Saving Seafood

Feds enforcing fishery, distancing rules to protect southern resident orcas

April 15, 2021 — For a third year in a row, the federal government has ordered fishery closures and imposed limits on vessel movements to protect the critically endangered southern resident killer whale population.

The measures by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans focus on the main threats to the orcas: lack of access to Chinook salmon stocks, acoustic and physical disturbance, and contaminants.

The commercial and recreational salmon fishery will be closed in a portion of Swiftsure Bank from July 16 to Oct. 31, and in Juan de Fuca Strait from Aug. 1 to Oct. 31.

DFO is also enforcing a new closure for commercial and recreational salmon fisheries in the southern Gulf Islands, where closures will be triggered by the first confirmed presence of southern resident killer whales in the area.

Monitoring will begin in the area on June 1. If a southern resident killer whale sighting is confirmed, the fishery will be shut down and remain closed until Oct. 31, the department said.

Distancing measures will also be enforced. For a second year, vessels will be prohibited from coming within 400 metres of any orca in coastal waters between Campbell River and Ucluelet, including Barkley and Howe Sound. This is in effect year-round until May 31, 2022.

Read the full story at The Times Colonist

Regulatory approaches differ for burgeoning offshore aquaculture sector

April 5, 2021 — As offshore aquaculture becomes a more viable enterprise globally, a variety of regulatory approaches have emerged that reflect conflicting perspectives of the sector as either an economic opportunity or an environmental threat.

The governments of Canada and Denmark have both taken aggressive actions to curtail offshore aquaculture, with Denmark banning any new projects as of December 2020 and Canada adopting increasingly restrictive policies on net-pen aquaculture.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Canada launches “dark vessel” program to combat IUU

March 24, 2021 — Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has announced the launch of a new CAD 7 million (USD 5.5 million, EUR 4.7 million) program designed to track vessels deliberately avoiding automatic location devices.

The program, called the Dark Vessel Detection Program, is being launched in collaboration with Canada’s Department of National Defence, Defence Research and Development Canada’s Centre for Security Science, Global Affairs Canada, and MDA, DFO announced. The goal is to reduce illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing by tracking around the world by identifying vessels that are deliberately turning off automatic tracking devices.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

BC salmon farmers ask for more time as farm closures estimated to cost CAD 390 million

March 2, 2021 — Salmon farmers in the Discovery Islands – located in British Columbia, Canada – are asking for more time in a planned phase-out of all net-pen farming in the area in order to alleviate some of the economic impacts.

Fisheries and Oceans Canada announced on 17 December, 2020, it plans to completely phase out all net-pen salmon farming in the Discovery Islands over the next 18 months. Salmon farmers and the B.C. communities – which say they were blindsided by the decision – are asking for an extension to give them more time to prepare for the shift and to avoid the euthanization of salmon.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Tribes, fishermen decry Alaska and B.C.’s decision not to extend transboundary monitoring

March 2, 2021 — A 22-page final report released on Thursday culminates two years of data collected from water, sediment and fish tissue in three transboundary watersheds that straddle the frontier. And now, Alaska and British Columbia governments say their work is done.

“Given the existence of other sampling programs planned by state, federal or provincial agencies throughout the transboundary region, there is no need to continue the joint program,” the state and province said in a joint-statement.

Congress appropriated more than $3 million for renewed stream monitoring at border stream gauges operated by the U.S. Geological Survey.

“With all the resources didn’t feel like it was necessary for multiple agencies to be collecting the same thing,” Terri Lomax, a program manager with the state Department of Conservation, told CoastAlaska.

She’s been part of the cross-border effort ever since Gov. Bill Walker signed a landmark agreement in 2015 with B.C. to set up joint water quality monitoring for a shared watershed that hosts a booming Canadian mining sector that drains into Southeast Alaska.

“We’ve developed a lot of partnerships and a lot of relationships over the last couple of years,” she said. “We didn’t have these relationships with British Columbia.”

Provincial officials say they agree that the program has run its course.

Read the full story at KRBD

Why a net‑zero future depends on the ocean’s ability to absorb carbon

February 26, 2021 — Most of us growing up along Canada’s East Coast never worried about hurricane season. Except for those working at sea, we viewed hurricanes as extreme events in remote tropical regions, seen only through blurred footage of flailing palm trees on the six o’clock news.

Today, a warming ocean spins hurricanes faster, makes them wetter and drives them towards Atlantic Canada and even further inland. Hurricanes, winter storms and rising sea levels will continue to worsen unless we slow climate change.

The lifeblood of coastal economies and societies has always been the connection between land and sea, and that’s become more evident with climate change. But this isn’t just a coastal story anymore.

The oceans moderate the world’s climate through the absorption of heat and carbon. And just how much carbon the ocean will continue to absorb for us remains an open question. Whatever we do, it must be grounded in our growing wisdom of the deep connections between life on land and in the sea.

As Canada commits to a net-zero future and plans its post-COVID economic recovery, innovations and investments could backfire if they reduce the ocean’s ability to absorb our excesses.

Read the full story at PHYS.org

Canada announces new 2021 measures to protect endangered right whales

February 22, 2021 — The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) Canada has announced a plan to better protect the endangered North Atlantic right whale in 2021, carrying over several measures from 2020 and adding new requirements.

Protection of the North Atlantic right whale – one of the most-endangered species on the planet, with roughly 366 individuals remaining – has been an ongoing issue for fisheries in both eastern Canada and the Northeastern U.S. as gear entanglements have been linked to whale deaths. Those ongoing conflicts resulted in a U.S. court declaring the American lobster fishery in violation of the Endangered Species Act, and prompted U.S. senators, in 2019, to call on Canada to do more to protect the species.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Canadian Government Invests in Research Assessing Impact of Oil on Pacific Salmon

December 17, 2020 — The Government of Canada announced on Tuesday $349,948 in funding will be provided to the University of Guelph for a “two-year research project to evaluate how Coho salmon, in the early stages of life, are impacted when exposed to diluted bitumen (dilbit) – a crude oil found in natural oil sands deposits that is mixed with a lighter diluent.”

The Honourable Bernadette Jordan, Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard announced the funding and explained that the research builds on previous University of Guelph projects looking at impacts dilbit exposure has on salmon.

Read the full story at Seafood News

Search continues for 5 fishermen in Bay of Fundy after 1 found dead

December 16, 2020 — Searchers found the body of a crew member from a scallop vessel that went missing in the Bay of Fundy off the coast of southwestern Nova Scotia Tuesday, as teams combed the air and shores for five other missing men.

The Maritime Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre (JRCC) announced the news in a tweet late Tuesday.

“Our thoughts and sincere condolences go out to the family,” the JRCC tweet said. It’s unclear when the body was found or where. Next of kin have been notified.

The emergency beacon was activated for the missing vessel, Chief William Saulis, Tuesday morning. The JRCC said the emergency signal came in at 5:51 a.m. AT near Delaps Cove, N.S.

A Cormorant helicopter and a Hercules aircraft from CFB Greenwood and three coast guard ships were dispatched to help with the search, which is being hampered by bad weather.

A CP-140 Aurora Maritime Patrol Aircraft from Greenwood also joined the search Tuesday evening.

Read the full story at CBC