forcing captains to choose between economic gain and the safety of their crews. The rules were later amended to accommodate bad weather.

Read the complete story at South Coast Today.

Because of working for many years in both New England and Alaska, I have long been extremely critical of the New England approach to fisheries management because it has suffered from a fatal flaw: a failure to believe in the basic goal of maintaining fish stocks at their optimum level.

This underlying rejection of the fundamental goals of fisheries management is what has led the New England council time and again to fail to adopt effective measures to rebuild stocks, which now for a generation have been in serious decline.

Now, the council is again acting like a dysfunctional spouse in a domestic abuse case – unable to stop fighting the last war despite the intervention of grownups.

Yesterday, following largely the advice of lawyers based in Gloucester, the council voted again to affirm its rejection of NMFS interpretations of the mixed stock exemption, arguing explicitly that in a situation where many stocks are harvested together, the council has the ability to refuse to rebuild those stocks most at risk if it interferes with the other stocks being harvested at their optimum yield.

Read the complete story at Blogfish.

Not everyone in New Bedford, Massachusetts was busy debating fishing rules this month. Some of them were reveling in the legacy of New Bedford’s last great resource hunt, whaling.

It was the annual Moby Dick Marathon at the whaling museum, where 170 people read aloud the entire text of Moby Dick. No, I’m not kidding, the read the whole thing out loud, it took just over 24 hours. This year marked the 13th undertaking of the leviathan task. Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank read chapter 3, nice going Mr. Frank.

The rise and fall of whaling was New Bedford’s last big boom and bust, and fishing has done some of that. But unlike whaling, fishing should last forever if done right.

Read the complete story Blogfish.

BOSTON, MA (March 20, 2009) – Get ready, Green Line riders. The foul-mouthed fish are back.

After months of negotiations, Legal Sea Foods said it has received approval from the MBTA for a new series in its "Fresh Fish" ad campaign.The new insults include zingers such as: "Kiss my bass;" "If that’s your girlfriend, I’d throw her back;" and "Darn, you smell like carp."

Read The Boston Globe story in full

 

FAIRHAVEN, MA (March 19, 2009) – Approximately 185 people had the opportunity to listen to a presentation by a scallop fishing boat captain who described the business from a unique perspective.

Justin Tonnessen captain of the 99 foot Ambassador, was the guest of the Fairhaven Historical Society, Inc. for the presentation at the Fairhaven Town Hall Friday evening.

The 31 year old captain detailed some of the history of the boat yards and shops that are intregal parts of the fishing industry in Fairhaven.

Read the Hathaway News Service story in full