2017: Twists, Turns and a Little Turmoil
The year 2017 will soon be added to the annals of history.
For the fishery, wouldn’t it be good to look back at the developments of the last 12 months, rub your hands together in a satisfied fashion and state that it was a good year — an unqualified success, so to speak.
But as everyone already knows, the fishing industry in Atlantic Canada is unfortunately never that simple to summarize in a few words. It is an extremely challenging and complex business with as many highs and lows as ...
Petty Harbour Mini Aquarium 2017
The mission of the Petty Harbour Mini Aquarium is to foster curiosity about local marine life and inspire action toward personal and global sustainability through display, interpretation and direct action. At the end of the Aquarium’s season in October, all of the creatures on display were released back into the ocean.
Photos by Jennifer Oake and Krista Jestican
MI Establishes New Regional Aquaculture Centre in Coast of Bays
A new centre has been established to support the rapidly growing aquaculture industry in the Coast of Bays region on Newfoundland’s South Coast.
The Coast of Bays Regional Aquaculture Centre (COB-RAC), a unit of the Fisheries and Marine Institute of Memorial University, is ideally positioned to better meet the training, research, development and technology transfer needs of the expanding aquaculture industry and to address the training needs of the broader maritime industry in the Coast of ...
Beneath the Surface
A professor in the Department of Ocean Science at Memorial University recently unveiled a series of underwater photos from various Newfoundland harbours and the results were quite disturbing.
Corey Morris explained that the purpose of the survey, conducted from 2007 to 2016, was to study the effects of harbour infrastructure on fish and fish habitat. But it was the amount of garbage on the bottom that really stood out, he noted.
The researchers monitored 20 locations over the course of ...
Lobster Landings Solid in LFAs 33 and 34
Above photo: Woods Harbour fisherman Sandy Goreham carries a trap while loading the Theresa and Cole at the Lower Woods Harbour wharf.
Halifax Airport Gears Up for Busy Cargo Season
The lobster season is well underway in southwestern Nova Scotia, with solid landings, a strong shore price and firm market conditions during the opening month.
The season opened on November 28 after a one-day weather delay for the close to 1,700 fishing vessels in Lobster Fishing Areas (LFAs) 33 and 34. ...
Southwest Nova Groundfish Fishery Holding Its Own
The Southwestern Nova Scotia groundfish fishery is holding its own, with an overall landed value that has topped more than $50-million in 2015 and 2016, harvested by just over 400 vessels from all sectors of the inshore fleet.
According to preliminary statistics from the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans, in 2016 the total landed value of groundfish species on Georges Bank (5Z) was $22,308,556. Fifty-four vessels participated in the fishery, including 31 from the under-65 mobile ...
New Player in Town
Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan Enters North American Shellfish Industry With Purchase of P.E.I’s Largest Mussel Producer
There is a new player in the Atlantic Canadian aquaculture industry — and it’s a big one.
On November 17, the Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan (OTPP) announced that it had purchased Atlantic Aqua Farms, the largest mussel producer on Prince Edward Island and one of the largest in North America.
OTPP was founded in 1990 to manage the defined pension ...
Over and Under
Sarah Walsh, from Mount Pearl, Newfoundland, has always been on a wet and slippery slope.
Her summers were spent in Port Blandford where she says, “My parents always had us out on the water. Every weekend we were either out fishing or going to the beaches. I can’t remember when we never had a speed boat, canoe or a pleasure craft. I think that’s where it kind of started.”
She says as a child she always wanted to be a marine biologist, but somewhere along the way, “When I went ...
The Survival and Patience of Job — Part II
Above photo: Job’s boots were blown off his feet in the explosion but later recovered. The force of the explosion separated half the boot from the soles in both.
Last month we told you about an explosion and fire that killed two men from Little Bay Islands onboard a vessel. A third man miraculously survived. Job Goudie, from Springdale, was delivering gasoline to a small tanker vessel that was docked in Little Bay near Springdale, on Newfoundland’s northeast coast, when a fire, ...
The New Face of Cod
International Markets and Products Have Changed Considerably since 1992
The international markets for cod are now a whole lot different than they were 25 years ago.
The last time Newfoundland and Labrador cod was a substantial export was prior to the groundfish moratorium in 1992. Pre-moratorium, frozen cod block was the main product being churned out by N.L. fishplants. Jump ahead two-and-half decades and the world groundfish/whitefish market is almost unrecognizable compared to the cod ...
