Saving Seafood

Hand cream to luxury leather: Incubating ideas on how to use fish parts

November 5, 2017 — In Reykjavik’s harbour, overlooking the colourful fishing vessels, there’s a building full of bright, young entrepreneurs. While they may never set foot in a boat, haul a net or set a hook, with their social media, marketing and design skills they’re determined to maximize value from the seafood industry.

They’re members of Iceland’s Ocean Cluster House, an innovation incubator for startup companies looking for the best new business idea from fish oil, bones, intestines and skin, or whatever else the ocean provides.

It’s the brainchild of Thor Sigfusson, who’s eager to show the space to a group visiting from Newfoundland and Labrador.

“Let me just walk with you through the house, now.”

The tour starts at the Ocean Cluster’s public restaurant, Bergsson, where pillows are made from old boat sails and pendant lights are cleverly fashioned from old buoys. Everywhere you look there are reminders of the ocean.

“We love to have designers involved with what we are doing here,” says Sigfusson, who holds a PhD in business.

While working on that degree, he found that fishing companies with money to invest weren’t well connected with entrepreneurs in the marine field. So, in 2011, he brought them all together under one roof.

Read the full story at CBC NEWS

 

Right Whale Disentanglements Allowed on Case-by-Case Basis

July 21, 2017 — The disentanglement of critically endangered North Atlantic right whales has been authorized by the National Marine Fisheries Service on a case-by-case basis.

The agency suspended all whale responses last week after a Canadian responder was killed while disentangling a right whale off New Brunswick.

NOAA lifted the ban for all other species Tuesday after reviewing safety policies.

Right whale responses will be contingent upon a review of circumstances and available resources.

Read the full story at CapeCod.com

Feds allow entangled whale rescues to resume, except for ‘unpredictable’ right whales

July 20, 2017 — U.S. officials are lifting a ban on some whale disentanglement efforts after briefly banning the practice that last week led to the death of a Canadian fisherman.

But the ban will stay in effect for right whales, “whose unpredictable behavior is particularly challenging during rescue attempts,” Chris Oliver, Assistant Administrator for NOAA Fisheries, said Tuesday.

In response to the death of Joe Howlett, who died after freeing a right whale from fishing gear, the fisheries division of the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration on July 11 barred anyone from approaching an entangled whale in U.S. waters.

On Tuesday, it announced that rescue efforts could resume, but that it would only allow right whale disentanglement efforts “on a case-by-case basis,” depending on circumstances and availability of trained people. The suspension of right whale rescues likely will remain in effect as long as Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans investigates Howlett’s death, NOAA has said.

Federal law bars anyone from closely approaching whales, except for those specifically trained and authorized to do so for research or conservation purposes.

Howlett, 59, died July 10 while freeing a whale from fishing gear in the Gulf of St. Lawrence near Shippagan, on the northeast coast of the Canadian province of New Brunswick. Howlett, who helped found the Campobello Whale Rescue Team, was part of a group of trained responders who had just freed the whale when it struck and killed him.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

US bars people from disentangling whales after Canadian’s death

July 13, 2017 — U.S. officials are temporarily barring anyone from approaching an entangled whale after a Canadian fisherman was killed trying to free one in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

Joe Howlett, a fisherman from Campobello, was struck by a North Atlantic right whale on July 10, moments after he and other responders had freed it from fishing gear near Shippagan, New Brunswick, on the province’s northeast coast.

“Because ensuring the safety of responders is of paramount importance, NOAA Fisheries is suspending all large whale entanglement response activities nationally until further notice, in order to review our own emergency response protocols in light of this event,” said Chris Oliver, assistant administrator for the fisheries division of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Marine mammals are protected under federal law, which means it is illegal to harass or harm them. Exceptions are made for properly trained people who are pre-approved by NOAA to respond to entanglements or strandings. By suspending entanglement responses, NOAA temporarily is banning anyone from approaching or trying to free an entangled whale.

Disentanglement efforts have been intense this past month in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, which is ringed by five Canadian provinces, as seven North Atlantic right whales have been found dead in the gulf over the past several weeks. The causes of death for each one have not been determined. Researchers estimate that the critically endangered species has a population of only roughly 500 individual whales.

NOAA Fisheries and its partner agencies will continue to respond to all other reported stranding of marine mammals in distress, but Oliver emphasized that those efforts are technically challenging and should be attempted only by trained experts.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

HILDE LEE: Cod has special place in nation’s food history

July 11, 2017 — I have a certain curiosity about food, particularly seafood. I am not shy about asking, “Is the fish fresh? When did it come in?”

Thus, one day I got the definitive answer from one a man at one of our local grocery store fish counters. “Yes, the fish is fresh and we get it frozen. I only thaw out what I think will sell daily. Thus, the fish is very fresh.” Well, it may be fresh, but it was frozen. After all, we are not on the seacoast.

I like cod and the various members of the cod family — haddock, hake, pollock and Atlantic cod. The flesh of these fish is usually firm, making it ideal for a variety of dishes — broiled, baked, and stewed. Cod is also a good receiver of sauces, particularly tomato-based ones with herbs.

Just like the bison and the eagle, cod can be considered a symbol of America. It was here even before the first settlers came to New England, where cod was plentiful.

When Giovanni Caboto sailed from Bristol, England, on May 2, 1497, he, like Columbus, was searching for a western sea route to Asia. But Caboto — known as John Cabot, a Venetian navigator sponsored by King Henry VII — returned from his first voyage not with exotic spices, but tales of the sea. He told of the many fishes that could be caught simply by lowering weighted baskets into the water.

Even before Cabot’s reports of great schools of cod along the northern shores of the new continent, fishermen from Scandinavian areas had spent any years fishing the North Atlantic.

By 1602, Bartholomew Gosnold ventured south beyond Nova Scotia seeking sassafras — believed to be a cure for syphilis — but found French and Portuguese fishermen harvesting numerous fish along the Great Banks, an area 350 miles of coast south of Newfoundland. There, the cold Labrador Current and the Gulf Stream joined, creating ideal conditions for a variety of fish. Gosnold named the land, which jutted out to sea, Cape Cod.

Read the full story at The Daily Progress

GLOUCESTER TIMES: Saving a species in danger

July 11, 2017 — The revival of the right whale should be one of America’s great conservation success stories, standing alongside the grey wolf, the American bison and the bald eagle.

Once hunted to the edge of extinction, the right whale made strong strides toward recovery in recent decades, in large part due to conservation efforts. Today there are thought to be about 500 of the mammals swimming in Atlantic waters.

Recent events, however, show just how tenuous the species’ hold on survival really is, and make clear the need for continued, innovative conservation efforts. A new effort to educate recreational and competitive sailors about the dangers of vessel strikes is a step in the right direction.

Six right whales were found dead in the waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Canada, late last month. Early evidence suggests two of the whales died after being struck by boats, and one after becoming entangled in lost or discarded fishing gear.

Meanwhile, fewer right whale calves have been born in recent years.

“Including the right whale killed by a ship strike in Cape Cod this past April, we have now lost seven right whales in a year where only five calves were born,” said Regina Asmutis-Silva, executive director of the Plymouth-based research and advocacy group Whale and Dolphin Conservation. “Only 20 years ago, over 500 (vaquita whales) swam in the Gulf of California but today only 30 remain because of human impacts. Where will the right whales be in 20 years if we do not make meaningful changes that reduce their threats of ship strikes and entanglements?”

Massachusetts researchers, who warned the species was in trouble last year, remain concerned.

Read the full opinion piece at the Gloucester Times

Recent Right Whale Deaths Have Scientists Worried

July 7, 2017 — The deaths of six North Atlantic right whales in the Gulf of St. Lawrence last month have raised alarms among whale biologists who fear for the future of one of the rarest whales on the planet.

Robert Kenney, a marine mammal expert at the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography, called the unexpected deaths “a major concern” because the population of right whales totals fewer than 500 animals and their numbers have been declining since 2011. The dead whales represent more than 1 percent of the population.

While the deaths raise many questions, one of the first, according to Kenney, is what were they doing in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in the first place?

“Right whales go to the same places to feed every year — the Great South Channel, the Bay of Fundy, the Nova Scotia shelf — feeding grounds they probably learned from their mothers in their first year of life,” said Kenney, who manages the sighting database for the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium. “But recently they seem to be wandering farther afield. If there’s not enough food where they traditionally feed, they go to other places. That’s what we think is going on.”

What caused the deaths of the six whales in the Gulf of St. Lawrence — the water body surrounded by Newfoundland, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick — is uncertain. Preliminary results of necropsies on three of the animals showed evidence of blunt trauma from ship strikes on two of the whales and fishing gear entanglement on the third. But a news release from Canada’s Marine Animal Response Society said other problems that “may have predisposed these animals to this trauma cannot be ruled out at this stage.”

Read the full story at ecoRI News

The story behind an alleged fraud worth millions in Nova Scotia’s lobster industry

May 23, 2017 — In June of 2015, three men stepped out of a summer day thick with flies and into the Beaverdam Lake, N.S., cottage of lobster dealer Wayne Banks.

It wasn’t a casual visit.

They had arrived unannounced at his doorstep, claiming that in the space of about 10 days, someone had ripped them off to the tune of $1.6 million.

“Have a seat, you fellas,” said Banks. “I think I know why you’re here. But there ain’t nothing I can tell you.”

The secret recording of that conversation, later provided to CBC News by one of the men, offers a glimpse into a large alleged fraud case, one that reveals the money and high stakes at play in Canada’s most lucrative lobster industry.

Only later would local RCMP team up with the federal Serious and Organized Crime unit to launch a joint investigation into what they called a complex criminal operation, one some feared could have broader ramifications on the industry.

But on that June day two years ago, one name threaded its way through the conversation — Wayne Banks’s younger brother, convicted fraudster Terry Banks.

“How many families get destroyed because of Terry f–king Banks again?” said one of the visiting men in exasperation.

“I don’t understand why Terry’s still alive. I don’t.”

Last week, RCMP charged Terry Banks, 51, with four counts of fraud over $5,000 and three counts of theft over $5,000 involving allegations he was part of a scheme that stole about $3 million from four different seafood companies.

His 69-year-old brother, Wayne, faces six fraud and theft charges. A third man — Chris Malone, 52 — is charged with one count of theft and one count of fraud. All three men return to court Aug. 24.

None of the allegations has been proven in court.

RCMP Supt. Martin Marin said Tuesday that those charged had a “substantial reach and influence on the local, national and international seafood market.”

“Had this fraudulent activity continued, Nova Scotia’s economy and seafood industry could have been negatively impacted,” he said in a news release.

Read the full story at CBC News

Troubling signs for right whale population

April 10, 2017 — The quickly fading population of vaquitas sets a worrisome example for those trying to save North Atlantic right whales.

“It has me slightly terrified,” said Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution biologist Mark Baumgartner, who heads up the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium, at the annual U.S. Marine Mammal Commission meeting, held last week at the Sea Creat Beach Hotel in North Falmouth.

In 1997, scientists first counted 567 of the small porpoises in the Bay of California in Mexico, but in 20 years that has dropped precipitously — to 30 — as the vaquitas drown when caught underwater in gillnets.

The North Atlantic right whale population, at 524 animals, is currently on a downward trend, too, members of the consortium announced in November. This year’s low calving rate —only 3 right whale calves were documented — is one thing, Baumgartner said.

But a low calving rate coupled with increasing deaths due to fishing gear entanglement spells trouble.

“What could we expect in the next 5 to 10 years?” he said.

At the annual commission meeting, scientists delivered the sobering news that, starting in October, several vaquitas would be captured in the wild and placed in a conservation area for safekeeping and breeding. A recent and intense market in China for the swim bladder of totoaba, which is caught illegally in the bay using gillnets, “caught everybody by surprise,” said Peter Thomas, Marine Mammal Commission International and Policy Program Director. The vaquitas get caught in the gillnets and drown; their corpses are then brought up with the fish and are discarded by the fishermen.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

NOAA Fisheries Declines to List Thorny Skate as Threatened or Endangered

February 23, 2017 — The following has been released by NOAA:

In response to a petition from Defenders of Wildlife and Animal Welfare Institute to list thorny skate (Amblyraja radiata) under the Endangered Species Act, we have now determined that listing is not warranted at this time.

The May 2015 petition requested that we list a “Northwest Atlantic Distinct Population Segment” or a “United States Distinct Population Segment” of thorny skate as threatened or endangered.

In making a determination as to whether distinct population segments of thorny skate exist, we considered the best available information on thorny skate distribution, genetics, and behavior. We considered whether the information supported the distinct population segments as identified in the petition or if other distinct population segments exist.

We determined that the information does not support the existence of any distinct population segments of thorny skate as they mix throughout the North Atlantic. Therefore, we also assessed whether listing the full species was warranted.

Based on a comprehensive status review report, which included an Extinction Risk Analysis, we determined that the species is not currently in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range, nor is it likely to become so within the foreseeable future, so listing is not warranted at this time.

Thorny skate are at low abundance in U.S. waters compared to historical levels, primarily due to overfishing. However, declines have been halted throughout most of the species’ full range, and the species remains abundant throughout the North Atlantic, with hundreds of millions of individuals in the Northwest Atlantic alone.

Read our determination as filed in the Federal Register today.

Questions? Contact Jennifer Goebel at 978-281-9175 or jennifer.goebel@noaa.gov