Vinalhaven Archives - Saving Seafood

Lobstering, climate change, and Maine. Read 7 takeaways from our ‘Lobster Trap’ series

December 17, 2021 — In “The lobster trap,” The Boston Globe and the Portland Press Herald zoomed in on a small island central to Maine’s signature industry, smack dab in the crosshairs of global climate change. Reporters immersed themselves in the lives of local lobstermen reckoning with change and struggling to plot a path into the future.

Below are seven key takeaways from the series:

1. The forces that sparked a lobster boom, and brought unprecedented prosperity to Maine lobstermen, can also take it all away.

The American lobster thrives in chilly waters between 54 and 64 degrees, but can stay healthy up to 68 degrees. Long-term exposure to anything hotter spells serious trouble, like respiratory and immune system failure.

As ocean temperatures rise, the epicenter of the lobster population is shifting north to cooler waters. Right now, the thermal sweet spot is off midcoast Maine, where Vinalhaven and Stonington lobstermen fish.

But scientists warn the good times won’t last: As warming continues, they predict the catch will decline by half within 30 years.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe

The Lobster Trap

December 14, 2021 — A hard rain falls all around Johnny McCarthy, beading across the sprawling deck of his brand-new lobster boat, as he steers around the hidden threat of Folly Ledge through an ink-black night and into his home port.

His journey this midsummer night is momentous: a maiden voyage on the boat he’s always dreamed of, from the boatyard where her hull took final shape to the harbor where their fates will be made together.

You’d never know it to meet McCarthy – an unassuming, soft-spoken man who goes to work in a T-shirt and waterproof oilskins – but he is, at 32, among the most successful lobstermen in a place where lobster is king. On this remote and rocky island, 15 miles offshore, virtually everyone from the grocery clerk to the family doctor traces their living back to the tanks full of lobster that these boats haul into port each day.

The Gulf of Maine has been kind to McCarthy and his neighbors. The vast expanse, which stretches from Cape Cod to Nova Scotia, is one of the fastest warming ocean territories on the planet – and, for 30 years, that trend worked in Vinalhaven’s favor, turning the waters that surround the island into a near-perfect nursery for lobster. It is now the state’s second-richest port, and hard-working men and women like McCarthy have joined Maine’s one-percenters, pulling in hundreds of thousands of dollars per year in a state where the average worker earns about $32,000.

McCarthy’s decision to invest in a new $650,000 boat – a gleaming, green-hulled fiberglass beast, 45 feet long and the envy of every captain in Vinalhaven’s 200-boat fleet – was a vote of confidence that the good times would continue. At least it was when he made the down payment three years ago.

That was before the coast of Maine became a front line in the battle over climate change.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Lobstermen in Maine’s historically open zone vote to close their waters to newcomers

August 26, 2016 — The lobstermen of Stonington and Vinalhaven, the busiest lobster ports in Maine, have voted to close their waters to additional fishermen, preferring that newcomers wait for others to leave before dropping traps there.

Almost three of every four local lobstermen who voted in a referendum this summer supported the adoption of a waiting list system. The majority included many of the small island communities that had previously opposed making newcomers wait for lobster licenses out of fear that it would discourage people from moving to their far-flung communities.

Of the nine districts within the regional lobster zone, only one, the district that includes Matinicus and Criehaven, voted against making newcomers go on a waiting list. Results show that local lobstermen of all ages, license types and business size support the closure.

The election results now go to the local lobster council for consideration Sept. 8. If the council approves the closure, its recommendation will go to the commissioner of the state Department of Marine Resources, Patrick Keliher, who makes the final determination.

Approval would make permanent a temporary closure implemented in June, when the council voted to put the waiting list question to the 936 licensed lobstermen in the zone. It had been the last of Maine’s seven lobster zones to allow newcomers to fish without a wait.

Other regional councils had previously voted to close their fishing zones and make qualified applicants wait, sometimes for as long as a decade, to get their own lobster licenses.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

In Maine’s last open lobster zone, a feud over limiting newcomers

May 25, 2016 — In most of Maine, adults who want to make their living trapping lobster must wait until a licensed lobsterman dies or forgets to file a license renewal.

There is only one place in the state, in the waters of eastern Penobscot Bay off Stonington, Vinalhaven and Isle au Haut, where a resident who completes the necessary training and safety classes can get a license to lobster without waiting for at least a decade. But the lobstermen who oversee Maine’s last open lobster territory are now fighting over whether to cap the number of lobstermen who can fish those waters, effectively closing the last open door to the state’s largest commercial fishery.

The debate is pitting islanders who worry that a cap would eliminate an incentive for adult children to return home against mainland fishermen who want to protect this lucrative industry from outside exploitation. After years of debate, the local lobster council has tried to put the issue to a vote twice before, but the meetings have fallen through, with members missing meetings or walking out moments before a closure vote could be held.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Maine issues emergency closure to scalloping around Vinalhaven, Fox Island Thorofare

January 14, 2016 — AUGUSTA, Maine — The Department of Marine Resources in-season surveys conducted on Jan. 7 and 8, in specific scallop-fishing regions observed significant declines in scallop biomass densities, according to a Jan. 14 news release.They also determined that seed scallops were being illegally taken.

“An immediate conservation closure is necessary to reduce the risk of unusual damage and imminent depletion of the scallop resource in the Vinalhaven and Fox Island Thorofare and the Whiting and Dennys Bays,” said the DMR.

Therefore, DMR is adopting emergency regulations to close these areas Saturday, Jan. 16. In addition, a correction to the South Portland Harbor Targeted Closure will also be included to ensure enforceability of this area.

Vinalhaven and Fox Island Thorofare

In the Lower Penobscot Bay and Outer Islands Rotational Area, Marine Patrol, sea sampling, in-season surveys and direct industry reports indicate that the majority of fishing activity has been focused in the Fox Island Thorofare and around the inshore islands (Leadbetter, Hurricane, and Greens Islands) west and southwest of Vinalhaven.

Strong catches were reported during the first three weeks of the season, with upward of 20 vessels fishing and easily able to reach their daily landings limit by as early as 10 a.m. However, over the following weeks, Catch per unit effort decreased with vessels taking the majority of the day to reach their daily landings limit and the fleet began working in more exposed areas outside of the sheltered islands, indicating that the majority of legal sized scallops had been harvested from these areas.

Read the full story at Penobscot Bay Pilot