With lucrative species like clams and lobsters moving northward to find cooler waters, climate change could be the final blow for East Coast fishermen, says The Associated Press. The industry has already been battered by overfishing, pollution, regulations, and foreign competition, but climate change is another level of challenge altogether.
“A federal report from 2009 found that half of 36 fish stocks studied in the northwest Atlantic Ocean have been shifting northward over the past 40 years, and that the trend is likely to continue,” says AP. The Gulf of Maine, in particular, is warming faster than 99 percent of the world’s oceans.
Maine lobstermen are currently bringing in record catches, as the species migrates past the state in order to escape parasites and disease further south. But experts say Maine’s boom will eventually turn to bust—just as it did in southern New England, where the adult lobster count has dropped from 50 million in the late 1990s to 10 million in 2013. Cod populations have likewise plummeted. New England’s cod fleet has gone from 1,200 boats in the 1980s to just about 12 now, as the catch has fallen from 117 million pounds in 1980 to a little more than 5 million in 2014.
Scientists blame climate change, but the fishing community is divided about the cause. “The warming stuff is a lot of baloney,” Nicholas Crismale, a former lobsterman and president of the Connecticut Commercial Lobstermen’s Association told AP. “All that is is another scientist looking for a grant.” Crismale blames pesticide runoff for the falling lobster numbers, despite the fact that Connecticut researchers found no pesticides in lobsters in Long Island South, Connecticut’s lobster hub. Other fishermen say they’re are plenty of fish, but that the government-enforced quota system makes it nearly impossible to catch them.
While other factors may be at play, there’s no doubt that the waters are warmer. “A power plant on the sound recorded more than 75 days with an average water temperature above 68 degrees Fahrenheit in each of the years 2012, 2013, and 2014, according to a regulatory board’s report. Between 1976 and 2010, that happened only twice. Lobsters prefer temperatures in the high 50s and low 60s,” says AP.
In search of fish, some fishermen are moving their boats farther north or going farther out to sea, which means more time spent commuting and away from their families. Others have switched species, hunting for ocean quahogs instead of Atlantic surf clams, for instance. But many are pulling out of the sea altogether—a common fate across all U.S. fisheries. According to the Coast Guard, the U.S. fleet had more than 120,000 vessels in 1996. Today, it has just 75,000.