This article is reprinted with permission of Commercial Fisheries News, the Northeast's fishing newspaper for over 30 years, ©2003 Compass Publications Inc. Commercial Fisheries News is published monthly; annual subscriptions are $21.95. To subscribe or request a sample issue: call (877) 263-4496; fax (207) 367-2490; e-mail (cfoster@fish-news.com); or click on the hot link.
by Natalie Springuel
On July 24, 2001, a group of fishermen and researchers dispersed about 300,000 one- and two-year-old scallops into the northern reaches of Penobscot Bay.
The effort was part of the Wild Scallop Stock Enhancement Project, which started in 1999, when fishermen set out the first scallop spat collection bags in the waters off Stonington, ME. Collecting spat has continued each year since then, but this was first deployment of seed scallops on bottom.
The hope is that the seeds, which had reached sizes ranging from less than an inch to over 2", will settle onto the seabed and grow into healthy, harvestable sea scallops. If mature scallops are found a few years down the road, then fishermen and researchers involved in the project will be one step closer to reaching their goal of enhancing the wild scallop stock resource and reversing the decline of this important shellfish species in nearshore waters off the Maine coast.
Any success that comes from this deployment should be attributed to the fishermen involved and project coordinator Marsden Brewer, according to Maine Sea Grant extension agent Dana Morse, who is working with scallop enhancement projects along the coast.
"Without leadership, support, and goodwill of the fishermen, this whole thing would fizzle," Morse said.
In the last issue of CFN, Science Side examined the nuts and bolts of collecting scallop spat and explored some of the primary scientific questions researchers asked about scallop spawning in Maine. This time, Science Side will report on success rates of scallop reseeding in the Canadian Maritimes
The Canadians are further along in scallop stock enhancement than anywhere else in North America. They have already addressed many of the issues that arise with stock enhancement, such as the question "ownership."
Their experiences can offer helpful lessons for managers and fishermen in Maine who are just now beginning to talk about what could become a complex debate: when fishermen, private industries, and municipalities help restock a public resource, who has access to the harvest?
Where has reseeding worked?
In the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the Magdalen Islands are starting to show some promising results from 4.7 million scallops deployed in 1996. George Cliche, scallop research coordinator for the Quebec government, explained that preliminary evaluations by dragging and underwater camera show survival rates between 15% and 20%.
"This may seem like a low survival rate but it is important to emphasize that, for the project to be economically viable, the survival rate has to be around 25% to 30%," Cliche said.
Starting in 1998, predators were removed from reseeding sites prior to deploying scallops. Cliche believes that with adequate control of predators, primarily sea stars, the Magdalen Islands project will achieve the necessary 25% to 30%.
Closer to the shores of New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, Euclide Chiasson manages scallop stock enhancement projects for Pecten Inc. (named after the Latin name for scallop, Placopecten magellanicus) in Northumberland Strait, Miramichi Bay, and Baie des Chaleurs. Pecten Inc. was created to manage stock enhancement in those regions. It was founded and is funded by the Maritime Fishermen's Union along with funding from the province of New Brunswick.
Chiasson said that, despite an autumn storm tangling much of the gear, the growout of reseeded scallops is promising so far. By next fall, he expects that the three sites will collectively return 6.5 to 7.5 million scallops.
Another success, according to Chiasson, is that fishermen have donated their time and goodwill towards the scallop projects because "they believe in it."
"The only problem? When it is good enough weather to work the spat collectors and reseeding gear, it is also good enough weather to be out fishing for scallops," Chiasson said.
So, to ensure the project's longevity, the Maritime Fishermen's Union and partners have hired two captains, their crews, a technician, and a manger to carry out the work.
In July, fishermen deployed about 300,000 seed scallops on bed sites in Penobscot Bay.
Their hope is that the seed will settle onto bottom and grow into healthy,
harvestable sea scallops.
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Values discussion
These early results of scallop survival after reseeding are positive, but it is too early to tell what end results they will eventually bring, and how much they could enhance the wild stock. Most people agree, however, that the potential opportunities are too great to pass up.
"It could be a way to a have a phenomenal wild scallop fishery, and to help the fishery through stewardship and education," said Robin Alden, former commissioner of the Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR), who is involved in scallop work with the Stonington Fisheries Alliance (SFA).
"You have to crawl before you walk, and this requires a change in how we think about fisheries; it is a values discussion."
Values are at the bottom of most fisheries issues and this one is no exception. Inevitably, questions of resource ownership come into play when fishermen become involved in public stock enhancement.
Leslie-Anne Davidson, a scallop biologist and the scallop project leader with Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans, acknowledges the need to open a discussion.
"The problem is not with biology, but in identifying the question of ownership; this needs to be identified soon, in the next few years, so fishermen don't lose faith," she said.
It is easy to see why the question comes up. Fishermen committed to enhancement invest their time, effort, and, perhaps most essentially, their knowledge. With both spat collection and reseeding, fishermen are sharing information about the location of key scallop beds, places that could be harvested by others not involved in stock enhancement work.
However, Alden cautions that focusing the debate on ownership could detract from the far-reaching benefit that enhancement could have on the scallop fishery.
Carla Morin of the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance (NAMA) agrees. NAMA and the Saco Bay-area fishermen who have been working on an enhancement project deployed their first scallop seed in August.
"The ultimate goal is that scallop stock enhancement works in every port all up and down the coast so no one has to fight over scallops," Morin said.
Tagging seed
In the meantime, managers are thinking of creative ways to protect scallopers' knowledge of good beds while still encouraging them to become involved in the process.
One solution has been to encourage fishermen collecting spat to keep their sites confidential. Then, when their scallops are used for reseeding, they can be tagged.
Approximately 400 of the scallops deployed last July in northern Penobscot Bay were tagged, said Morse.
The tags, 3/8" in size and post-it note yellow in color, are made of plastic-coated vinyl. Each tag's four-digit number, along with the location and time of its deployment, is recorded by the DMR.
When someone harvests a tagged scallop, he will be asked to report it either to the DMR or the local project coordinator, in this case, Marsden Brewer in Stonington.
Morse explained that a few years down the road, fishermen can identify if those scallops were the ones they collected and where they ended up.
"In the end," Morse said, "it is a win-win situation: Maine's Department of Marine Resources will have more information on success rates and movement of reseeded scallops, which will help in the long-term management of the fishery; and fishermen won't have to broadcast their favorite scallop fishing areas to the world."
Canadian management
Stock enhancement of scallops raises a whole new variety of challenges for fisheries managers. Off New Brunswick, Chiasson of Pecten Inc. said that the question of who has access to the reseeded beds has yet to be resolved, "but it is the fundamental issue in the long-term success of stock enhancement."
Currently, in Chiasson's region, the Canadian government has established ordinances prohibiting fishing in reseeding areas for five years. But, he cautions, this is no long-term solution "because petoncle (as they are called in French) travel outside the reseeding area."
Chiasson offers a solution: since everyone will benefit from stock enhancement, why not raise the fee for scallop fishing licenses and use the extra money for reseeding?
Further north in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, there is an incentive for fishermen to get involved in stock enhancement, as they will be the ones who reap the benefits at harvest time.
George Cliche explained that the scallop season around the Magdalen Islands opens on July 30 and one sector of the reseeded area will be open to harvest. Of the 23 fishermen holding scallop permits in that area, 21 participated in the enhancement project. Only these 21 will have access to a percentage of the total allowable volume taken out of the reseeded area.
Furthermore, "The more a fisherman invested, the greater his part of the reseeded volume will be," Cliche said.
As of 2001, a percentage of the value of the catch will also go into funding the spat collection and reseeding work, which is carried out by a company owned primarily by those same 21 fishermen.
In Maine
In Maine, as the state's scallop landings have dramatically declined over the last several years, the DMR is starting a process that will result in a new comprehensive management plan for scallops.
The state is asking fishermen to help create a plan that addresses almost every aspect of the scallop fishery, from entry controls to gear modifications, area closures, landing restrictions, and stock enhancement.
It may not yet be clear how much stock enhancement will help the wild population, but Dan Schick, DMR scallop biologist, is hopeful.
"I see great promise for scallop enhancement. I am excited down to the core," said Schick.
But, he adds there is much more research to be done that will have an important bearing on management. For example, if it is found that a particular area returns low spat collection success, then scallopers in that area will have less opportunity to participate in stock enhancement.
"So giving access to permits only if you are a collector may not work," Schick said.
On the other hand, if scallop numbers increase as the reseeding effort unfolds, then more and more fishermen will want to become involved.
"There has to be a management system in place," Schick said. "These things take chewing over. They take time."
Everyone involved agrees that management questions will take time to resolve, just as the scallop seed takes time to grow. But as more and more results filter in from research projects spanning the coast from Martha's Vineyard to the Gulf of St. Lawrence and many points in between, stock enhancement is sure to be an important topic to consider in creating scallop management plans.
In the meantime, many fishermen continue to voluntarily give their time, their money, the use of their vessels and equipment, and their enthusiasm because they are concerned about the future of the scallop industry.
To those working on the Wild Scallop Stock Enhancement Project their mission is clear and direct, according to Marsden Brewer.
"The way we fishermen talk about our intentions when we are talking among ourselves is that this isn't about you and me; it is about providing a future for the next generation in the fishing community," Brewer said.
