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Changing Oceans, Changing Fishermen

March 6, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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Should fishermen be the face of climate change?

This was one of the more compelling questions posed at the Maine Fishermen’s Forum in Rockland on March 4.

It’s an interesting posit with many implications. For anyone in and around the industry, the answer is pretty straightforward. Fishermen are on the frontlines of how climate change impacts fisheries around the world. Along with researchers, fishermen are the first to see changes in everything from migratory patterns to spawning success and recruitment and predator/prey relationships.

Just ask Linda Williams. She is former chair of the Western Rock Lobster Council in Western Australia. Her husband and son fish for western rock lobster. She told a crowd of 300-400 that fishery has undergone mammoth changes in the past decade. Ten years ago, the average annual haul was 10 million kilograms, brought in by 600 boats during a roughly nine-month season. Now it is 5-6 million kilograms, brought in by 250 boats year round. The interesting catch? They are now logging record profits and working less.

So how did this happen? In 2009, lobstermen and researchers noticed a significant drop in the number of late larval stage lobsters in normal locations. Females were releasing eggs earlier than ever, which affected migratory patterns of the lobsters as they grew from larvae. The end result would be fewer lobsters caught in season and a downward spiral. This coincided with a warming trend of about 1-3 degrees Celsius over long-term summer averages, which also coincided with changing currents along the Western Australia coast.

Seeing the potential for disaster, lobstermen, scientists and policy makers worked together to form a quota system based on predictive analyses of future harvests determined by current larval settlement (the numbers and location of late larval stage lobsters). The industry anticipates how changing water temperatures and shifting currents will affect harvest 3-4 years in advance. Now the fishery operates profitably, even as the oceans are warming around them.

That kind of adaptation was the theme from other commercial fishermen. John Mellor fishes for Dungeness crabs and sablefish (black cod) off California. He sensed trouble in the water a year ago, noticing a milky, bluish hue and seeing big schools of anchovies flopping around the surface gasping for air. The culprit was algal blooms sucking up too much oxygen and releasing high concentrations of domoic acid (a neurotoxin) along the West Coast. California’s witness to climate change has coincided with this year’s El Nino, which extended a three-year period of lower than average storm and wind activity that would otherwise mix up the currents and slow the progress of algal blooms and the resulting red tides.

Filter feeders like clams, mussels and worms absorb the neurotoxin, and the crabs eat them, posing a threat to human health. Mellor explained the devastation to the industry when shortly before this season was to begin, California shut down the fishery indefinitely. Crabs represent 2/3 of his income, and he said he was fortunate to have a sablefish permit just to keep operating. Many fishermen are facing foreclosure etc.

“I see you enjoying your lobster fishery,” he said to the audience. “I suggest you keep an eye on the water. If you see it start to change a milky blue, be prepared.” He said fishermen need to adapt as quickly as the oceans are changing to survive.

Keith Colburn, who fishes Alaska king crab and has appeared on the TV show “The Deadliest Catch,” said in 30 years on the water, the most dramatic weather and water changes have occurred in the last 15 years, including the three coldest years and the three warmest years in Alaska. He said 20 years ago, they might have one storm that registers 50-knot winds per year. Now they may have 10-15 storms of that magnitude.

Noting the migration of the lobster fishery out of Long Island South and north of Cape Cod, he said somewhat jokingly, “If I was a Maine lobsterman, I’d be thinking about getting a Canadian passport soon. Each of you came out here to discuss a topic no one wants to think about. But we need to think about it.”

A fisherman from Point Judith, R.I. noted that their lobster fishery has been devastated by black sea bass (a mid-Atlantic species following warming waters north along the coast) and dogfish devouring larval lobsters. As regional waters warmed, more of these predators invaded the region and outnumbered the lobsters and other local species. The local fleet dropped from 150 boats 10 years ago to zero now, by his reckoning.

Scientists keep ringing the alarm bell

Scientists on the front edge of the latest climate research such as John Hare of NOAA and Andy Pershing of Gulf of Maine Research Institute highlighted just how much the water has warmed in the Gulf of Maine and how much that has impacted several native species.

Pershing noted how the Gulf of Maine is warming faster than 99% of the oceans on the planet at a rate of .23 degrees C or .4 degrees F per year, almost four times faster than anywhere else. He said because of the record warmth of the past several months allowing to El Nino, normal current variability and the recent warming trend, lobstermen could expect this year’s shed (when lobsters shed their shells) to happen anywhere from two to three weeks before the usual timeframe of the first week in July. That kind of predictability helps lobstermen at least have some idea of when their season will be most productive and profitable and plan ahead.

John Hare discussed his recent research methodology, which helps scientists, fishermen and policy makers better predict how climate change will impact growth and migratory patterns of 82 Northeast species. He said 42% of those species have a very high potential vulnerability to climate change, while 50% are likely to change their distribution because of warming waters. (See chart below).

Overall climate vulnerability is denoted by color: low (green), moderate (yellow), high (orange), and very high (red). Certainty in score is denoted by text font and text color: very high certainty (>95%, black, bold font), high certainty (90–95%, black, italic font), moderate certainty (66–90%, white or gray, bold font), low certainty (<66%, white or gray, italic font). Source: Hare et al (2016)

“Warming oceans and acidification are posing a significant threat to fisheries,” Hare said. “I firmly believe we can only face these changes together.”

Which brings us back to the original question posed by chef and author Barton Seaver. He asked if fishermen could be the voice of social change at a time when politicians and scientists are often seen as bloviating by those who deny climate change exists. Perhaps fishermen, whose lives depend on the weather, could deliver a broad enough, “Everyman” appeal to spark a larger movement to minimize greenhouse gases, slow global warming and better manage the health of our oceans. Colburn, the Alaskan king crab fisherman responded, “Being that fishing is America’s oldest job, I think as fishermen we could ban together, we could start to change our patterns.”

But perhaps the question isn’t so much should fishermen be the face of climate change, but will they? As Colburn said, “A lot of fishermen want to believe that the environment is not changing.” So, getting them to sound an alarm may be a tough ask. But as the ranks of those fishermen pushed to the brink swell, like California’s Mellor, or those that found a way to adapt, like Western Australia’s Murray, perhaps there will be enough momentum for a unified voice, as Seaver suggested.

Forums like this one, uniting scientists and fishermen to understand how things are changing and how quickly they’re changing, and to work together to figure out how to adapt are significant starting blocks. And if you can get policy makers, such as John Bullard, Northeast Regional Administrator for NOAA Fisheries, to not only attend such meetings, but state publicly that we need to do something about climate change (as he did here), perhaps there is enough accountability and unity in place for us to do something to protect the climate collectively.

If we can get all of these stakeholders at the same table, working together, as John Hare suggested, we can do better adapting to how rapidly the oceans are changing, and maybe even limit the long-term damage. Doing so would help us better deliver on the Slow Food promise of good, clean, accessible and fair seafood for all.

As consumers grappling with the implications of global warming on the seafood we eat, we should understand that “eating within the ecosystem” is now more important than ever. That is, we should eat what is locally available, sustainably harvested and seasonal. Choosing “invasive” black sea bass here in Maine rather than big name species facing multiple stresses — including climate — is a step in the right direction.

Additional reading

Check out this column by Bren Smith, a commercial fisherman who adapted to the changing climate by embracing the “eating within the ecosystem” philosophy.

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The Telltale Cod

February 26, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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This is a blog written by my good friend Chef Evan Mallett for the Slow Fish 2016 website. Slow Fish 2016 is an international gathering of fishermen, chefs, scientists, policy makers and other activists to discuss and share local fishing community challenges and solutions from around the country and the world. One Fish Foundation will be attending. Evan speaks with a clear, informed and passionate voice on why we should care about seafood sustainability.

By Evan Mallet

In 2012, I wrote a blog entitled “Grandpa, What’s a Cod?” The motive for writing that blog was a dramatic realization that my children’s children might someday ask me such a question. Perhaps, I projected, they will see an old menu or read an article, or visit the Cape that bears the name of a mystery fish.

Entire books have been written about cod—citing the fish’s dominion over our national heritage, how it inspired colonization and later, an inestimably rich global seafood trade. As our New World and its human population have expanded from the shores where codfishing boats first landed, cod has been there every step of the way. Until now.

Since I wrote the blog, assessments of the cod population in the Gulf of Maine (my backyard) have only brought more bad news. I am a chef, and I have grown up alongside the bounty of North Atlantic fisheries. In recent years, I have watched those fisheries, and the small family-owned boats that ply our local waters, dwindle to the point of near-extinction. It is clear that a revolutionary shift in mindset is the only solution to a problem we have created over decades of fishing a species to the brink.

Some experts point to changing water temperatures, locally and globally, that might explain a shift in breeding grounds for Atlantic cod and other coldwater species. And, whether as a result of this shift or a three-decade moratorium on cod fishing, there is evidence that Newfoundland—where annual cod harvests once numbered over a million metric tons—might be experiencing a cod comeback of sorts.

It’s not that I personally hold cod up as the all-seeing banner of virtue and supremacy that our founding fathers did when they marched a “sacred cod” wooden replica to the Massachusetts State House, where it still hangs today. The truth is, I definitely revere cod’s flavor, texture and utility. However, a simple reality check tells us that we have no choice but to consider other species as alternatives to our New England culture’s longtime staple fish. I am one of those few chefs who sells Pollock, Acadian redfish, even dogfish, on my menu, because I believe with all of my heart that we have no choice but to ignite a new awareness now, before the fish we grew up eating are gone.

When I attended Slow Food’s Terra Madre and Salone del Gusto in 2010, I heard a fisherman from Oceania talk about how his family could afford frozen farmed salmon from Northern Europe, purchased in his local supermarket, but could not afford to eat his own fresh, local catch, upon which his livelihood depended. That fisherman’s story started my trip down the undercurrent of insanity that is our global seafood distribution system.

I have yet to understand how the economics of food have so egregiously ignored the ecology of food for so long, and I don’t know if even radical change will come too late. But I do know that right now, every community on our planet needs to wake up to a seafood crisis. At stake is not only the human diet’s most nutritious animal protein, but also the trophic balance of all aquatic ecosystems.

Slow Fish is uniquely positioned to spread this gospel like no other organization, and I look forward to seeing talk of change lead to actions that will preserve both fisheries and fishermen.

Evan Mallett is chef/owner of Black Trumpet in Portsmouth, N.H. He also sits on the national Chef’s Collaborative Board of Overseers, the Slow Food Seacoast Board of Directors and the NOAA Seafood Marketing Steering Committee.

photo: Chef Evan Mallett showing Slow Food UNH students how to prepare dogfish.

SLOW FISH 2106 INFO

REGISTER for Slow Fish 2016.
JOIN our Facebook Event Page.
SUPPORT our Indiegogo fundraising campaign.
HOST a Fisher-Chef Alliance dinner.

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Oceans Rising Faster Now Than In Past 3,000 Years

February 24, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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I wonder if there will ever be a tipping point for climate change deniers. That is, I wonder if a critical mass of scientific evidence suggesting man-made greenhouse gas emissions could ever sway even some of the most outspoken critics of climate change.

Perhaps not.

But as scientific methods become more exact, the scope and depth of research more extensive, and the conclusions of experts around the world more universal, denial becomes harder, and more futile.

New research released Monday suggests that not only have oceans risen over the past roughly 3,000 years, but that seas have risen faster in the 20^th century than in the previous 27 centuries. Moreover, this century’s global sea level rise is largely due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, studies say. In effect, the research highlights just how much we have contributed to global warming and global sea level rise above normal fluctuations.

For example, one study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, points to a strong link between global temperatures and sea levels. The study suggests sea levels would have risen by as much as 7 centimeters in the 20^th century without global warming, reflecting the “typical” fluctuations that occur naturally. With global warming caused by man, scientists suggested global sea levels have risen by twice that much or 14 centimeters.

That may not sound like much, but when you account for oceans rising at a current rate of about a foot a century, several coastal communities are already imperiled. If seas rise by as much as four feet by 2100, as many scientists have predicted, communities like Miami, Charleston, S.C. and New Orleans could be under water.

Another study issued Monday, highlights how steadily rising waters have already affected coastal communities, and how much of that is attributable to greenhouse emissions. Scientists used data from instruments called tide gauges, which measure flooding based on above normal water levels in coastal communities around the country. They found that about two thirds of the nuisance flood days (days when waters flooded streets, clogged storm drains etc., but not catastrophic flooding) since 1950 have been caused by man-made emissions. More specifically, researchers found the greatest increase in the number of flood days occurred between 2005 and 2014.

For example, the number of flood days in Wilmington, N.C. jumped from 14 in the 1955-1964 decade to 376 in the last decade of 2005-2014. Researchers attributed 308 days, or more than 80% of those days to human-caused climate change. The researchers also suggested that trend of “nuisance flooding” where low-lying coastal communities experience flooded roads, dying grass, over-taxed infrastructure from high tides amplified by rising oceans will continue, costing billions of dollars in damage and pushing some communities further into danger.

Over time, this kind of flooding also dramatically changes coastal habitat for seafood, forcing many species to relocate, which in turn affects local fishermen as well.

So I wonder how high the pile of scientific and economic evidence needs to get to start changing some of the skeptics’ minds.

Perhaps it won’t happen until they’re flooded with it.

Photo: car driving through flooded street in Charleston, S.C. credit: NOAA

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When the Levee Breaks, Sugar

February 13, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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UPDATE 02/16/16: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plans to release water this week from Lake Okeechobee south to Everglades National Park, where it is badly needed. Doing so will alleviate the burst of polluted fresh water released into the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers and slow some of the negative impacts already taking place in those estuaries. The Everglades has been drier than normal for several years, and the fresh water influx will help balance the salinity levels to restore marsh areas. The water would pass through a reservoir south of the lake, where it will be purged of some of the unwanted nutrients from the lake.

In case you haven’t heard, Lake Okeechobee is rising. El Niño has spanked several areas in the U.S. with higher-than-average rainfall, and the second largest freshwater lake in the lower 48 states is now at 16 feet. Its average depth is between 10 and 12 feet. Officials with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the South Florida Water Management District worried the 32-foot tall, 143-mile levee surrounding the lake could fail if any more rain fell. Ironically, this is “the dry season.”

So last week they unleashed up to 4.9 billion gallons of water (think 7,400 Olympic swimming pools) per day out of two dams: one heading east via the St. Lucie River to the Atlantic Coast, and the other heading west via the Caloosahatchee River to the Gulf of Mexico. These outlets to the rivers were created decades ago to help manage the lake’s water levels. The “wet” season for the region is June through September, and for the past several years, these releases have unleashed torrents of dirty brown and sometimes green water through these canals.

Where does that polluted water come from? The agricultural and other pollutants dumped into the lake from areas north. Why not allow excess lake water to flow south, as it had for nearly 6,000 years before humans got involved? Because politically and financially powerful U.S. Sugar (hereon called Big Sugar) owns more than 60,000 acres of land directly south of the lake to grow and refine sugar cane. And because this has been the status quo for decades when state and federal regulators and the Corps of Engineers first laid out the plans for water management. In fact, it was because of the sugar industry that the water was diverted east and west to make those massive sugar cane fields arable.

So let’s summarize: An ill-conceived plan by man to redirect Nature’s intended path for water drainage to accommodate Big Sugar, as well as big development, now has imperiled several thousand people, their homes, their drinking water and the health and welfare of millions of acres of precious wetlands which serve as the nursery for some of the most ecologically rich, coastal habitat in the country.

And here’s the painful kicker. The state had the option to purchase that land as the first step to help restore the withering Everglades for several years up until last Oct. The state failed to exercise that option, and now Big Sugar wants to put up several thousand homes and big warehouses. Last fall, Fla. voters overwhelmingly approved a measure that would use some real estate tax money to buy lands for conservation and improved water quality. But the state government has so far used those funds toward agency support (salaries, insurance, etc.), not buying the more than 40,000 acres Big Sugar agreed to sell seven years ago. Several environmental groups have filed a lawsuit that is currently pending.

The damage done

The nitrogen and phosphorous that pours into the lake from agriculture gets blasted out of canals into the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries. The excess nutrients wreak havoc on the ecosystem, causing oxygen-choking algal blooms, massive fish kills and severe damage to prime shellfish habitats. Moreover, the influx of freshwater tips the delicate salinity balance in the marsh, killing vital grasses and forcing out species living in the brackish (part salt, part fresh) water. Conversely, during the dry season, the Corps releases much less fresh water (because it’s used for agriculture) than the Everglades needs to sustain that balance. That is, when the salinity gets too high, root structures get damaged and the vegetation can die in the marsh.

A technical study conducted by the University of Florida Water Institute last year makes several recommendations to reduce these outflows into the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee river systems. Chief among them is to restore southerly flows into the estuaries after the water from the lake has been stored and treated in yet-to-be-built reservoirs. The study calls for similar reservoirs to be built or extended north of the lake and in or near the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee basins. All of this would also help restore the Everglades.

As a former journalist, I have an inherent mistrust of politicians because too many times I’ve seen up close how they essentially followed the money. As a recreational fishermen, I don’t trust the state to consider the long-term economic impact if recreational fishing plummets because vital species can’t tolerate drastic habitat change. The impact for commercial fishermen could be equally dire.

As a New Orleans native whose elderly parents rode out Hurricane Katrina, only to leave two days after the storm on the last passable road and ultimately sell their house because the infrastructure was a shambles, I inherently don’t trust the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

About a year after Katrina, I spoke to the Corps colonel in charge of rebuilding the city’s levees. I asked him point blank why the Corps was restoring the levees to their previous standard of being able, in theory, to withstand a category 3 hurricane, when the city had just been devastated by a category 5 storm. He said the reconstruction was following the path laid out by Congress and the state. I asked him if he thought that was a good idea, and he said, “It’s not my call.”

Right now, the call on the future of the Everglades and the Indian River basin is in the hands of Florida’s governor and legislature. I only hope there are enough politicians outside of the mold that made me mistrustful in the first place to do the right thing. I hope enough of them will see that actually delivering on the promises they made to voters … to protect precious resources like the Everglades and surrounding watersheds … far outweighs surrendering integrity to the financial puppetry Big Sugar offers.

If not, getting re-elected won’t be so easy if a major environmental/economic disaster occurs and Florida becomes more of a poster child for environmental failure than it already is.

Here is some additional reading:

March 2015 Miami Herald column by Carl Hiassen about the money trial

Miami Herald Op Ed proposing a joint fix between state and Congress

Florida Department of Environmental Protection history of Lake Okeechobee

The News-Press: Fort Myers paper’s article on Gov. Rick Scott and legislators recently asking Army Corps to release lake water south toward Everglades

Huffington Post Column by Alan Farago

photos: Storm water releases. credit: Jaqqui Thurlow-Lippisch

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Climate Change Could Threaten Several Northeast Fisheries New Study…

February 6, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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Go ask Long Island lobstermen … if you can find any … what they think about climate change. Trouble is, there aren’t many left because there aren’t many lobsters left in Long Island Sound. Same thing with Atlantic cod fishermen. There aren’t nearly as many boats targeting cod compared to 25 years ago because there are fewer fish.

We can blame climate change to a degree. No, it would be shortsighted to blame all fisheries depletions on warming waters. Myriad factors including fishing pressure can conspire to harm stock health. But a new study from NOAA underscores a concern many scientists and fishermen share: ever warming waters will continue to dramatically impact fisheries.

Published in the journal PLOS ONE, the study relies on a new methodology to look at how 82 species in the Northeast region have been and will be affected by climate change. Specifically, the study measures which species will be most vulnerable to climate change effects, including ocean acidification, as well as which species’ migratory patterns will most likely change because of ocean warming. In a nutshell, species that live along the ocean floor such as cod, mussels and lobsters, and those like salmon and sturgeon that migrate between salt and fresh water are most at risk.

Some of the species’ responses we already know. As the Gulf of Maine warms faster than 99% of all ocean climates on earth (at a rate of a half a degree Fahrenheit increase per year for the past decade), several native species have reacted. Lobsters have moved north and east along the coast, leaving fisheries in Long Island and Cape Cod in succession. The Northern Shrimp fishery has collapsed in the past few years. Scientists speculate the combination of warming waters limiting spawning and reducing the amount of plankton the shrimp eat is largely to blame. Scientists also say these warming waters limit cod reproduction and health and survivability of juveniles.

Gulf of Maine temperature increases have opened the door to invasive species like black sea bass and scup, and have made bays and estuaries more hospitable to European green crabs, whose numbers have risen exponentially in the past few years. Green crabs wreak havoc on eelgrass flats as they burrow in to eat larval mussels, clams and oysters.

Jon Hare, a fisheries oceanographer at NOAA Fisheries’ Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC) and lead study author, said the main purpose of this study is to give fisheries managers and other stakeholders tools to take climate change into account when devising management policy.

“We’re never going to have perfect information,” he said. “The ecosystem is going to change because of a combination of anthropogenic influence such as greenhouse gas and natural climate variability.” To keep up with the pace of that change, which has been dramatic in the past 10 years, Hare and his colleagues developed a methodology that incorporates already established research and factors in expert extrapolation. This methodology helps them predict things like how mussels will respond to warming waters or how they will react to increased acidity in their ecosystem in the next 10 years.

The scientists graded each of the 82 species’ vulnerabilities taking into account different variables, and set those grades to peer review. The result is a composite view of how likely a species may suffer reproductive pressures from increased temperatures or how likely a species may change migratory patterns.

Hare said other studies are beginning in the Bering Sea and off the coast of California, and the National Marine Fisheries Service wants to conduct these studies on all U.S. coasts.

No doubt much discussion will arise from this study and others like it. Some will question the study’s approach, efficacy or even need. Some fishermen may view the study as simply another tool for regulatory bodies like the New England Fisheries Management Council to further restrict fishing without real stakeholder permit. Others might ask why this hasn’t occurred before.

I see a couple of potential positive outcomes. First, the fact that NOAA is not only acknowledging climate change, but also actively trying to take steps to factor that into management decisions is significant. Like any federal agency, NOAA moves at a glacial pace (I wonder how long we’ll be able to use that descriptor…). But Hare and his colleagues eschewed the traditional approach to ecosystem-based management via species-specific analyses, which could take decades, to adopt a faster, potentially more efficient methodology for studying the issue. This is largely because climate change has been transforming ecosystems faster than we can study them.

Secondly, Hare says he hopes this tool becomes iterative — that in fact it will adapt as ecosystems change so scientists and researchers will have a chance to keep closer tabs of impacts than before. Some of fishermen’s frustrations with past NOAA research/policies is that that they are static, and don’t change dynamically with ecosystems. But Hare hopes the iterative process for this methodology will take into account fishermen input when considering which species may be affected by climate change. “Fishing communities will be impacted as well,” he said.

One impact is that some of these communities will start adapting to the changing marine ecosystems and harvest “locally abundant” species that were once considered invasive species. For example, black sea bass have started showing up in lobster traps in Maine because they’ve followed the warming trend north. Now they are an available seafood choice in local stores and restaurants.

I too hope this process becomes more collaborative. Because without that interactive participation in the science and policy making, the process will continue to be viewed by many as a set of unilateral decisions curtailing fisheries at the expense of small scale fishermen. As Hare said, even if we magically stopped all green house emissions now, the lingering effects of warming oceans would continue for decades.

Acting now, collaboratively, is the best chance at present for ensuring we effectively manage fisheries even as warming waters seek to change the dynamics. I attended a workshop a year ago in which scientists (including Hare), fishermen, and policy makers discussed how to better predict climate change impacts on fisheries and how to communicate that to fishermen.

Perhaps this is the first step.

Lobster photo credit: NOAA

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Fish Tales at Slow Fish 2016

January 28, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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I’ve had the privilege of connecting with various organizations on the front lines of fisheries issues, including Cape Ann Fresh Catch, Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance, Gulf of Maine Research Institute, and others. I’ve recently been working with Slow Fish, the fisheries movement under the Slow Food organization, aimed at ensuring fair, affordable, local and sustainable seafood. As part of the promotion to shine a light on Slow Fish 2016, Gateway to the Americas (March 10-13) several people are blogging about their fisheries experiences. Read more “Fish Tales at Slow Fish 2016” →

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Rising Temperatures Raising Global Warming Alarms

January 28, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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Summers in New Orleans can all but suffocate the uninitiated. The heat and humidity in August make a five block walk feel like a five mile run in normal conditions. The last time I experienced it for any length of time was in 1985, when I rode the streetcar to and from downtown for a summer job as an accounting clerk. After a couple of days of showing up drenched in my suit and tie, I began tucking my office clothes in a backpack and wearing shorts for the commute. Read more “Rising Temperatures Raising Global Warming Alarms” →

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NOAA Opens Door to Aquaculture in the Gulf of…

January 16, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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Federal regulators yesterday announced the country’s first regionally approved aquaculture management program in the Gulf of Mexico. The NOAA “final rule” essentially clears the way for private entities to begin fish and shellfish farming in U.S. federal waters (exclusive economic zone). According to the announcement, those operations must follow the fishery management plan established by the Gulf Coast Fishery Management Council. Read more “NOAA Opens Door to Aquaculture in the Gulf of Mexico” →

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One Fish Foundation, 2016 Edition

January 11, 2016October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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Welcome to One Fish Foundation 2016!

Here’s hoping your 2015 was eventful, prosperous and fun.

It was certainly that for One Fish Foundation. The non-profit officially launched in March, the website went live in August, and classroom instruction began in October. Online visibility has grown steadily, and opportunities to spread the sustainable seafood message continue to arise.

Some of the 2015 blog highlights include:

a compelling look at the challenges of properly managing forage fisheries;
a review of the status of the Pebble Mine project proposed for the headwaters of the world’s largest wild salmon run;
accounts of classroom experiences with different age groups and the enthusiasm shown toward sustainable seafood;
new research on how to obtain more accurate fish and shellfish counts;
a study suggesting that eating smaller fish is better for the resource;
several blogs on new research showing how climate change affects everything from carbon sequestration in the arctic, to cod reproduction, as well as a blog highlighting the new global pact signed in Paris to fight global warming;
and a look at some of the hot button issues around GMO salmon, or “Frankenfish.”

As 2016 begins, the foundation is positioning itself to expand into more classrooms along Maine’s coast and south into New Hampshire and Massachusetts, broaden the curriculum, magnify its online presence and engage in more community dialogue about sustainable seafood. We will attend more industry conferences and science-based workshops, and stay current with frontline research and key decision makers.

And we will dig into some of the more critical, yet relevant issues surrounding seafood, its management, consumption and overall health for the One Fish Blog.

The One Fish Foundation mission continues to be the education of middle- and high-school students and their communities about why their informed decisions can make a difference in ensuring the seafood they eat is sustainable.

Come join us for the ride!

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Invasive Species: What the Sea Bass Said

December 22, 2015October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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When it comes to education, I believe a hands-on approach delivers the most immediate message, whenever possible…even if the message is pungent.

Thus I found myself waving a dead fish at a bunch of 6^th graders at the Mahoney Middle School in South Portland last week. And they loved it — in the way you might love watching a horror movie, half wanting to shut your eyes (and nose), half wanting to get closer.

Crowded around the front desk, students fired questions at me about size, color and eating habits of black sea bass and begging to touch the pharyngeal teeth (crushing plates in the fish’s throat). They learned how sea bass swallow fish head first to avoid catching a dorsal fin in the throat, and how the pharyngeal teeth crush baby lobsters and other shellfish. After the first class, students in the other three classes kept asking me, with no shortage of enthusiasm, if they would get to touch the fish.

So why did I bring a fragrant, dead sea bass caught in R.I. to a class in Maine? We were talking about invasive species, non-native animals, plants, fungus, pathogens, etc. that wander into local habitats and tip ecosystems out of balance. We discussed how ever warming waters in the Gulf of Maine have created an inviting environment for species that are native to the mid-Atlantic states and elsewhere. We also weaved terms like “habitat”, “predator/prey relationships”, “carrying capacity”, and “ecosystem balance” into the conversation.

Students learned why black sea bass have been increasingly showing up in lobster pots in Casco Bay, and the implications for lobsters populations and cod, which rely on baby lobsters for food. They learned that lobstermen successfully lobbied the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission this fall to increase the commercial and recreational quota for black sea bass in an effort to slow the influx. We discussed why ASMFC made that decision considering the black sea bass fishery was worth $8 million in 2013, while lobsters raked in over $460 million.

Unfortunately, there is no real, established commercial market for European green crabs. Students learned how most marine invasive species arrive via ships from distant waters, either on the hull, gear or in the ballast, as did the green crabs some time in the mid-1800s. We discussed how green crabs’ preference for warmer water has guided them north along the coasts as temperatures have increased. In the past couple of decades, their numbers in northern New England have skyrocketed, to the point where coastal researchers in Maine view them as “naturalized,” meaning they are comfortable living here.

That said, I spent about an hour stalking around a nearby flat the day before class looking for a green crab to bring to class. No luck. It was 32 degrees and we’d had a couple of cold snaps, so any that may have been around likely moved to warmer water. This too became a teaching point.

Though cold water may keep the crabs somewhat in check for a few months, they come back in numbers during the summer. Students learned green crabs can rock entire ecosystems because they eat larval mussels, clams and oysters and wreak havoc on critical eel grass beds, which are nurseries for said shellfish and many other baby species. They also learned green crabs have no significant natural predators and no commercial market value because they require too much work for too small amount of meat. As such, scientists, fishermen and fisheries managers are scrambling to come up with a viable means of reining in the crabs before they severely damage valuable shellfish markets.

I finished each class with a ray of hope, born of the landmark climate change pact signed in Paris on Dec. 11. Nearly 200 countries, representing almost all nations on the planet, signed a document agreeing that climate change was real, that anthropogenic causes are fueling it and that each country needs to devise a plan to limit carbon emissions and demonstrate progress. Students learned that agreement could be the turning point where collectively, countries around the world took the first step to slow the process by which warming waters are encouraging invasive species to become “naturalized” where they don’t belong.

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Paris Accord Sets Global Climate Change Commitment

December 15, 2015October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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Something happened in Paris on Friday that many thought wouldn’t.

Agreement.

Agreement by nearly 200 countries that climate change is a significant problem with short- and long-term global implications that we must address collectively. It was an uphill slog. Those countries signed a pact to reduce their carbon footprints and slow the pace of global warming in the coming century.

In a nutshell, after months and years of preparation, with weeks of hard back-and-forth negotiation culminating in two overnight sessions, nearly 200 countries agreed that:

Climate change exists and has the potential to do irreparable harm to the planet;
Global commitment to reduce greenhouse gases is critical to minimizing this harm;
Each country must commit to reducing carbon emissions, and revise those commitments to ever stricter standards every five years;
Each country must demonstrate what measures it has taken to cut emissions via a transparent process, every five years;
The goal is to keep the global temperature increase below 2 degrees Celsius, if not 1.5 degrees;
Forest preservation is critical to offsetting carbon emissions, and countries should enact policies to limit logging and save intact forests; and
Developed countries like the U.S., France, England, etc. should take the lead in providing funds for programs to reduce global carbon emissions, including those in developing countries.

Establishing a framework

To be sure, this is a first step. Conference organizers in Paris and elsewhere must have looked at this effort like herding cats. Coal gobbling countries like China, India and the U.S. have traditionally held different views on their responsibilities for and the extent of climate change. Smaller developing countries like the Marshall Islands, which are sounding the alarm bell that they’re losing ground…literally, have completely different views.

Such widespread agreement is monumental in the shadow of the failed 2009 climate agreement in Copenhagen. While the 2009 summit only suggested what to do, this accord is an almost Earth-wide acknowledgement that countries need to tackle this collectively, and a legally binding commitment to do so.

Will it stop global warming completely by on its own? No, say many scientists. The real tipping point would be to prevent the average global temperature increase from exceeding 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. Scientists say that if global annual temperatures rise above 2 degrees, the planet will be past the point of repair, and the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets will melt, sea levels could rise 20 feet, etc.

But as written, this agreement will only limit global temperature rise by about 3 degrees Celsius if countries achieve their current emissions reductions commitments, according to some scientists. It’s far better than the status quo, which is on track to bring an increase of more than 4 degrees Celsius and potential catastrophe. Still, on the new path the oceans will continue to rise, and polar caps will continue to melt, only at a slower pace.

To meet the agreement’s goal of avoiding damaging climate change, the nations of the world must step up the ambition of their cuts over time. The pact is voluntary for countries to strive for that 2 degree goal. What is legally binding is that each country commits to some kind of carbon emissions reduction, that they commit to continuing to reduce emissions more significantly every five years, and that they demonstrate what they have done, again every five years.

One of the biggest reasons the Paris agreement does not specify benchmarks for each country is that the United States Congress would have to vote on such a measure. And the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate would have nixed any such wording. Interestingly, the U.S. Republican party is the only political party in a study of nine developed countries that flat out denies “anthropogenic climate change.” More interestingly, the study suggests that opposition to addressing climate change is strongest in countries with large reserves of oil, natural gas, and/or coal (all of which the U.S. has in abundance).

Reason for optimism

Though it will not stop global warming, this binding agreement sets a precedent for global cooperation to combat climate change and hold each other accountable. Five years ago, this seemed like an impossible task. It also hopefully creates momentum to bring the discussion to the forefront of critical diplomatic and business discussions. It sends a signal that fossil fuels do more harm than good, and should stay where they are. It will force countries to start thinking harder about developing infrastructure for alternative energy, and create a path for industries and investors to spur innovation to scale up clean energy.

And perhaps it sets a framework for more aggressive action on a global scale if the scientific evidence shows our climate is changing faster than predicted.

I’m going to teach middle school students this week about how the warming Gulf of Maine has become home to some invasive species. The European Green Crab, for example, is a warm-water invader that has been showing up in increasing numbers for the past couple of decades. It eats larval shellfish like clams, mussels and oysters. It also destroys eelgrass habitats that are nurseries for many species.

Those kinds of invasive migrations are likely to continue for a while. But I look forward to capping off the classes with a ray of hope offered by the events in Paris last Friday.

Here’s some additional reading:

Science Alert: Here’s what you need to know about the new Paris climate deal

National Geographic: Paris Agreement Catalyzes Global Cooperation Toward a Low-Carbon Future

New York Times: Climate Accord Is a Healing Step, if Not a Cure

BBC: What did the Copenhagen climate summit achieve?

2012 Republican Party Platform

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Going Home to Nature

December 1, 2015October 20, 2021
by Colles Stowell

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I have many things to be thankful for, and I reflect on them with more focus this time of year: my loving wife, my imaginative daughter, close family and friends, a roof over our heads and clean water, to be sure.

A strong bond with Nature is also on that list. Countless hours and days on the water or in the woods with my dad taught me to drink in the sights and sounds of fish swimming, birds flying, frogs croaking, deer grazing, bugs buzzing, etc. I’ve learned to accept what Nature has to offer.

I was reminded of this earlier this month when I flew with my cousin from New England back home to New Orleans to fish for bull red drum in the Mississippi River delta. Since graduating from high school in 1984, I’ve done very little fishing in the waters where I grew up. My dad and I used to fish bayous around Lake Borgne and Lake Pontchartrain, and sometimes we drove down to Venice or Empire to go deep sea fishing.

The excitement was palpable as we left the dock in those days, knowing that in those waters in and around the delta, whether near oil rigs or out in the open, we could catch a wide variety of species. Grouper, snapper, jacks, king mackerel, pompano, sharks. You name it. The Gulf of Mexico had that big of a bounty.

I wondered how things had changed a couple of weeks ago as we stepped onto the Capt. Travis Holeman’s boat heading out of Venice. Several hurricanes, including Katrina, the oil spill and countless other factors had conspired to change the delta dramatically since I’d last been there.

I’d read that the coast is losing up to 30 square miles a year of shoreline, and the problem could get worse as sea levels rise. With 10,000 miles or more of canals dug out of the delta, protective freshwater marshes are being overrun with saltwater that kills the plants and weakens the soil.

Regardless, the biomass in Southeast La. is significant. Even on windy overcast days with fronts that drop the temperature by 10 degrees, marine and avian life seems to bubble over. Multiple shrimp and pogie boats worked offshore, bringing in tons of seafood. The pogies jumped out of the water, often creating enough of a disturbance to entice 20 lb. redfish off the bottom. Pelicans slammed into the water and came up gulping oily mouthfuls of protein. The terns and gulls also worked the water, especially marauding the trail of bait and shrimp left by the shrimp boats.

We caught and released several fish ranging from 12 to 30 lbs. We saw sharks and dolphins work the shoreline as giant jacks darted in close to shore to eat, then disappear. We saw how quickly conditions could change out there, based on wind, atmospheric pressure and water clarity spilling out the river, particularly after heavy rains in states up north.

The bottom changes constantly, and even “current” NOAA maps are out of date because lagoons, islands, ponds and other geographic features disappear daily.

That the delta has changed significantly since the last time I was there was evident. That it will continue to change as significantly remains to be seen. But indications are that the coastline will continue to pull back as the ocean gobbles up the fragile, yet protective marshes that are critical nurseries for a variety of important species. The delta is sinking as some scientists predict the Gulf of Mexico could rise about 4.5 feet by the end of the century.

I can only hope the rich biomass can adapt with the coming changes … because it is a special place, unique in its diversity and scope, that holds a strong connection to my past, and the love I’ve always had for Nature.