Fishing In Berkeley

Derelict Fishing Equipment Haunts Bay Waters

Camouflaged in waters around many of our rivers and the Chesapeake Bay, lost fishing gear no longer brings in seafood but continues to snag marine life. The gear — crab pots, tangled fishing line or nets — were either abandoned or dropped from a severed line. This derelict gear poses a threat to fish, birds and invertebrates, as well as to water craft with propellers and anchors that can become entangled in line or nets.

Part of the problem is monofilament fishing line. According to the BoatUS Foundation, mono-filament can persist for 500 years in the water, accumulating at popular fishing holes. Rusted, derelict hooks can be dangerous for people who are wading or walking. Fishermen waste hours each season untangling their gear from this so-called ghost gear. For watermen, dealing with ghost line, nets and pots means more than lost time — it means lost revenue.

Ghost crab pots are a persistent problem in the Chesapeake Bay, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Crab traps become lost when buoy lines snap or a storm breaks the trap free. Some 10 to 30 percent of a commercial crabber’s pots may be lost each year to storms or propellers, according to Maryland DNR. That’s a big loss, since crab pots cost some $30 each.

Side-scan sonar surveys by the Maryland Geological Survey and the NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office revealed an estimated 85,000 ghost pots on the bottom of Maryland’s part of the Bay. Virginia surveys estimate at least 35,000 derelict traps actively ghost fishing. Whatever the staggering total number, the impact is real. Lost pots continue to catch crabs and take away from harvest-able crabs and crabs left to reproduce. Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS), researchers estimate that an abandoned trap catches an average of one market-sized blue crab every four days.

As part of Maryland DNR’s Ghost Crab Pot Retrieval program, 450 watermen were paid up to $400 per day to recover and dispose of ghost crab pots in 2010. These watermen pulled some 8,000 pots or parts of pots from six areas, primarily the West, Patuxent and Patapsco Rivers. Virginia has a comparable program for watermen, who retrieved 9,000 ghost posts and hundreds of other abandoned pieces of gear for $300 per day last year; 66 watermen participated.

Recreational anglers can do their part, too, by not abandoning tangled or snagged fishing line.

UC Berkeley achieves sustainable seafood certification

Five years after becoming the first university dining program in the country to achieve organic certification, Cal Dining at the University of California, Berkeley, has achieved another first. It is the first public university in the nation to be awarded  Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certification for its commitment to seafood sustainability, the MSC announced today (Monday, June 20).

Sustainable seafood refers to seafood caught in a way that ensures the long-term health and stability of individual fish stocks and of the surrounding oceans’ ecological balance.

“Cal has taken an important step,” said Kerry Coughlin, regional director for MSC’s Americas region. “The more institutions and fisheries and retailers that are certified sustainable, the more we know fish are going to be around for future generations.”

The MSC is an independent, global, non-profit organization that contributes to the health of the world’s oceans and helps preserve fishing-related livelihoods by recognizing and rewarding sustainable fishing practices and by working with partners to transform the seafood market to a sustainable basis.

Its globally-recognized ecolabel designates seafood that can be traced through every step of the supply chain to show it has not contributed to the environmental problem of overfishing. At UC Berkeley’s four dining halls – Crossroads, Café 3, Foothill and Clark Kerr – the labels will begin appearing this summer on menus and at food stations, and students will learn more about the MSC certification from dining hall posters and tabletop ads.

“At UC Berkeley, our diverse student body enjoys eating seafood in the dining facilities, and we’re proud to be able to provide them with items including tuna, cod, flounder, mussels and salmon that will bear the MSC ecolabel,” said Shawn LaPean, executive director of dining for UC Berkeley’s Housing & Dining Operations. “We buy safe, sustainable fish as much as possible and will highlight what we buy as sustainable.”

Some of the most popular seafood dishes served in the campus dining halls are lemon parmesan flounder and black bean mussels, he said.

To be certified by the MSC, a dining program must be able to prove that the seafood comes from an MSC certified supplier and is stored apart from non-MSC certified seafood. MSC’s “Chain of Custody” certificate is good for three years, subject to annual audits.

Weekly World News

"We want to promote fishing in Berkeley County and attract tourists to our beautiful lakes and rivers," said special projects coordinator Donna Smith. ...

Basic Essentials Knots for the Outdoors, 3rd

Trilene (Fishing) Knot Berkeley researchers recommend this knot for tying lures in slippery monofilament line. The trilene knot is a cross between an anchor ...

The New international encyclopædia

It also has important fishing interests. Berkeley, named after Bishop Berkeley, was settled in 1868 and was incorporated as a town in 1878. ...

Forest and stream

"An hour or so later we were fishing near each other a hundred yards further ... Berkeley, Cal., Nov. 9. — Editor Forest and Stream: The resignation of FW ...

Material Dreams, Southern California Through the 1920s

The Avalon home perfectly served Grey's passion for deep-sea fishing. As Berkeley professor TK Whipple was noting as early as the 1920s, Zane Grey was the ...