ELLSWORTH — Maine lobstermen are catching it coming and going, but the “it” ain’t lobsters. Last month, the lobster industry found itself confronted with a demand from federal fisheries regulators that it reduce the risk it posed to endangered right whales by 60 percent and began the arduous task of figuring out how to remove …
BLUE HILL – Roger Shepley’s Omega 42 sailboat Seriana has been a familiar sight at its summer mooring off Kollegewidgwok Yacht Club in Blue Hill harbor and it is becoming a familiar sight at the top of the biennial Bermuda One-Two ocean race fleet. The race encompasses a singlehanded sail from Newport, R.I. to St. …
ELLSWORTH — Summer is still a few days away, but last weekend the sights and sounds of summer roiled the waters of Boothbay Harbor and Rockland as Maine’s summer lobster boat racing season got underway. Boothbay Harbor is the traditional opening venue and by Friday night more than two dozen boats from along the Maine …
PENOBSCOT — The contentious, drawn-out battle over an aquaculture lease in the Bagaduce River came to an apparent end Monday afternoon when Taunton Bay Oyster Co. President Michael Briggs emailed the Department of Marine Resources and asked the agency to “terminate the entire lease immediately.” The reason Briggs offered in his two-line email directed “to …
BLUE HILL — A longtime oyster farmer wants to expand his operations in the Salt Pond by nearly 50 percent and has filed an application with the Department of Marine Resources for a 20-year standard aquaculture lease covering 7.25 acres divided between two tracts near Carlton Island. DMR has scheduled a scoping session on the …
BROOKSVILLE — Robin Hadlock Seeley will speak on “The Key Role of the Rockweed Forest and the Intertidal Zone” at 7 p.m. Tuesday June 25 at the Reversing Falls Sanctuary, 818 Bagaduce Road in Brooksville. Seeley’s multimedia presentation will address the role of rockweed in the nearshore ecosystem and the sustainability of commercial harvesting in …
BROOKLIN — Driving into this tiny town at the eastern corner of the Blue Hill Peninsula, a roadside sign welcomes visitors to “the boatbuilding capital of the world,” and with good reason. In addition to its several world-class boatbuilders, the community has adopted a commitment to maintaining its traditional connection to the sea. For the …
ELLSWORTH — The Maine lobster boat racing season gets underway this weekend, but however the season goes, it just won’t be the same. Racing begins Saturday, June 15, in Boothbay Harbor and moves up to Penobscot Bay on Sunday, June 16, but two of the most iconic figures in Maine lobster boat racing — Galen …
DEER ISLE — For Maine lobstermen, 2019 is likely to bring a summer of discontent. Fuel prices are high. Cuts in herring fishing quotas — with further cuts likely — mean that bait is likely to be extremely scarce, and whatever’s available extremely expensive as the season develops. And that’s the good news. What really …
MACHIAS — Big science is coming to Downeast Maine next week. On Monday and Tuesday, June 17 and 18, the Eastern Maine Coastal Current Collaborative (EM3C) will host a State of the Science Conference at the University of Maine at Machias. The conference will discuss ecosystem-based fisheries management in eastern Maine and will bring together …
TRENTON — The North Atlantic right whale remains critically endangered. Since entanglement with rope from fishing gear is one of the threats to the population, major changes are coming down the pike for the Maine lobster industry. Those changes are unlikely to be popular with lobstermen. “Feel free to yell at me,” Patrick Keliher, commissioner …
ELLSWORTH — In March, NOAA Fisheries announced that the number of vertical lines connecting surface buoys to, primarily, lobster traps would have to be reduced by as much as 60 percent off the New England coast and in the Gulf of Maine to protect endangered right whales from entanglement in fishing gear. More recently, the …
