University of Maine Archives - Page 2 of 14

Salmon deplete fat stores while stopped at dams, UMaine study shows Avatar photo

February 10, 2023 — Restoration of the critically endangered Atlantic salmon is an important issue in the rivers of Maine. Dams on Maine rivers have long been known to impact fish populations, but a new study led by the University of Maine quantifying the time and energy lost by Atlantic salmon stopped by dams indicate that the structures might have even more of an impact than once thought.

Atlantic salmon return to the rivers of Maine from the ocean every spring to make the long, arduous swim upstream to spawn in freshwater. When the fish are stopped by dams, they are stuck in warmer waters for longer than expected, which can deplete the fat they have stored up to power their journey. The stored energy isn’t just used for migration, but also producing gametes, developing secondary sexual traits and spawning.

“Salmon limit the food they eat in freshwater, so excess energy lost during their migration doesn’t get replaced,” says Sarah Rubenstein, who completed her masters of science in wildlife ecology at the University of Maine in 2021. “However, spawning takes a lot of energy, so the more energy reserves salmon have left after migrating and during spawning, the more likely they will be at successfully reproducing. This is particularly important here in Maine where Atlantic salmon populations have been on the decline since the 1800s.”

Read the full article at Bangor Daily News

U of Maine Lobster Study Aims to Protect State’s Vital Fishing Industry

December 28, 2022 — Researchers at the University of Maine are studying how warming Arctic waters flowing into the Gulf of Maine are affecting the region’s lobster population, in an effort to protect both the famous shellfish and the communities that depend on it.

Already, scientists say warming ecosystems have caused a decline in the survival rates of larval lobster and forced some lobster populations to move to colder areas further north.

Richard Wahle, director of the University of Maine Lobster Institute, said what happens in the Arctic unfortunately doesn’t stay there.

“Lobsters are now the elephant in the room,” Wahle emphasized. “And if things turn down for lobster, it’s going to have some really important consequences.”

Read the full article at Public News Service

Local Catch Network kicks off campaign raising awareness for local fisherman, seafood harvesters

August 23, 2022 — A social media campaign is kicking off this week to raise awareness for community-based fisheries across North America.

“It’s a campaign to promote local and regional values-based small scale seafood businesses across North America,” said Paloma Henriques, a graduate assistant at the University of Maine.

This is the second year of the campaign that started after researchers found the pandemic highlighted the need to build resilient local and regional seafood systems.

“The global supply chains really faltered and struggled. If you’re looking at seafood, it’s one of the most highly traded commodities. A fish can be caught in one country processed in another and consumed in a third country,” Henriques said.

Read the full story at WABI

On the horizon: National survey in support of a strong domestic seafood economy

July 13, 2022 — American seafood harvesters play a vital role in supplying healthy, high-quality food to people across the United States and around the world. But they also face serious challenges caused by market disruptions, competing ocean uses, environmental change, and fishing regulations.

Selling seafood directly to consumers, or direct seafood marketing, has become an increasingly common way for harvesters to sell their catch. A forthcoming national survey aims to strengthen the domestic seafood economy by understanding direct marketing practices of American seafood harvesters.

Surveys of direct marketing practices have been beneficial to the agricultural sector. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) surveys American farmers engaging in direct marketing of agricultural products through the Local Food Marketing Practices Survey (LFMPS). Data from these surveys helped the USDA develop grant programs and technical assistance to support small- and mid-sized farming operations.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Scientists see long-term hope for Maine’s lobster fishery despite warming waters

June 13, 2022 — Dire predictions about the effects of global warming on Maine’s lobster population may be exaggerated and underestimate the potential that conservation measures have to preserve the fishery into the future.

Rapid warming in the Gulf of Maine and the collapse of lobster fisheries in southern New England have fueled predictions that lobsters will likely move north out of Maine waters in the coming decades. But ongoing research at the University of Maine is revealing a more optimistic long-term view of the Maine lobster fishery.

The UMaine scientists are now projecting that temperatures in Gulf of Maine will likely remain within lobsters’ comfort zone because of the gulf’s unique oceanographic features, though changing ocean currents are harder to predict. The researchers cautioned that the dynamics of global warming are complex and make it difficult to project far into the future with certainty.

Ocean stratification – where water of different densities separates into distinct layers – is keeping the bottom temperatures colder on the Gulf of Maine’s western side, the scientists say, while strong tidal mixing in the eastern gulf and the Bay of Fundy helps moderate the water temperature there during the summer. Because Maine waters have historically been so cold, they say, even a couple of degrees of warming should keep Maine’s bottom waters below 68 degrees, the temperature at which lobsters begin to show signs of stress, according to the Atlantic States Fisheries Management Council.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Can Offshore Wind Energy Coexist With Maine’s Lobster Industry? Attempt Underway

June 9, 2022 — Researchers at the University of Maine are attempting to work ahead to prevent problems between one of Maine’s heritage industries and a new clean energy sector.

Over the past several years, Maine lobstermen have raised concerns about offshore wind development in the Gulf of Maine and its potential to disrupt where and how they fish.

Hundreds of people in Maine’s lobster industry organized a protest in the state’s capital, Augusta, last year on the same day Gov. Janet Mills issued a moratorium on all new offshore wind development in state waters for 10 years, excluding some specific research projects. ‘

Roughly one week ago, UMaine announced it would try to “minimize” conflict by working with the Maine Lobstermen’s Association and other groups to gather data on where fishing occurs, in order to inform offshore wind development.

“Right now, published maps suggest that lobster fishing is occurring everywhere. We hope through this effort to provide more spatial specificity about the most important fishing locations — where fishermen spend more time and effort,” said Kate Beard-Tisdale, a professor of spatial computing at the university who is leading this collaboration, in a statement released by UMaine.

Read the full story at NECN

UMaine and lobster industry team up on innovative collaboration to map Maine’s fishing effort

June 6, 2022 — The University of Maine is leading an innovative new research project to collaborate with Maine’s lobster industry to explore the potential to use data owned by commercial lobstermen to map fishing effort. These data may be used to minimize conflict from potential future offshore wind development.

The state of Maine has set an aggressive goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and achieve carbon neutrality by 2045 and is looking to floating offshore wind development in the Gulf of Maine to supply renewable power, as well as economic benefit.

Participants in Maine’s commercial fisheries are concerned that offshore wind development could result in lost fishing grounds and pose significant navigation and safety concerns. While Maine’s lobster fishery accounted for 82 percent of the value of Maine’s commercial seafood landings in 2021, there are no comprehensive data on where and when Maine lobstermen fish. To minimize the impact on Maine’s lobster fishery, better data are needed on the location, type and intensity of fishing activity in the Gulf of Maine.

Kate Beard-Tisdale is leading this collaborative project to use data already being collected by commercial lobstermen to fill these data gaps.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

UMaine research defines lobster line requirements for whale entanglement risk reduction

May 4, 2022 — Efforts to reduce the risk of entanglement in lobster trap lines for the endangered North Atlantic right whale may need to consider more factors than just line strength if they want to be safe, effective and economical, according to new research led by the University of Maine and the Maine Department of Marine Resources.

North Atlantic right whales have the potential to get caught in the vertical line that runs from gear set on the bottom to the surface marker buoy in fixed-gear fisheries, like that of the American lobster fishery in Maine. Often whales can break free of the gear and are simply left with scars, but the risk of death increases as the lines are stronger and more densely distributed throughout the water.

To mitigate right whale injury and deaths, U.S. federal management agencies like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have mandated weak points or weak ropes be inserted into vertical lines to limit strength and provide points at which right whales can break the ropes if they become entangled. New regulations on minimum trawl lengths — or the number of traps fished per vertical line — took effect on May 1, 2022, and caused increases in lobster fishery vertical line loads across all fishing grounds, considerably increasing with depth and distance from shore.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

New report sets broad goals for Maine’s aquaculture industry in the next decade

April 15, 2022 — In the last 8 years, Maine’s aquaculture harvest has more than doubled in volume and in value, and some predict that the state’s aquaculture exports could be worth as much as $800 million by 2025. A new report is recommending how that growth should be managed over the next decade. But critics say it’s too focused on expanding the industry, and gives short shift to other users of the ocean commons or the ecosystems that they all depend on.

The document sets broad goals for aquaculture’s next decade in Maine, starting with streamlined permitting for public water leases that “balances the rights of the applicant and the public.

And it identifies the potential costs of specific actions: $100,000, for instance, to support a state employee who would help applicants get through the permitting process and engage with host communities, $100,000 to integrate aquaculture into K-12 education, and a quarter million dollars to create a Maine Seafood Council to market both farmed and wild-caught seafood.

“It’s one tool that can be used along with the many tools the state has in thinking about the future,” said Gayle Zydlewski, who directs Maine Sea Grant, a federal-state program housed at the University of Maine that led a collaborative effort to create the so-called Maine Aquaculture Roadmap.

Read the full story at Maine Public

MAINE: Lobster fishery, coming off a record year, faces challenges ahead

March 18, 2022 — Maine’s lobster fishery scored a record-breaking value in 2021, with a 75% increase over 2020 and a 10% increase in landed weight.

But fishermen face increasing pressures, including difficulty finding and keeping crew, rising operational costs, competition for fishing grounds from other industries, new regulations affecting fishing gear and methods and coastal development pressure that’s squeezing waterfront access and opportunities to live they work.

There are plenty of long-term studies on the lobster side of the fishery. For example, the University of Maine’s Lobster Institute handles the American Lobster Settlement Index, which monitors larval lobsters and their environment.

Now a new study is underway to study the human side of the fishery.

“Last year’s season was the most valuable ever,” said Theresa Burnham, a University of Maine research associate and a member of the study’s research team.

Read the full story at Mainebiz