Climate Change: What DFO is Seeing in Atlantic Canada Waters
Above: Lonnie Snow photo
“Waters in Atlantic Canada have seen varying degrees of warming over the past 10 years,” says Kathryn Hallett, Fisheries and Oceans Canada media relations.
Hallett said there is an important distinction between sea surface temperatures (SSTs) that are highly influenced by air temperature, and temperatures at depth. “The warming trend observed in air temperature since the 1870s of about 1°C per century is expected to have occurred in ...
Fishing Industry on the Front Lines of Climate Change
Above: Tracey Wallace photo
The temperature is rising in the Atlantic Ocean, both on the sea surface and in deep waters, giving the fishing industry a front row seat to the impact of climate change.
“We find it’s impacting virtually every day. That’s an exaggeration, but we’ve seen frequency of storms and severity of storms we’ve never seen before over the past three years in particular,” says Stewart Lamont, managing director of the Tangier Lobster Company Limited...
The Impacts of Climate Change on Atlantic Canada are Unprecedented
As the world reacts to dire new warnings contained in the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate, Ecology Action Centre (EAC) is focusing on how changing oceans could impact Atlantic Canada and what we can do about it. “Atlantic Canada’s way of life is so closely tied to the ocean,” says Shannon Arnold, senior marine coordinator, EAC.
“The impacts of climate change on marine ecosystems could severely ...
Government Committee Releases Report on Climate Change Impacts to Lobster and Snow Crab
The House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans recently released a report related to its study of the migration of lobster and snow crab in Atlantic Canada and the impact of climate change on carapace size.
The report entitled In Hot Water — Lobster and Snow Crab in Eastern Canada, included 10 recommendations, which focused on the need for more research (climate and economic impacts in particular), as well as the need to collaborate with harvesters (i.e. to advance ...
Looking Beneath the Surface
In the fishery, we are always concerned about what is going
on underneath the surface of the ocean.
Looking at the surface can provide helpful information but
what is below the surface is what really matters.
Beneath that surface is the part of the ocean ecosystem the
fishery depends on. The different fish resources we harvest, the food for those
fish and predators who compete with us to catch them are all down there
somewhere. So is the fishing gear we use to catch them and even the ...
Wilkinson’s Marching Orders
It has now been nearly three months since Jonathan Wilkinson was appointed the new Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and Canadian Coast Guard by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
By now, Minister Wilkinson’s handlers have been working overtime getting him up to speed on the numerous contentious and ever-changing files in this closely watched and oftentimes controversial department. Just ask his predecessor.
It would be an understatement to say that numerous decisions by New Brunswick native ...
Are Coastal Communities in Peril?
Atlantic Ocean Predicted to Rise Substantially in 20- 50 Years
While President Trump contemplates a mega billion-dollar wall between the U.S.-Mexican border, recent news from the scientific community strongly indicates the wall should be constructed along the coastline of the United States to protect such entities as New York City, Miami and San Francisco.
The accepted theory by most of the world’s leading marine scientists is that the world oceans would rise by one to two feet in the ...
What Will Climate Change Mean for Future Fisheries?
Climate change offers both opportunities and risks to established and emerging fisheries and aquaculture enterprises and the communities they support.
ClimeFish is a four-year project largely backed by the European Union. This project has, at its core, the goal of providing sound advice to guide management decisions to ensure that seafood production can increase in areas and for species where there is potential for sustainable growth under climate change.
The ClimeFish consortium of ...
Larval Science: Scientists Trying to Predict Climate Change Impact on Baby Lobsters
They say that no visit to Atlantic Canada is complete without a traditional feed of lobster.
Few grow up here without having at least some experience with handling the delicious, if prickly, crustaceans. The species and the harvesting thereof, is part of the fabric of life in the region.
But before they’re hauled up from the ocean floor for a date with a diner plate, Atlantic lobsters have to survive almost unfathomable odds in order to reach adulthood.
It is in the measuring of ...
Climate Change Hits the Seafood Industry; We’re in for a Wild Ride
As I write this in Boston on December 23, highs are forecast in the 70s.
It is not just that we haven’t seen snow. The same thing is true in New Hampshire and Maine, hundreds of miles to the north. The unsettling warmth is not just disrupting holiday ambiance. My wife had wanted to get sleds for our grandchildren this year and I felt what was the point since they couldn’t use them.
It is also disrupting the seafood industry on a global scale.
Our basic problem is that warming ...
