'Ghost' traps, long lost, keep catching lobsters

CBS4.com ^ | Nov 26, 2009 | CLARKE CANFIELD

[Daffynition]

In this Friday, Nov. 13, 2009 photo, a lost lobster trap sits on the ocean floor off Biddeford, Maine. Marine biologists say "ghost traps" lost by lobstermen continue to catch lobsters as they sit untended in the cold ocean waters off Maine's coast. This winter lobstermen will grapple up gear from selected spots in the first large-scale study of ghost traps. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

[gitmo]

Reminds me of temporary tax increases.

[Daffynition]

Yep. Makes ya wanna throw in the towel, just like the lobstermen.

[Nervous Tick]

>> Marine biologists say...

Any more, whenever I hear “this-or-that group of scientists say...” I reflexively reach behind and cover up my billfold. It’s just an instinctive reaction.

[KrisKrinkle]

“Lobstermen this winter will grapple up gear from selected spots...”

I wonder how much harm will come from blindly grappling up stuff from the ocean bottom?

[djf]

“It’s a complicated issue,” he said. “And it’s not going to go away.”

Ummm.... no it’s not. And yes, it will.

ALL modern traps used (at least for crab) have a good sized hole built into them. To use the traps, you have to tie some cotton twine back and forth across the hole so if a crab goes in the main door, he can’t get out.

After a few days underwater, the twine will decompose and the crabs/lobsters will simply swim out.

As far as old traps go - does the writer have even the tiniest clue HOW ABSOLUTELY CORROSIVE SEA WATER IS?
Don’t think so!

[reagan_fanatic]

"It would be very interesting if we could drain the ocean and look at what's down there," said Holly Bamford, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Marine Debris Program. "We might be surprised."

You'd probably see a lot of fish lying there, flopping around, gasping for water...

[cmsgop]

HAHAHAHAHA!!!

[Tainan]

...the sea was angry that day my friends; like an old man trying to send back soup in a deli...

[freedomlover]

When I was about 12, my grandfather drained a 10 acre so they could do some dam repair.

For a 12 year year old boy, it was the coolest thing. We scooped bass and catfish all day one day into 55 gallon drums and moved them to another lake downstream.

Way cool.

[djf]

These days, you’d get arrested for a stunt like that...

Sad, but true!
;-)

[thecodont]

Towel origami!

[SZonian]

So, if these abandoned traps will continue to “trap” water bugs, why do the lobstermen bait them when trapping them normally? Think of the money that could be saved.

I think this is about as relevant as AGW is right now with a hell of a lot of exagerration thrown in to make folks sympathetic to a BUG!

A delicious bug, but a bug nonetheless.

SZ

[Travis McGee]

I used to hate those things when I was snorkeling in the Keys and the Bahamas. Old lost traps use trapped/dead lobsters as “bait” for the next lobster and so on forever.

They pissed me off so much. I’d see 3 or 4 “lost” traps around one trap with a rope and a float. I’d end up opening the doors on the lost traps, and pinning them back, so critters could escape. A drop in the bucket to do a few like that, of course.

The solution is that traps MUST have doors that will fall off after a while, using latches and hinges that will corrode or rot and fall off. On working traps, these could be replaced every few months on the lobster boats.

But trap users don’t want the hassle. And they end up “competing” against many many “ghost” traps, forever.

[Travis McGee]

IN the KEys, lobster traps are generally wood, and rot after a while. I’d actually just pull planks off of lost traps, and turn them into “lobster havens” they could enter and leave.

But in the Bahamas, they used rubber-dipped galvy steel mesh. Those suckers would last for DECADES, killing generation after generation of lobsters.

[Travis McGee]

Yes, bugs are great eating, but it’s stupid to have 3 or 4 “lost” traps still killing the critters for every “working” trap in the area.

Nobody gains by killing the bugs for NOTHING.

[Travis McGee]

So, if these abandoned traps will continue to “trap” water bugs, why do the lobstermen bait them when trapping them normally? Think of the money that could be saved.

I have seen this personally with my own eyes many many times. Each trapped bug that starves becomes "bait" for the next bug and so on ad infinitum. In most "ghost" traps, I would see live bugs, dead bugs, and bug shells, telling the story.

[djf]

They might last for decades - but I tend to think that would be quite a stretch.

And remember. Lobster’s gotta have a good reason to go in there. And seeing his dead mother in law might not cut it!

(trap has no bait...)

[BlueDragon]

They mention Dungeness pots, while they (should?) damn well know that such gear, BY LAW is required to have a length of cotton twine (in place of stainless steel hand-woven mesh) that is designed to rot out. It can and does rot out, allowing the crabs and anything else, to escape.

Even before that happens, the bait gets old, and the gear quits fishing. Experience proves all of the above. These things have long been found to be the truth of the matter. What has changed???

This is in addition to permanently affixed escape rings of such a size that will allow under size crabs to escape --- which includes pretty much ALL the female crabs, as they are not allowed to be landed regardless. Since males of a certain number of years old get much bigger than the females of any age, it was simple (and good practice) to have such sized escape rings. It goes a very long way to keep the fishery safe from so-called "over fishing". The crabs will also sort themselves for size, on longer "soaks".

In fact, in regards to Dungeness, it's pretty well IMPOSSIBLE to "over fish" them with the legal gear in use today.

When I crabbed in the Bering years ago, there was LAW there too, that a certain minimum length of cotton twine be used in the seizings. I know this well enough, for I used to "web" king crab pots on land, in addition to working the deck during the season.

This "ghost fishing" in regards to Dungeness post is nothing much more than re-application of fisheries management (read enviro-fascist PRESERVATIONISTS) media release PR to help pave the way for ever more total closures, and help justify the draconian ones currently being implemented.

If they are having trouble on the East Coast with lobster pots, FIX IT OVER THERE, dammit!

They just announced yet another closure area off the Sonoma Coast, to take effect next year(?) right where I crabbed last winter. With Salmon fishing being totally closed State wide for two years, there wasn't much any other fishing there. Less than a dozen small vessels (6-7) worked the area crabbing...but they closed the area to ALL fishing, including the well thought out, well managed & relatively benign harvesting of male-only Dungeness crabs, once they reached a certain size.

Even if all the large males where to be caught (which won't happen), there would be PLENTY enough of the small ones left to do the breeding. It's been like this FOR YEARS!

What are these ninnys talking about? Fear, fear, fear...

[Ditter]

Let me start by saying that I know absolutely nothing about trapping lobsters. I am responding to your post. Maybe lobstermen bait their traps because more lobsters come in to eat the bait (as planned) and when they lose a trap it still has bait in it. Lobsters come in to the lost trap and die and then those lobsters are bait for other lobsters who then come in and die. Sort of a perpetually baited trap. Now if you tell me lobsters are not cannibals then my theory is worthless.