August 5 - Man, Eating Shark - My plan was to kick off Shark Week by feasting on Squalus acanthias, aka Spiny Dogfish, and reporting my impressions. Spiny dogfish are one of the few fish populations in good biological condition that New England fishermen can still catch, having recovered from a crash back in the early 1990’s. Once a fish despised because of the havoc it caused with fishing gear and its voracious predation on more valuable commercial fish, many fishermen who can no longer find cod or other prime species are turning to dogfish out of financial desperation.

August 6 - Uncertain Science Isn’t to Blame for Groundfish Crisis - The real issue is not whether there is uncertainty in fisheries management science. Of course there is, and the more you get into the weeds of fishery management science the more the numerous uncertainties reveal themselves. The real issue is how managers choose to deal with the uncertainty that is inherent in fisheries management. In New England, by and large, they deal with it badly.

August 7 - Managing Fisheries in “A Climate of Change” - The Maine nonprofit Island Institute organized the two-day symposium “A Climate of Change” to bring fishermen, scientists, fishery managers, and NGOs together to share information and ideas about how climate change is already affecting fishing, and what they can do about it.

August 9 - Fish Talk in the News – Friday, August 9 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, a new study shows marine species moving poleward in response to climate change; the ASMFC delays a decision on elver management; NEFMC chair Rip Cunningham writes to John Bullard in response to NERO’s refusal of Amendment 5 to the herring plan; NOAA declines to list river herring under the Endangered Species Act; Obama nominates Kathryn Sullivan to lead NOAA; Maine’s lobster monoculture is vulnerable to climate change; Senator Warren calls for federal disaster aid for the groundfish industry.

New England’s cod populations are at their lowest levels in history, thanks to decades of chronic overfishing and habitat destruction. Fisheries scientists agree that protecting vital fish habitat is key to restoring these once-plentiful fish species. How does the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) respond? Yesterday NOAA proposed to allow new bottom trawling and other forms of commercial fishing in areas of New England’s ocean that have been protected for almost twenty years. NOAA’s assessment, which did not include a full analysis of the impacts and benefits of removing this protection as required by federal law, actually concludes that, for three of the four areas, opening them to trawling and other forms of fishing is “likely to yield only small increases in net benefit.”  NOAA’s assessment also finds that, in one of the areas, the opening will result in a reduction in net benefits to offshore lobstering, which will not be allowed at times when groundfishing is permitted.

The trade-offs exchanged for this “small increase in net benefit” are many, and they include the value of almost two decades of ecological restoration. Protecting habitat promotes the recovery of Georges Bank haddock and has rejuvenated the valuable scallop stocks. If NOAA’s own environmental assessment concludes that these protected areas harbor larger, more productive fish, why is NOAA allowing access to kill fish that could help overfished stocks to rebound or healthy stocks to remain healthy?

Also at risk is any role that these areas might play in the long-term protection of fish habitat. For more than eight years, the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) has been “developing” a grand plan, known as the Omnibus Habitat Amendment, designed to meet federal law requirements to protect fish habitat against the damaging impacts of fishing gear. A final decision on the Amendment is expected in ten months. Bizarrely, NOAA is proposing to open areas now that are under consideration for future protection. What will be the remaining value of this habitat after trawls have been allowed to ply them for months? Let’s face it, NOAA, any trawling will diminish this area’s habitat value and trawling for two months will eliminate it. The fact is that if NOAA’s proposal is completed it will effectively preempt the NEFMC’s assessment of these areas and remove them from inclusion in any future habitat protection plan without the fully required analysis.

If the benefit that these areas play in rebuilding and maintaining fish stocks and the fact that they are under consideration in a federally-mandated habitat protection plan was not enough to convince NOAA that opening these areas was a bad idea, the agency should have at least been convinced by the role that they play in buffering against climate change impacts. This is especially so given that NOAA’s strategy for helping fish adapt to climate change is to “conserve habitat to support healthy fish,” and one its means for achieving that is “to reduce negative impacts of capture practices and gear on important habitats for fish.” Sadly, this action could not be more diametrically opposed to these strategies.

NOAA’s proposal appropriately retains protection from trawling for places in the Gulf of Maine like Cashes Ledge, an underwater mountain range 80 miles off the coasts of Massachusetts that harbors the largest and deepest kelp forest on the eastern seaboard and shelters some of the most diverse habitat and wildlife in the region. The agency should extend its rational thinking beyond the Gulf of Maine and retain all existing protected areas until a full consideration of the functions, values and merits of new and existing protected areas has been completed as part of the Omnibus Habitat Amendment process.

The public has until July 26 to comment on NOAA’s proposal to open nearly 3,000 square miles of protected habitat to commercial trawling. Please take action here.

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.

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.

April 3 – For Cod’s Sake - In this video, CLF’s Peter Shelley explains the dramatic decline of cod stocks in New England and the action that must be taken to prevent the loss of this region’s most iconic fishery. Atlantic cod populations are at an all-time historic low. The cod fishery, which for generations has supported a way of life in New England’s coastal communities, may be in complete collapse. Click through to see the video.

April 5 - Help Count River Herring (Because They Count, Too) - Somewhere out there on our coast, out where rivers hit salt water, thousands of small fish are gathering, getting ready for an epic voyage inland. The annual run of river herring is about to start. Hundreds of people are getting ready, too. They’re the volunteers who will gather at bridges, fish ladders and riverbanks to count the passing herring—an important exercise in citizen science that can help to conserve these imperiled fish.

April 5 – Fish Talk in the News – Friday, April 5 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, two Senators push for fisheries disaster aid; NEFMC will discuss raising the catch limit for white hake; a bill to open the St. Croix to alewives gains traction; Gov. LePage threatens reprisals against Passamaquoddy Tribe over elver fishery; acoustic monitoring may help locate spawning cod aggregations; Senator Jack Reed pushes for Rhode Island membership on Mid-Atlantic Council.

A few weeks ago my colleague Peter Shelley stood in front of fishermen and policymakers and spoke about the startling decline of New England’s cod fishery. Did you know that, since 1982, it’s estimated we have lost more than 80% of the cod in New England’s ocean? That surely should be a wake up call to us all.

That day, Peter’s argument was simple, and backed by sound science. We must act quickly, he argued, to prevent the Atlantic cod – New England’s most iconic fish — from complete and utter collapse.

The response? Hisses and boos. Hisses and boos.

Peter is no fool – he knew what was coming. A fisheries expert who filed the first lawsuit that led to the cleanup of Boston Harbor, Peter has heard this same response too often. But still, this response is as startling as it is unhelpful.

The science is clear. Atlantic cod populations are at an all-time historic low. The cod fishery, which for generations has supported a way of life in New England’s coastal communities, may be in complete collapse. Don’t believe me? Watch this video of Peter explaining the science behind this critical issue.

Over the coming 14 days, NOAA – the agency in charge of setting limits on how much cod commercial fisherman can catch – is deciding how much to allow commercial fisherman to catch this year. We at CLF believe that the managers of this public resource have a responsibility to revive and rebuild cod stocks.

Instead, they are continuing a decades-long pattern of risky decision-making that has run this fishery and its communities into the ground.

We have an opportunity to urge NOAA to save the Atlantic cod from complete collapse. But we have to act now. The longer we wait, the more we risk losing this iconic fishery.

We at CLF are working to urge NOAA to do three things:

1. Shut down the commercial cod fishery, so as to save it for future generations
2. Protect cod populations, especially the adult females that produce as many as 8 million eggs a year
3. And, protect the ocean refuges that will allow cod to recover, not bow to industry pressure by opening them to more commercial fishing.

If you believe, as we at CLF believe, that the cod fishery is worth saving, please stand with thousands of New Englanders and take action today.

Now is not the time to push the limits of the law and set dangerously high catch levels. Now is not the time to bow to industry pressure. Now is not the time to risk this species for short-term gain.

Now is the time to show strength, and real leadership. Now is the time to try to save New England’s cod fishery for future generations to enjoy.

Please stand with us, and thousands of others, in calling on NOAA to protect this species before it’s too late.

March 29 - On Cod, Climate, and Closed Areas - It’s good to know NOAA has a solid plan for helping fish adapt to climate change. Now, if only someone would tell NOAA. You see, while NOAA’s right hand says protect habitat to help fish adapt to climate change, the left hand has proposed to end protection for about 5,000 sq. miles of seabed habitat.

March 29 - Fish Talk in the News – Friday, March 29 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, NOAA releases a draft rule setting 2013 catch limits; a symposium discusses the Cape’s gray seal problem; CNN talks trawling and climate change; Omega Protein charged with polluting coastal waters; the Maine legislature hears arguments on alewife restoration bills; the Obama administration releases its wildlife climate adaptation strategy; Magnuson-Stevens reauthorization hearings focus on implementation.

March 18 – The Broken System - The present politically based implementation of the Magnuson Act guarantees the death of commercial fishing on the east coast of the U.S. Allowing fishermen a major voice in the councils has led to the current scarcity of cod and haddock in New England.  Every single piece of stock assessment data indicates that stocks of these two species are in dire straits, yet fishermen complain that NMFS is destroying their living  by not letting them catch more of these fish.

March 22 – Fish Talk in the News – Friday, March 22 - In this week’s Fish Talk in the News, NOAA releases the proposed rule for Framework 48, right whales make a comeback, Maine lobstermen seek to unionize, minimum catch size limits may be forcing fish to mature at a smaller size, Senator Cowan raises concerns over use of Saltonstall-Kennedy funds; Maine legislators debate alewife bills.