June 24 - At-Sea Catch of River Herring Gets Long Overdue Attention - Severely depleted river herring and shad have been the focus of extensive restoration efforts in rivers for years—dams have come down, fish ladders and passages have gone up, and millions of dollars have been spent to improve habitat and water quality. Yet the loss of hundreds of thousands of these fish in the nets of trawlers has gone largely unaddressed—until now.

June 27 - Worst times, or just very, very bad? Industry splits hairs over the awful condition of cod - There remain some marginal voices in the fishing industry who continue to claim that cod populations are not in bad shape. Taking issue with a recent conclusion of mine that Atlantic cod were in their worst condition in history, these apologists for overfishing suggest that cod are just “in the middle of a rebuilding period.” Nonsense.

June 28 - Fish Talk in the News – Friday, June 28 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, another Boston Globe opinion piece says Martha Coakley’s lawsuit will have negative consequences; NOAA’s John Bullard hosts a conference call to discuss industry recovery; a new yellowtail assessment will involve industry participation; Penny Pritzker is confirmed as Commerce Secretary; the Hook changes its name; members of Congress ask for a higher bluefin tuna catch limit; letters to the editor point out the poor state of groundfish stocks; Scott Lang and Brian Rothschild start a NOAA watchdog group; Maine allocates $2 million to lobster marketing.

June 10 - Day of Celebration on the St. Croix - It’s not often you get the chance to celebrate such a clear victory for the environment as the return of the alewife to the St. Croix River watershed. As discussed in prior posts, a Maine law prohibiting alewives from accessing this fish ladder at the Grand Falls Dam was repealed this past May and for the first time in two decades, alewives are able to return to their spawning grounds upriver.

June 10 - Veteran Gloucester Journalist Richard Gaines Dead at Age 69 - We at Talking Fish are saddened to hear of the passing of Gloucester Daily Times columnist Richard Gaines yesterday afternoon. Richard worked for 11 years at the Daily Times covering city hall, politics, and the fishing business, and in his 40-year career, he also worked as a political writer for UPI and as editor of the Boston Phoenix. Our thoughts are with his wife, family, colleagues, and the Gloucester community.

June 12 - The Bottom Line: For New England’s Fishing Fleet It’s Déjà Vu All Over Again - Twenty years later, the sense of déjà vu is unshakeable. A new season brings a troubling scenario of depleted fish populations and deficient management. Fourteen of the region’s 20 groundfish—or bottom dwelling—species are currently overexploited. Cod stocks are at the lowest levels ever recorded. New England’s best captains could not find enough cod in the past year to meet more than a third of their allotted quota on Georges Bank. It is, officially, an economic disaster, as the U.S. Department of Commerce declared last fall. In short, here we are, with our storied fishing grounds in even worse shape than they were two decades ago.

June 14 - Fish Talk in the News – Friday, June 14 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, a Globe editorial says Attorney General Martha Coakley’s lawsuit has “destructive potential”; Gloucester Daily Times journalist Richard Gaines dies; Cape Cod fishermen seek cleaner fuels; the Cape’s first great white shark of the season spotted off Orleans; Ed Markey and Gabriel Gomez answer questions on groundfishand Cape Wind; Connecticut scales back salmon stocking efforts; Maine defeats a bill to let groundfishermen land lobster; the MA State House holds a hearing on seafood mislabeling; Senator Mo Cowan adds amendments to the Farm Bill to help fishermen.

Photo by Phyllis Toomey

The entire ocean seemed to be falling from the sky Tuesday night as people dashed through the rain from the parking lot of the Seacoast Science Center into the warm, dry lobby. We were waiting for them with hot coffee, cookies, and lots of information about ocean planning.

The film Ocean Frontiers is “an inspiring voyage to seaports and watersheds across the country where we meet industrial shippers and whale biologists, pig farmers and wetland ecologists, commercial and sport fishermen, and reef snorkelers—all of them embarking on a new course of cooperation to sustain our oceans and the economies that rely on them.”

About 60 people joined us to watch the film, and stayed for a conversation about ocean planning in New England. Among the many concerns people had about our ocean’s health, the one we heard most in New Hampshire was about the nitrogen pollution in Great Bay. People were inspired by the movie to think about how ocean planning could help better manage this and other long-standing problems in New England’s ocean.

We encouraged them to attend the public meeting on June 25^th in Portsmouth to talk to the Northeast Regional Planning Body members about their concerns and ideas, as they relate to the goals this newly formed, first-in-the-nation planning body has drafted. If you are interested in being part of this important conversation, you should come, too. There are public meetings taking place all throughout New England, and will be a full meeting of the regional planning body in the fall, so now is a great time to get involved.

When asked what the most important takeaway message from the film was for them, these are a few of the comments we got:

“To see different groups working together toward a common goal was inspiring.”

“Everyone has to be at the table for ocean planning to work.”

“The most important takeaway for me was how interconnected we all are to the ocean. It isn’t just important for those who directly interact with the ocean to preserve it. We all need to do our part to take care of our resources.”

Once person simply said: “There’s hope.”

There has never been a more important time to care about the health and management of our oceans than now. If you are interested in learning more about ocean planning in New England and across the nation, consider hosting your own screening of Ocean Frontiers. Keep up with the latest news here, or on the Northeast Regional Planning Body’s website.

June 6 - The Most Valuable Fishery You’ve Never Heard Of - On May 31, Maine’s elver fishing season came to a close. For the small number of Maine fishermen who can make over $100,000 in two months capturing elvers, the end of the season may come as a bit of a letdown. For the regulators and conservation officers who try to manage the fishery, however, the close probably comes none too soon.

June 7 - Fish Talk in the News – Friday, June 7 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, ocean acidification will affect squid; puffins may be in trouble due to depleted herring populations; NOAA cancels furloughs; Maine celebrates the reopening of fishways on the St. Croix; Omega Protein will pay $5.5 million in fines for Clean Water Act violations; the Maine Legislature wants a $3.5 million bond to subsidize groundfish permit purchases; fourteen sea scallop research projects receive $12.5 million in grants.

There has never been a better time to care about the ocean than now. The ocean provides us with so many things – half of the air we breathe, an amazing variety of things to eat, a place of beauty and refuge and sometimes fury. This year the New England coast line was pummeled by tropical storms and Northeasters, reminding us yet again that our glorious ocean is powerful, relentless and unforgiving. Despite our ingenuity and technical know-how, we live in a natural and changing environment and need to better plan and protect our ocean ourselves going forward.

We used to think that the ocean was so big, and life in it so abundant, that nothing we did could harm it or exhaust its resources. But now, because of us, the ocean is changing fast and in dramatic ways. It is getting warmer, more acidic, and ever more crowded – as we consider new uses like tidal and wind energy development in addition to our historic ones like fishing, shipping, sailing and other recreation. The fabric of New England’s ocean ecosystems is changing, too. Previously depleted populations of sharks and seals are on the rise, while other species like Atlantic cod and yellowtail flounder have plummeted. And there’s evidence that the changing ocean chemistry will profoundly affect the entire food chain, from tiny plankton on up.

The time to care is now. With climate change affecting our oceans in ways we are only beginning to understand, now is the time to restore the health of our ocean so that it can be as resilient as possible to the changes that are coming. Ocean conservation has been part of our work at CLF since the mid-1970s when we were a scrappy little organization on Beacon Hill fighting the federal government and the oil industry over oil and gas drilling on Georges Bank – New England’s most important fishing grounds. We won that case, then won it again and again as the oil industry kept knocking on New England’s door. Ocean conservation is part of our history and is embedded in our DNA, and we are still working hard to  protect our ocean and keep it thriving for future generations of New Englanders in many ways:

• Keeping vital habitat protected – special places like Cashes Ledge, a breathtakingly beautiful underwater mountain range 80 miles off the coast of Cape Ann, home to the largest coldwater kelp forest on the North Atlantic seaboard. Cashes Ledge provides rich habitat for many of our most amazing and iconic sea creatures – Atlantic cod and wolffish to bluefin tuna and North Atlantic right whales. Some of these species are on the brink of existence in our waters, and truly need places of refuge to sustain and rebuild their populations. CLF has recently gone to court to keep current protected habitat areas, including Cashes Ledge, closed to destructive trawl and dredge fishing gear.

• Working for an end to overfishing – all the habitat protection in the world won’t help a species recover if the fishing pressure is too high. CLF has been fighting for sustainable New England fisheries for decades, and we still aren’t there. Cod numbers are currently at a very small fraction of what a healthy population would be. We have asked for a moratorium on directed cod fishing until their numbers recover – in opposition to the current political push to increase catch limits. Can you imagine New England without cod? Neither can we – which is why we have gone to federal court against fisheries managers to stop them from increasing catch limits on cod and other imperiled groundfish until the populations are better recovered.

• Supporting our nation’s first regional ocean plan – New England is leading the nation in ocean planning. With the increasing pressures on our rapidly changing water, we need to better coordinate all of our uses to minimize conflict and make decisions based on the whole ecosystem, as opposed to individual uses. CLF has been involved in ocean planning from the start, advising and supporting our states on the Massachusetts Ocean Management Plan and Rhode Island Special Area Management Plan. And now we are actively supporting  development of the nation’s first regional ocean plan by the Northeast Regional Planning Body – made up of state, federal, and tribal representatives and convened pursuant to the National Ocean Policy.

• Celebrating our beautiful ocean – Our New England Ocean Odyssey campaign is all about showcasing the amazing, breathtaking, important, and often strange things that lie beneath our waves. We have one of the most productive, diverse ocean ecosystems on the planet right off our shores, and we hope that by bringing you the gorgeous photography of Brian Skerry and others, and engaging stories, you will be inspired to help us protect it.

• Restoring historic river herring runs – After 18 years, ocean-going alewives (also known as river herring) can return to their ancestral spawning habitat on the St. Croix River in northern Maine and eventually make the St. Croix the largest river herring run in New England once again.  CLF fought for this right on two fronts.  First, we successfully filed suit against the EPA last year to enforce water quality standards, successfully arguing that a 1995 law excluding alewives from parts of the St. Croix river conflicted with the river’s Class A water quality designation under the Clean Water Act. Second, CLF worked with other environmental organizations and the Passamaquoddy Nation to support emergency legislation in Maine to repeal the alewife exclusion law. The alewife, is a “keystone species” that provides food for many animals, birds and larger fish species native to Maine’s marine and fresh waters, and restoring it to its native river habitat is a wonderful reason to celebrate.

We will continue to fight these battles for a healthy ocean so we have more to celebrate next World Oceans Day, and the one after that, and beyond. Please stay with us on our voyage and be part of a better ocean future in New England.

Originally posted on New England Ocean Odyssey.

If you are like me, you will take just about any excuse to go to the New Hampshire Seacoast – but we have a really great reason for you to head there next Tuesday evening:

Ocean enthusiasts and the community are invited to join the screening of Green Fire Productions film, “Ocean Frontiers: The Dawn of a New Era in Ocean Stewardship.” This event, which is free and open to the public, will take place on Tuesday, June 11, 2013 from 7:00-9:00PM at the Seacoast Science Center in Rye, New Hampshire.

The evening will begin with a reception including coffee and cookies, and will feature educational materials from the event hosts. After the screening, there will be a Q&A discussion session moderated by Jennifer Felt, Conservation Law Foundation’s Ocean Planning Outreach Manager.

This event is free, however we request you RSVP online: http://www.ocean-frontiers.org/seacoast

This event is hosted by the Seacoast Science Center and Conservation Law Foundation, both members of the New England Ocean Action Network, a diverse group of organizations, individuals, and industries working together to promote new approaches to ocean management in our region based on collaboration, cooperation and sound science, and by Green Fire Productions.

Ocean Frontiers is an inspiring voyage to seaports and watersheds across the country where we meet industrial shippers and whale biologists, pig farmers and wetland ecologists, commercial and sport fishermen, and reef snorkelers—all of them embarking on a new course of cooperation to sustain our oceans and the economies that rely on them.

Green Fire Productions’ Executive Director and producer of Ocean Frontiers, Karen Meyer stated, “We are excited to present Ocean Frontiers to the New Hampshire Seacoast community. This film clearly conveys that win-win solutions are possible when industry, scientists, fishermen, conservationists, and government groups work together.”

“Ocean Frontiers wonderfully illustrates how very different stakeholders can come together and cooperatively make good decisions for our vital ocean resources,” said Priscilla Brooks, CLF’s Vice President and Director of Ocean Conservation. “If we are going to be more active and responsible stewards of our ocean, we will need robust public involvement, access to good scientific data, and better coordination between the many government agencies that manage our use of the ocean. CLF is very happy to be part of a growing movement to promote awareness of these important issues and collaboration in designing a comprehensive plan for the future of our ocean.”

Wendy Lull, President of the Seacoast Science Center, said, “We are proud to host New Hampshire’s premiere screening of Ocean Frontiers. As a non-profit marine science education organization, we want everyone to understand that a healthy ocean drives our quality of life. As so beautifully shown in the film, no matter where you live, what you do every day influences the health of the ocean, and ocean health impacts our daily lives–from weather, to what we eat, where we live and how we play. Ocean Frontiers heralds a new era of stewardship, and we hope you will join us for the film, for the discussion, and for the future of our seacoast and sea.”

A reception will precede the screening and will feature information and opportunities to learn more about what New Englanders can do to help support improved management of their ocean and coast. Online registration is requested: www.ocean-frontiers.org/seacoast

Photo Credit: IronRodArt – Royce Bair (“Star Shooter”)

We are in the throes of a first-in-the-nation regional ocean planning process, and we need you to join those who are already taking part. The Northeast Regional Planning Body (RPB) is holding a series of public meetings throughout New England (find one near you here) to tell people what’s going on in ocean planning and to find out what your questions and comments are about the goals that they have developed, and their potential actions and outcomes. This process is much more effective and meaningful when people who care about the management of our ocean and coasts get involved.

There were two public meetings held last month – one in Portland, ME and one in Narragansett, RI. The meetings were well attended, and many people made comments and asked questions. Among the fishermen, renewable energy developers, and conservationists who spoke, several themes emerged:

• People want a transparent process, where they know what is being planned before it happens, and they want to be involved in meaningful ways.
• There should be careful review of the maps and data decision-makers are using to plan ocean uses.
• People want to know what this planning process will look like, and how will it be used in a practical way.

There is a meeting tonight in Ellsworth and tomorrow night in Rockland, ME, this Thursday afternoon in Boston, and later this month in New Bedford, Gloucester, and Barnstable, MA, in New Haven, CT, and in Portsmouth, NH. See the full schedule and location details here. There are many ways to submit comments to the RPB even if you can’t go to a meeting.

Why should you get involved? There are so many reasons to appreciate New England’s ocean – amazing wildlife, gorgeous scenery, a natural playground to enjoy with our children – but there is also an unprecedented amount of change right now: renewable energy has hit the water, our fisheries are in tremendous flux and some of our most iconic and economically important stocks are in true peril, our waters are rapidly warming and getting more acidic, and we are seeing accelerating coastal erosion in some of our most heavily developed shorelines. The time is now to start making better decisions that will protect our ocean for future generations.

Do you care about the way our oceans are managed? Then come learn more about ocean planning and make your voice heard! Find a meeting near you and get involved.

Reinforcing the need to protect vital ocean habitat areas and end overfishing of New England’s severely depleted groundfish, the Conservation Law Foundation and Earthjustice filed a pair of lawsuits in federal district court challenging the shortsighted and damaging groundfish regulations developed by the New England Fishery Management Council and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) for the 2013 fishing year.

The first lawsuit challenges NMFS’s plan to open several groundfish conservation areas in New England that have been closed for at least a decade to commercial fishing for cod, haddock, and flounder.

The second suit challenges a plan to boost 2013 catch limits for several New England groundfish stocks beyond the allowable science-based limits by “carrying over” ten percent of the quota from 2012 that fishermen were unable to catch.

The science is clear—cod stocks are in their worst shape ever in the history of New England fishing. Cod on Georges Bank and in the Gulf of Maine are at nine percent of healthy levels, and they aren’t improving. The Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries’ most recent trawl survey showed the lowest number of cod in the historical record. Many fishermen couldn’t come close to meeting their quotas last year because fish populations are so low. Fisheries scientists say there is no cause for optimism that stocks will rebound any time soon.

Despite this overwhelming evidence, the fishing industry—now enabled with a deeply misguided lawsuit from Attorney General Martha Coakley—has placed growing pressure on regulators to allow fishermen to catch more fish and trawl previously protected habitat. These NMFS actions will allow fishermen to apply for access to 5,000 square miles of previously protected habitat. These vitally important areas, such as Cashes Ledge and the Western Gulf of Maine Closed Area, have been protected from the most damaging fishing gear for well over a decade, but are now at risk to being opened to new fishing pressure. Allowing new bottom trawling would damage critical spawning and nursery areas. Further, despite catch limits that already match or exceed the highest levels recommended by scientists, NOAA will allow fishermen to carry over ten percent of their quota from last year, effectively authorizing even more overfishing.

NOAA’s actions are legally and scientifically wrong, plain and simple. Authorizing continued overfishing won’t create more fish. NMFS’s actions to potentially allow new fishing in protected areas have been implemented through a shoddy process that undercuts responsible development of fishery management plans and ignore the requirement to complete a full environmental impact statement. That’s a clear violation of the Magnuson-Stevens Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

These suits make a simple request of NMFS—to follow the science and the law. The agency must show leadership in ending overfishing and protecting vital habitat areas like Cashes Ledge, or there is little hope for the future of New England’s iconic fisheries and a healthy ocean.

Almost 200 attendees to the BVS IV prepared for a full day of discussing important ocean policy issues on Capitol Hill. Sean Cosgrove, of the Conservation Law Foundation, led a presentation on the benefits of the National Ocean Policy.

Over 200 ocean advocates from 23 states converged on Washington two weeks ago to deliver a very important message – full implementation of the National Ocean Policy is vital to ensure healthy and resilient oceans, coasts, and Great Lakes. The Blue Vision Summit which took place May 14- 16 was a gathering of ocean and coastal leaders, focused on finding solutions to the challenges facing our oceans. This year regional ocean planning was highlighted as one of those solutions and it was evident that New England is leading the charge.

During the three day conference packed with ocean themed workshops and Hill visits, key members of New England’s Congressional Delegation demonstrated enthusiastic commitment to working towards an ocean stewardship and planning model that will support healthy and economically valuable oceans for New England.

Senator Whitehouse from Rhode Island opened the Blue Vision Summit by thanking the conference participants for their work in support of the oceans and for bringing the message that ocean health is important, to Washington. The Senator highlighted that the health of the oceans is tied to the well being of our economy, particularly in coastal states like Rhode Island.

Senator Whitehouse returned the next night for the 2013 Peter Benchley Ocean Awards to present this year’s Excellence in Policy to Congressman Ed Markey from Massachusetts for his work to protect the ocean from the impacts of overfishing, climate change, and pollution. An award Senator Whitehouse received last year.

Congressional leadership and support of the NOP did not stop there for New England, Maine’s Shelly Pingree spoke to the participants of the Blue Vision Summit and reminded people that living on an island off the coast of Maine gives her a clear perspective on how so many jobs depend on having clean water and healthy oceans.

The workshop wrapped up with a call to action for people to return to their home states and continue to advocate for full implementation of the national ocean policy. New England is doing just that with a series of public meetings throughout New England to discuss regional planning draft goals