Really Sick Lobster with Shell Disease and missing limbs
The search for what causes a debilitating shell disease affecting lobsters from Long Island Sound to Maine has led one Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) visiting scientist to suspect environmental alkyphenols, formed primarily by the breakdown of hard transparent plastics. Preliminary evidence from the lab of Hans Laufer suggests that certain concentrations of alkyphenols may be interfering with the ability of lobsters to develop tough shells. Instead, the shells are weakened, leaving affected lobsters susceptible to the microbial invasions characteristic of the illness. “Lobsters ‘know’ when their shell is damaged, and that’s probably the reason when they have shell disease, why they molt more quickly,” says Laufer, a visiting investigator at the MBL for over 20 years and professor emeritus of molecular and cell biology at the University of Connecticut. “But ultimately, they still come down with the disease. And we think the presence of alkyphenols contributes to that.” Like any crustacean, lobsters shed their shells multiple times in one lifetime. After molting, the outer skin of the soft and exposed lobster will begin to harden. It is here that Laufer thinks the alkyphenols are doing their damage. At this point, a derivative of the amino acid tyrosine, whose function is to harden the developing shell, is incorporated. It is known that alkyphenols and tyrosine are similarly shaped and Laufer suspects that the toxin may be blocking tyrosine from its normal functions. He is at MBL this summer to measure the amount of competition between the two molecules. Alkyphenols are also known to act as endocrine disruptors. Laufer discovered the presence of alkyphenols in lobsters serendipitously while investigating a tremendous lobster die off at Long Island Sound in 1999, when shell disease, first observed in the mid-1990s, was noted to be on the rise. Although an unusually hot summer, it was also the first time New York City sprayed mosquito populations to prevent the spread of West Nile virus. Laufer, who began his career as an insect endocrinologist, suspected the toxins from the sprayings may have contributed to the lobster die off. In 2001, while searching for the mosquito toxins in lobsters, he instead found alkyphenols. “It’s a real problem,” Laufer says. “Plastics last a long time, but breakdown products last even longer. Perhaps shell disease is only the tip of the iceberg of a more basic problem of endocrine disrupting chemicals in marine environments.”

Robbery Scene
The Ocean View Seafood restaurant was broken into between Sunday night and Monday afternoon. An undisclosed amount of cash was stolen, and damages to the seafood eatery were estimated to be nearly $2,000. According to a Lexington Police Department incident report, thieves pried open the side door and office door of the restaurant, damaging the alarm system, two cash registers, phone lines and the phone box in the process.

Flipped Semi Truck
Authorities say a semi trailer was heading west bound on I-10 when he lost control at the wheel. The semi rolled, causing 30,000 pounds of seafood to be thrown from the trailer. It happened around 9:15PM near mile marker 233 on I-10 in Jefferson County. Authorities say the driver was disoriented, but did not suffer from any major injuries. Authorities say there are no road blocks or detours from the incident.

An example of by-catch
Scottish fishermen say they are finding unusual quantities of octopus and other warm-water creatures in their nets and lobster pots. Where once fishermen were lucky to see, let alone catch an octopus, now they are finding up to 300 a time as the creatures invade the creels in search of the same bait that is used to attract lobsters and crabs, Duncan MacInnes of the Western Isles Fisherman’s Association told The Observer. MacInnes said that while the octopus are a commercial catch, they also eat the lobsters, which fetch more at market. Other species showing up in unusual numbers are squid, Japanese skeleton shrimp, John Dory and red blenny. The waters are certainly getting a warmer. Species that would have been typical for the south coast are now moving increasingly northwards, said Dr. Anuschka Miller of the Scottish Association for Marine Science. MacInnes said some cold-water species could be moving northward from Scotland. He suggested cod may be rare now, not because of over-fishing but because the water is becoming too warm for them

Elephant Shot By Poachers
The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has made arrests and is laying charges in connection with two alleged incidents in Yarmouth, N.S. harbor of fishing untagged lobster traps and fishing during a closed time. On Friday night, Aug. 8, two people were apprehended in Yarmouth harbor. “One individual was given an appearance notice for possession of undersized lobster and fishing untagged lobster traps. And the other one was charged with fishing during a closed time,” Jacob MacLeay, the acting area chief of conservation and protection, said on Sunday. DFO claims to have seized 60 legal size lobsters and 50 undersized lobsters. A 20-foot boat with an outboard motor and lobster traps were also seized. On Saturday evening, Aug. 9, five people were arrested with charges pending. “Four of them will be charged with fishing untagged lobster traps and one will be charged with fishing during a closed time,” MacLeay said. There were lobster traps seized, as well as a 40-foot lobster boat, the Ronnie Joseph. Because the charges have not yet been formally laid with the court, no names are available. All of the people being charged have been given appearance notices for Sept. 23 in provincial court. Asked how the arrests came about, MacLeay said, “The officers worked on it, they put their time in. There was some information passed along from the community, more concern than anything. And the officers worked on it in the last couple of days.”

Shoplifter Caught in A CVS
An Egg Harbor Township man accused of shoplifting Lobster tails and other assorted products from a ShopRite told police he didn’t steal because he was needy, but simply because he was greedy. Harvey Faulkner, 26, was arrested Wednesday after he allegedly shoplifted lobster tails, a bottle of milk and Tupperware containers totaling $24.59, police said. Faulkner placed the items in the bottom of an unoccupied baby stroller he was pushing around the store, police said. He told police he had never shoplifted before, but said “today he was just feeling greedy,” according to a police report. Faulkner was issued a summons and released.

Map of Native American Tribes in the Pacific North West
The Stillaguamish Indian Tribe has spent $70,000 over the past five years to locate and remove more than 400 crab pots that have been abandoned on the seabed of Port Susan. There are still about 100 crab pots left. Many are buried in sediment or too tangled to be easily raised. “They not only kill crabs, but also fish and other species,” said Jen Sevigny, a wildlife biologist for the tribe. “It damages bottom habitat like eel grass beds.” Fishermen leave the pots behind when they inadvertently drop them too deep into the water. Boats skimming the surface of the water often slice a pot’s line, letting it fall to the sea floor. In other areas, ferries drag pots left in their paths to ports miles away. Sevigny and other biologists know the abandoned pots are a problem, but how much of a problem isn’t clear. Over the next year, the tribe will conduct a crab mortality study in an effort to fill in that data gap. Last month, tribal crews dropped 12 crabbing pots into the port — six pots at 30 feet and six pots at 60 feet. “We’re deploying pots as if they were abandoned,” Sevigny said. Every week for the next year, divers will check the pots to determine how quickly crabs are caught. After a year, the tribe will have a good idea of how many crabs are caught in abandoned pots, how long they survive before dying, and how long abandoned pots continue to attract fresh catches. The data will be turned over to the University of Washington, which will create an economic model and determine the value of the loss to the crabbing industry. The Stillaguamish tribe, which is funding the study, said cleaning up the crab pots helps the ecosystem and native fisheries. While the tribe conducts the study, the Northwest Straits Commission will conduct its own research in Clallam County. Together, the data sets will offer fresh insight into how quickly abandoned pots accumulate, and exactly how many crabs die in them. The data will help the Stillaguamish tribe get grants and other funding to continue clearing out abandoned pots and to educate fishermen on how to catch crabs responsibly. Stillaguamish tribal employees found 145 crabs in the 12 purposely abandoned pots during the first seven days of the study, Sevigny said. That number doesn’t surprise her. The Northwest Straits Commission estimates up to 20,000 derelict crab pots have accumulated in Puget Sound waters over the past 3 to 5 years. The commission estimates that more than a third of those pots, though abandoned, continue to actively catch crabs and fish for several months to a year. Each pot has the potential to catch between 10 and 75 crabs a year. The commission says the pots could have killed between 50,000 and a half-million crabs. Abandoned fishing nets are as much a cause for concern as abandoned pots. According to the Northwest Straits Commission, one net known to have been abandoned for just one week trapped a seal, 68 crabs, 30 dogfish sharks and more than 200 other fish, including endangered chinook salmon.

Shrimp Boat in the Gulf of Mexico
Carlton Reyes’ truck bounces into the lot of Reyes Marine, his six-boat shrimping operation at the Brownsville shrimp basin. He hops out, swatting at mosquitoes as he drops a machine part into the grease-streaked hand of his mechanic. “There’s always work to do,” Reyes says, “for some of us anyway.” His attention turns to the dozens of shrimping vessels across the basin that will not trawl the Gulf of Mexico waters this year, or perhaps ever again. With a sympathetic smile, Reyes climbs back in his truck on yet another errand, last year’s battle cry, “Friends don’t let friends eat imported shrimp,” stamped in big white letters across his rear bumper, disappears in a cloud of dust. The Brownsville-Port Isabel shrimp fleet is in retreat. The boats that survived successive waves of cheap foreign imports and farm-raised shrimp are now buckling under a worker shortage and the pressure of exorbitant fuel prices, $75,000 to fill an 18,000-gallon boat domestically. Businesses have managed to offset some of their fuel costs by filling tanks in Mexico, where a gallon of diesel sells for $2.40 a gallon. Still, the fleet has lost another 60 boats to start this season, which began July 15. That’s down from 220 in 2007 and 350 less than a decade ago. “In some ways, it’s probably a good thing,” Reyes reasoned, “because even if the price of fuel wasn’t killing us, we wouldn’t have enough workers to man the boats.” As owner of a shrimping business and the president of the Brownsville-Port Isabel Shrimp Producers Association, Reyes has a front row seat to shrimping operations that have succumbed to the economic pressures. Brownsville’s shrimp basin alone has dozens of idle vessels. Some businesses have only a portion of their fleet at sea, while others have called it quits, tying up their boats and abandoning the basin altogether. “Nobody knows where they went for sure,” Reyes said of the owners of a nine-boat fleet. “The old man isn’t going to invest his retirement to save the business, and I guess the son decided he couldn’t make any money so he left for the oil fields.” The troubles plaguing Brownsville’s and Port Isabel’s shrimping businesses are endemic throughout the industry. The Southern Shrimp Alliance, which represents shrimpers across eight states along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, claims that a decade ago there were more than 8,000 shrimping boats in the Gulf of Mexico. Last year, that number was down to 1,100 boats, and this year it will shrink even further. Today, the industry is a shell of its former halcyon days when thousands of boats roamed the Gulf of Mexico, earning upwards of $5 a pound–the same pound now fetches $3.50. Wilma Anderson, executive director of the Texas Shrimp Association and a member of the Southern Shrimp Alliance, is driven to distraction by lawmakers’ inaction. She makes frequent trips to Washington D.C. on behalf of the industry, but her finger is set firmly on the pulse of Texas’ shrimping business. By her estimate, Texas employs approximately 10,000 seasonal workers in the shrimping industry. Captains and deckhands are a devoted clan, and as such businesses count on their return the following season. They also do a job largely ignored by domestic workers, unwilling to spend weeks at sea and apart from their families. In return for their labor, they earn between $12 and $18 per 100 pounds of shrimp. Under a provision added to the H-2B visa program in 2005, and renewed in 2006 and 2007, certain returning seasonal workers, including shrimpers, were exempt from the 66,000-worker cap. That changed last year in September when politicians and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus derailed legislation to renew the exemption, shutting the door on tens of thousands of temporary workers and dealing a blow to a range of industries that depend on foreign labor. Already reeling from a $4 dollar gallon of diesel, the shortage of H-2B visas delivered a knockout blow to hundreds of boats. “Now, they’re fixing to recess,” Anderson said of the Congress. “With all the politics going on, not much is getting done and we’re waiting for a solution.” Congress is at loggerheads over comprehensive immigration reform, of which H-2B visas is included. The arching legislation also figures to tackle the question of what to do with the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants already in the country, and issues of border security. Despite aligning itself with immigration’s harsher critics, the CHC does support expanding the H-2B visa program, but not at the expense of its larger immigration goals. It’s a risky political maneuver, but a calculated risk. By allowing the H-2B visa exemption to expire, the caucus alienates a key group of supporters. And in turn, it gains political capital. Congressman Solomon P. Ortiz, D-Texas, a member of the CHC, has long voiced his support for Texas’ shrimpers. He laments the industry’s decline, but says a short-term solution to the H-2B visa would undermine a larger and ultimately far-reaching plan for immigration. “Once you start addressing immigration reform piecemeal,” Ortiz said, “you whittle down support and endanger the whole package.” Ortiz doesn’t anticipate relief any time soon as the fight over immigration legislation in Washington D.C. is expected to rage until after the presidential election and into next year. Some businesses won’t survive, but it’s a sacrifice the CHC is willing to make to keep a comprehensive plan alive. “These poor guys have had every book thrown at them except help,” Ortiz said. “The fight is not over yet.” While Congress fumbles over a solution, businesses that rely on foreign workers make do. Salvaging this year is a lost cause, Anderson says, and the fight has now turned to saving next season. The fight to survive is a war of attrition. The future of the business is anybody’s guess, according to Anderson Uncertainty hangs like a dark cloud over Port Isabel where Harley Londrie manages Zimco Marine, a 23-boat family-owned operation. Despite receiving approval for 46 of his seasonal workers, the visas were never issued. Londrie said he knew tough times were on the horizon when the H-2B visa exemption provision wasn’t renewed, which is why he made the difficult decision to tie up nine of his boats at the end of last season. Beset on all sides, if it’s not the cost of fuel then there aren’t enough workers, Londrie said. “If you don’t have the men you can’t send the boats,” Londrie said. “We’re having a pretty good season, too.”