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Maine Gets NOAA Award To Study Lobster Gear’s Effect On Right Whales

Regina Asmutis-Silvia/WDC
North Atlantic right whale breaching in Cape Cod Bay, May 2009.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is awarding more than $700,000 to Maine’s Department of Marine Resources to study whether lobstermen’s gear poses a mortal threat to the endangered right whale.

There are about 450 right whales left on the planet, and some scientists say entanglement in lobster-trapping gear is making their extinction more likely. But many Maine lobstermen are skeptical and are pushing back against calls for new regulations on their ropes and buoys.

Now, DMR spokesman Jeff Nichols says the state will lead a NOAA-funded project to get better real-world data.

“So that regulators will be able to quantify where the gear is, how much is in the water, what the configuration of gear is and also how strong does it need to be in order to have the best conservation benefit for whales and also to allow the industry to continue to harvest safely,” he says.

Nichols says boats from Maine down to Connecticut will participate in the multiyear study.

A Columbia University graduate, Fred began his journalism career as a print reporter in Vermont, then came to Maine Public in 2001 as its political reporter, as well as serving as a host for a variety of Maine Public Radio and Maine Public Television programs. Fred later went on to become news director for New England Public Radio in Western Massachusetts and worked as a freelancer for National Public Radio and a number of regional public radio stations, including WBUR in Boston and NHPR in New Hampshire.