Court decision privatizes rockweed harvest in intertidal zone
Harvesting of rockweed just got trickier, at least in Washington County, following a ruling by Maine Superior Court Judge Harold Stewart II that rockweed in the intertidal zone belongs to the owner of the flats on which it grows.
Stewart’s ruled last week in favor of three shorefront landowners who filed suit in 2015 against a Canadian seaweed harvester, Acadian Seaplants Ltd., the Ellsworth American reported.
Rockweed is a low-value plant but makes a good living for harvesters, who in 2016 gathered nearly 14 million pounds for a value of $468,105. The brown macroalgae, abundant along Maine’s coast, is used in a number of products, including nutritional supplements for humans and pets, fertilizer, agricultural products, packing material for lobsters and as a stabilizer in food and cosmetics.
“Rockweed is the exclusive property of the intertidal landowners,” Gordon R. Smith, attorney for plaintiffs Kenneth W. Ross and Carl E. Ross, who own land on Cobscook Bay, told the American.
Department of Marine Resources Commissioner Patrick Keliher disagreed.
“I’m very disappointed in this decision,” Keliher told the American. “I plan to continue to manage it as a fishery and will be engaged in the appeal process.”
Acadian Seaplants, based in Nova Scotia, is a biotech company and the largest independent manufacturer of marine plant products of its type in the world.
Company President Jean-Paul Deveau, told the American the company employs “more than 50 people earning a living harvesting seaweed” in Maine and has indirect economic impact from activities such product transportation of the harvest.
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