Lobster bait focus of GMRI research
Photo/Rebecca Goldfine
Graham Sherwood is the lead research scientist on GMRI's herring survey
The Gulf of Maine Research Institute in Portland got final notice last week that it has received a $400,000 federal earmark, the last piece of funding it needed to launch a long overdue and innovative herring survey deemed crucial to the state's $320 million lobster industry. The survey will be the first comprehensive look at herring stocks along the coast of Maine, an area that's been neglected in favor of offshore herring research. It will be conducted next year in a joint effort by both Maine lobstermen and scientists.
The National Marine Fisheries Service grant allows GMRI to launch the herring project, which the institute has been planning for several years, according to Executive Director Don Perkins. Last year it received a conditional $530,000 grant from the Maine Technology Institute that could only be accessed if the institute found matching funds.
Support from Maine's delegation, which was instrumental in getting the federal funding, was bolstered by the unique partnership the institute is forging with Maine's lobstermen, Perkins says. GMRI will enlist 10 lobster boats and one herring vessel to collect the herring data next year, outfitting them with the acoustic equipment they'll need to scan for fish. "When [fishermen are] involved in research, they play a thoughtful role," Perkins says.
Perkins adds, "[Lobstermen] also need to reduce uncertainty so they can make better business decisions." Maine's lobster industry is hoping the survey will find a more robust fishery than the current government estimate, which is driving fishing quotas. Maine lobstermen rely on herring as inexpensive and plentiful bait for their traps. But in recent years, the total allowable catch for herring has been reduced, with the biggest decline in the shallow waters that hug the coastline, which are also the most heavily fished.
"This will be the first stab at a long-standing problem," says Graham Sherwood, GMRI's lead research scientist on the project. "We don't have reliable information about how much fish is in there."
The NMFS does track herring that swim and spawn offshore, on Georges Bank, but, limited by funding constraints, does not survey inshore herring. The shallower waters, choked with lobster gear, are also more difficult for a large research vessel to navigate. The result is an inshore quota for herring that is at best an educated guess.
Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen's Association, says lobstermen have been asking for a scientific survey of inshore herring for a decade or longer. "What we ultimately want to know is the most accurate representation," McCarron says. "If they are truly not inshore fish, that's good because we don't want to overfish them, but historically we've thought they were inshore."
Maine's relatively small herring fleet also prefers to fish inshore because it's safer and requires less fuel. But since 2006, the herring quota in Area 1A, as the coastal section is called, has been reduced from 60,000 metric tons to about 26,000 metric tons, which the fishing industry claims is overly precautionary. "The herring industry is saying, ‘We don't have the science to say we don't have that much fish'," Sherwood says.
The dwindling herring bait supply has become more expensive. McCarron says the price has more than doubled since 2007, and is on average now 31 cents a pound. In 2006, McCarron says herring accounted for roughly 86% of lobstermen's bait; in 2008, that percentage had dropped to 70%. Lobstermen also use menhaden or frozen red fish for bait, she says.
Beyond being an economic engine for Maine's $320 million lobster industry (the industry as a whole contributes $1 billion to the state), herring stocks are also critical for maintaining a healthy marine ecosystem. A small, oily, high-fat fish, herring is a major food source for many species, including cod, seabirds, tuna and whales. Overfishing would spell problems for much of the food web in the Gulf of Maine, Sherwood says.
To collect the herring data, GMRI will hire 11 fishermen who will be responsible for surveying different zones up and down Maine's coast. The lobstermen, through the Maine Lobster Association, have agreed to charter their boats for half the going price, or $500 instead of $1,000 a night, Sherwood says. The research project requires the surveyors to work one full night every week for 16 weeks between August and November 2012 during spawning season. The survey can only happen at night when herring rise from the sea bottom after sundown to feed.
McCarron says she hopes the herring pilot project will open up more opportunities for fishermen and scientists to collaborate on other marine research. "As lobstermen prove themselves to be reliable scientists and use these technologies according to protocols, and get the data as the equipment evolves, hopefully we can be involved in more complex research questions in the future," she says.
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