Saving Seafood

Grandmother and Grandfather Among 4 Endangered Whales That Died This Month

June 26, 2019 — Four North Atlantic right whales were found dead in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in Canada in the last three weeks, representing about one percent of the remaining population that is closely watched.

One, named Punctuation, was a breeding female who had mothered eight calves and then gone on to have several grandchildren, making her death a significant loss for a dwindling population. She had been sighted as long ago as 38 years.

Another, known as Comet, was roughly 33 years old and well known to whale-watching experts, who also said that he had become a grandfather.

Two others were a younger male named Wolverine that died earlier this month, and an 11-year-old female that was found dead along with Comet near New Brunswick’s Acadian Peninsula on Tuesday night.

The New England Aquarium, which tracks the endangered population, said in a statement: “The loss of sexually mature females is biologically a major loss to this species that has seen a precipitous population decline over the past several years.”

The aquarium noted that hundreds of the right whales had migrated northward into the Gulf of St. Lawrence as warming waters reduced their food source, mainly copepods in the Bay of Fundy and the Gulf of Maine.

Read the full story at The New York Times

Inside the secret, million-dollar world of baby eel trafficking

June 26, 2019 — In the parking lot of an Irving gas station in Aulac, N.B., not far from the Nova Scotia border, Curtis Kiley popped the trunk of a Toyota Corolla.

Inside was a white bucket containing what looked like a giant hairball, the type that might be pulled from a bathtub drain.

Except it was alive — a wriggling, slithering mess.

This was just an initial sample Kiley had brought to show a prospective black-market buyer, a woman he knew only through text message as “Danielle.”

He was ultimately hoping to unload up to 300 kilograms of the tiny creatures, a huge haul worth $1.3 million on the open market, but one he was offering at a steep discount.

Moments later, Kiley’s world turned from dollar signs to handcuffs. He’d been nabbed in a federal fisheries sting, one targeting poaching in a little-known but enormously lucrative industry that plays out each spring in Nova Scotia’s rivers and brooks.

At the centre of the undercover operation by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in May 2018 was the most unlikely of creatures — baby eels.

Read the full story at CBC News

MASSACHUSETTS: Officials confirm year’s second right whale death

June 24, 2019 — The second dead right whale of the year was found Thursday by a surveillance flight, drifting northeast of the Magdalen Islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, according to the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

The death was confirmed by New England Aquarium, which has identified the whale as “Punctuation,” an adult female that has been studied by researchers for nearly 40 years and seen more than 250 times along the coast of the U.S. and Canada.

The aquarium maintains a photographic identification catalog that encompasses most of the right whale population. Punctuation was first photographed in 1981.

“All right whale deaths hit hard, but this one is particularly devastating to the population,” the aquarium staff wrote in an emailed statement.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Task force teams up with Canada for orca solutions

June 21, 2019 — The United States and Canada are working together to save the endangered Southern resident orca.

The Southern Resident Killer Whale Task Force met for a second time this year for a review of the successful Legislature season and to discuss the group’s next steps on June 3 in Puyallup. Also, earlier this month, a new orca calf was spotted with J pod, the second baby to be sighted this year.

“A lot of good things have happened,” task force co-chair Stephanie Solien said. “Today is really a day to celebrate.”

There was significant progress made by the Legislature this year, Solien explained, with $933 million in actions passed related to Southern resident recovery.

“This funding is significant and will go a long way to helping in implementing our recommendations. And we thank the Legislature for that,” Solien said.

Solien said there are two more meetings scheduled for the task force, one in September and another in October, after which the group will make more suggestions to Gov. Jay Inslee. Over the summer, workgroups will gather to come up with ideas to present to the group during the September meeting.

Read the full story at The Islands’ Sounder

Alaska senators gain support on transboundary mining issues

June 20, 2019 — Senators from the Western U.S. are joining the Alaska congressional delegation to press the issue of Canadian mining practices in transboundary watersheds .

The bipartisan group of six senators — Mike Crapo, R-Idaho; Jim Risch, R-Idaho; Jon Tester, D-Mont.; Steve Daines, R-Mont.; Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.; and Patty Murray, D-Wash. — sent a letter along with Alaska Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan June 13 to British Columbia Premier John Horgan highlighting the steps states and the federal government have taken to monitor transboundary rivers and what they want provincial officials to do in return.

They were compelled to send the correspondence because there weren’t enough delegates to the International Joint Commission from either country to hold its biannual meeting in April, according to the letter.

IJC spokeswoman Sally Cole-Misch said it took roughly a year for President Donald Trump’s three appointees to the commission to be confirmed by the Senate and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appointed three new Canadian commissioners as soon as the terms of those appointed by his predecessor were completed.

Read the full story at the Alaska Journal of Commerce

Canada becomes first G20 country to ban trade in shark fins

June 20, 2019 — Canada passed a new law banning the import and export of shark fins, which also includes a requirement to rebuild depleted fish populations.

The new Fisheries Act, approved late on Tuesday, was hailed by environmental and conservation groups as a win for the preservation of fish habitats and for the shark population. Canada has become the first G20 country to ban the export and import of shark fins, said Josh Laughren, executive director of Oceana Canada, a private conservation group.

“With all laws, how they’re implemented matters, but there’s no question this has the potential to be transformative for how we manage Canada’s oceans,” Laughren said.

Read the full story at Reuters

10 nations to jointly study marine resources of the Arctic

June 19, 2019 — A two-day conference of scientific experts from Russia, the United States, Canada, Denmark, Norway, South Korea, China, Sweden, Japan, and the European Union in the Russian city of Arkhangelsk resulted in an agreement to conduct more research on Arctic fisheries.

The April meeting was the first after an agreement between the 10 countries was signed in October of last year. The legally binding accord prohibits all commercial fishing in the Central Arctic until the nations additional surveys of stocks, their sizes, and how the region’s ecosystems operate. The agreement also included a draft of a joint research plan, with details to be discussed later this year and with implemented stalled until all the participating states ratify the agreement.

There is almost no data on high Arctic stocks, as nearly all the Arctic countries have only surveyed their own 200-mile exclusive economic zones. The only known study of the high seas was conducted by scientists from the Stockholm University. Its results presented at the conference brought some surprise and made it clear that more extensive research is needed, according to Vasily Sokolov, deputy head of the Russia’s Federal Agency for Fisheries.

“The Arctic Ocean was supposed to contain no great marine biological resources to be of interest for commercial fisheries. But it turned out that stocks of Arctic cod seem to be there, which means that fishing there may be commercially attractive,” Sokolov said. “The density of stocks increases toward the polar cap.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Canada’s ‘transformative’ fishing bill, C-68, heads to royal assent

June 19, 2019 — Canada’s Senate on Tuesday night passed C-68, a bill that amends the country’s more than 150-year-old core fishing legislation, to require rebuilding plans for depleted species populations among other important changes.

Just three of the country’s 105 senators voted against the measure, which now heads to the desk of governor-general Julie Payette for her signature, an act known as “royal assent”, bringing it almost immediately into effect.

“Today is a great day for our oceans. The overhauled Fisheries Act has the potential to be one of the most transformative things that has happened for our oceans in many years,” said Josh Laughren, executive director of Oceana Canada.

Just 34% (66 of 194 stocks) of commercial fish populations in Canada are healthy, while 13% (26 stocks) are critically depleted, only five of which have rebuilding plans (Atlantic cod in the Bay of Fundy/Scotian Shelf; boccaccio rockfish; two yelloweye rockfish groups and northern shrimp in fishing area 6, off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador).

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

US senators take aim at Canadian mines’ impact on salmon

June 17, 2019 — A bipartisan group of US senators has written to the premier of Canada’s British Columbia province, airing concerns about the effects the country’s mines are having on salmon populations in four US states.

The eight senators, from Alaska, Idaho, Washington and Montana, asked John Horgan, the province’s premier, to undertake “dedicated efforts to monitor transboundary water quality”.

“While we appreciate Canada’s engagement to date, we remain concerned about the lack of oversight of Canadian mining projects near multiple transboundary rives that originate in B.C. and flow into our four US states,” the senators wrote.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

As right whales surge north, one death too many

June 17, 2019 — Before the leviathan was dragged to shore, before it was found floating at sea trailing a slick of blood, the massive creature had had its run-ins with its greatest nemesis: human beings.

This North Atlantic right whale — among the most endangered species on the planet — was known by researchers as Wolverine, for three propeller cuts on its tailstock that reminded them of the trio of blades used by the comic book character of the same name. In its short life of nine years, journeying through thousands of miles of dense fishing grounds, the whale had endured at least one vessel strike and three entanglements in fishing gear.

Now, Wolverine was decomposing on a grassy beach at the northernmost tip of New Brunswick’s Acadian peninsula, its large, black fins inert in the salty air, its wide fluke tangled in red rope that the Canadian Coast Guard used to haul its carcass in from the frigid waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

The death of even one of the mammals poses a grave threat to the species, given how few remain. But almost as notable is that Wolverine was here at all.

Until recently, right whales were seldom seen this far north. Now about a third of the species regularly comes to feed in these frigid waters. It has proved to be a very dangerous migration.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe