No Shrimp Fishery this Year

You have probably heard by now that there is no shrimp fishery this 2013-2014 season. This did not come as too much of a surprise: there have been early closures and reduced allowable catch limits put on the shrimp fishery since 2010. In 2012 Maine shrimpers hauled in 255 metric tons (mt) of shrimp compared to landings between 2,200 mt  and 5,600 mt from 2005-2012.  1969 marked the peak of the fishery with nearly 11,000 mt of shrimp landed. (Table 1a, ASMFC report)

“Given the overwhelming evidence of recruitment failure and stock collapse, and continuing unfavorable environmental conditions, the Section felt it was necessary to close the 2014 fishery to protect the remaining spawning biomass and allow as much hatch to take place as possible,” stated Northern Shrimp Section Chair Terry Stockwell of Maine. “When environmental conditions are poor, the ability of the stock to withstand fishing pressure is reduced. With the stock at all time lows and only failed year classes to come, there is even greater loss of resilience for this stock.”
- From ASMFC Northern Shrimp Section Establishes Moratorium for 2014 Fishing Season

If you want to read the 86-page report compiled by the Atlantic State's Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC)--the regulatory body that jointly manages the Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts shrimp fishery--I would suggest a strong cup of coffee first (it is pretty technical). Alternatively, check out their Executive Summary on page 7. 

What does this mean for Maine shrimp fishermen? The fishery has historically supported between 150-250 trawlers and trappers (the two methods for catching shrimp), and in 2013 there were around 160 Maine shrimp fishery licenses (table 6, ASMFC report). Although nearly 84 percent of shrimpers in Maine are also lobstermen, shrimping can be a significant supplement to their income, with some fishermen making $2,000 a day shrimping. This is yet another lost fishing opportunity that makes fishermen even more reliant on the lobster fishery for all of their income. One of our science advisors, Robert Steneck, wrote a compelling article about this issue in 2011 (this is a must-read).

Check out this article in the Working Waterfront to learn more about the shrimp fishery and the link between decreases in the shrimp population and increased water temperatures. You can also read more about northern shrimp (Pandalus borealis), their life history, and the history of their management on the ASMFC website.

Have you been impacted by the closure of the shrimp fishery? What do you think about the ASMFC's descision to close the fishery? Post your thoughts in the comment section!

Cool ways to use your Smartphone for Science

Well, at long last you can use your smartphone as a microscope! Check out this $10 instructables hack. Out on Hurricane there are plenty of cool critters to see under a microscope with just a few plankton tows. We had fun with one of our most recent programs, the Eastern Maine Skippers, collecting zoo and phytoplankton from the waters just off Hurricane Island. Check out some of the critters we saw below:

But what else can you do with your phone? Try signing up for Marine Debris Tracker so you can record what you find on the coastline during your beach combing adventures! Or how about recording the cool intertidal invertebrates you find with Project Noah. There are tons of ways you can contribute to science while having fun doing it, so get to it!

DMR Lobster Settlement Survey Dives

I spent Friday Oct 18 and Monday Oct 21 helping (by sorting samples) DMR scientists Robert Russell and Carl Wilson, who are conducting their annual dive survey of larval lobster settlement rates at 50 sites along the Maine coast. At each site they sampled 12 quadrats via underwater suction sampling. Samples were then sorted and processed on the boat. The suction sampler pulls up all loose sediment and other organisms, so we needed to sift through it and pull out any lobsters and crabs we found. Many of the samples also had shrimp, urchins, seaweed, brittle stars, marine worms, asst. shells, and occasionally rock gunnels and cunner (fish). Once the sample was sifted, we measured the lobsters and crabs carapace length, and we also collected data about the lobster's sex and number of claws.

The boat they used for these dives was the 38' Lady Anne, operated by Sea Ventures Charters, Captained by Dave Sinclair.

Some of the sites we visited during these surveys were Head Harbor at Isle Au Haut, Ragged Island, Allen Island, Matinicus, Hurricane, and Monhegan

Overall, Carl and Robert said that they were seeing far fewer settler-size lobsters across all of their sites than in previous years (this survey has been going on for 22 years). For example, we only found 6 settlers from the 5 sites that were surveyed on Friday, when in the past Robert and Carl have found 4-5 settlers per site in that area.

The data from these surveys will feed into the American Lobster Settlement Index.

Northern Flicker

For the past month and a half there have been many Northern Flickers and other woodpeckers flying quietly around Hurricane. Mostly I have only noticed them after they have been spooked and are flying away, but the underside of their wings is an unmistakable yellow that is visible even from far away. The Yellow-Shafted Northern Flicker Colaptes auratus is a unique woodpecker because it is actually often found foraging on the ground or perched upright on trees rather than against the trunk like their woodpecker relatives. Unfortunately, we found a beautiful female dead on Hurricane last week, likely from hitting a window.

Learn more about Northern Flickers at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. 

Hurricane Geology

Last weekend Bowdoin undergraduate students came to Hurricane, and I tagged along as they toured the different pocket beaches around the island. Although all of Hurricane's bedrock geology is granite, there are other types of (mostly igneous) rocks found on the island that traveled over from Vinalhaven and North Haven when the whole region was covered by a large glacier. Glacial till is characteristic because it is unsorted, which means that there are several different clast sizes and many rock types. The Flow-banded rhyolite, pictured below, was found in a pocket beach just east of Gibbon's Point. Flow-banded rhyolite is chemically equivalent to granite, in that it has high amounts of potassium and silica, but it formed in very different conditions. 

A professor holds out small clasts of Flow Banded Rhyolite,