August 4, 2021 — Motoring out of Bar Harbor recently, a small boat slowly navigated a field of colorful buoys before hitting the open water. It hooked around Bar Island, passed the Porcupines and slowed up on the leeward side of Ironbound, a mostly undeveloped private island. Had a person been standing on the rocky cliffs then, they would have seen the crew on the boat dump a lobster trap into the water and watch it sink, then motor off to a short distance away, from which the dozen people aboard watched the spot where the trap went down. Some time later, a bundle of floats would appear at the surface and the boat would circle back and snag it with a boat hook. By now the observer would have pulled out some binoculars to get a better view, and would see that the float was attached to the lid of the lobster trap, and that from the lid, a rope disappeared into the water, by which the rest of the trap was soon retrieved.
The object thrown overboard was not in fact a trap but a ropeless fishing system deployed in a demonstration for passengers on the boat, including a film crew, a reporter and three people who study or advocate for right whales.
Zack Klyver chartered the boat and arranged the demonstration. Through his consultancy, Blue Planet Strategy, he has been working as an intermediary between manufacturers, whale advocates and lobstermen, who find themselves on various sides of a regulatory survival equation as the federal government moves to protect endangered right whales.
In ropeless fishing, Klyver sees a potential win for everyone involved, but getting there may take time and a fair amount of persuasion.
Ropeless fishing is still in its infancy. Only a handful of companies make the gear, and as Maine law requires lobster traps to be marked with a buoy, it’s not even legal to use here yet.