By Sheila Dassatt
One of the things that I enjoy the most with my work, (it isn’t really work), is to be able to communicate with the fishermen and their families. As you know, I have been with the Downeast Lobstermen’s Association for over twenty-one years now and it has been very challenging and rewarding at the same time. Most of us are more than one generation and it is in our fishing heritage. This is what we want to communicate about and do our best to maintain our fishing industry.
I will admit, we all know that this is becoming an electronic world and most everything is done through some sort of cyberspace. Well, depending on the generation that you are in and even geographical location, this doesn’t come naturally to all of us. We are used to doing things the “hard way” and putting some physical effort into it as well. Speaking for our Downeast Sector, most of us still want to pay our bills with a check or cash. We are highly uncomfortable with the “automatic withdrawal.” We do not want anyone “messing” with our bank accounts!
So when it comes to fishing, lobstering has become a lot more complicated than it used to be. When I go to the dock, whether I’m on the boat that day or just seeing the boat off, I cherish the fact that I hear how a lot of them feel about things. This is what leads me to my articles and hope that I can get the word out. Times have changed significantly since Covid hit. Folks do not socialize like they used to and it is very difficult to get much of a crowd to meetings. Zoom has come into play, which can be good for folks that live on the islands and can’t get to a meeting in person. The price of fuel can make a big difference too if the meeting is in Augusta and you live way down on the coast. This is especially difficult if you live way Downeast.
I know quite a few of the older generation that simply decided to retire and sell out of their fishing business simply because they didn’t want to do all of the electronic reporting of their catch.
This is sad. Once they sell out and decide to retire, their boat sits in their dooryard with a For Sale sign on it for a long time. You see, it’s becoming and heading toward a big boat fishery. Most of the boats that are being retired are becoming “too small” for what they want to do now for lobstering. Even the younger generation including the student license fishermen are starting to use boats in the 28’to 32’ range. They are wanting to move up from the skiffs or smaller 19’ boats to the bigger boats in the name of safety for them. By the time they have finished their apprenticeship, they are looking to go into bigger boats. When my Dad and Grandfather were lobstering, a 32 foot boat was considered a fairly big, standard size boat. Speaking with a lot of our inshore fishermen, this is a big concern for our preservation. My Dad always told me, and a lot of other fishermen as well, “you see, theirs only so many lobsters in the ocean.” Once we catch most of the legal gauge lobsters, the only ones left are the small ones, or protected ones, so to speak. They will not be legal for a few more years yet and we hope that they don’t become food for the seals and predator fish that eat them for lunch.
So the bigger the boat, the bigger the payment is apt to be, which sometimes can be as much as $15,000 a month. Do the math…..how many lobsters do you need to catch to make that payment? This is not to mention the expense of bait, fuel, insurance and sternman payments before you receive your net profit. So once again, how many lobsters do you have to catch to meet this demand? Also, if you count the amount of boats out there that are in this category, it can really “rock your boat.” These are some of the major concerns that come across the dock and I don’t blame them. It is a matter of preservation not just for the lobster stock but for the fishermen and their families too. So how do we work together with this scenario? This is a good question and I am open for folks sending in suggestions.
One suggestion that I have heard is that with all of this reporting that we have to do, all it does is keep us legal with the dealers and the DMR. I am aware that what we report really needs to compare with the report of the dealer to keep us all honest. If we really want to know what is out there for lobsters, we need to have a system that reports everything that is in the trap, shorts, babies, eggers, V-notch and oversize and there are systems that would record that. We just need to enforce and be willing to take the time to punch in (which most are touch screens now) what our catch really is in a day. There may be a trap full of lobsters and we’re able to keep only one out of the whole batch! This is not being recorded at this time and it should be. We really need to have the entire haul accountable so we can tell the health of the stock. We need to see the whole picture not just a zoomed in proportion of the resource.
We have a very healthy resource that with proper conservation measures it should remain sustainable for our future generations. How about working together to take charge of our own fishery and keep track of what is really out there?
Our next generation depends on the conservation that we, as fishermen can do to preserve ourselves, not just the lobsters. We all matter, don’t we? With steps being taken to preserve our resource and everybody working together, a sustainable fishery can be ensured for the future. Our fishing communities, especially the small fishing communities depend on it. We do not want to see our communities go to the wayside and turned into summer playgrounds for people who really don’t contribute to our communities. Unfortunately it is hard to say this but our communities are being turned into communities for the rich. This clashes with the fishermen and families that rely on our commercial fishing industry to maintain a year round living.
I could go on and on about this, but at this point in time, I don’t want to see our islands become one big dog park, where all of the homes are bought up as air B&B’s and seasonal homes and all you see are these folks walking their dogs and using the island as Planet fitness. These are working communities and we are all working to survive and keep our fishery alive. This is the direction that it is heading and it is a big concern, really.
