Karenia brevis, the Gulf of Mexico red tide organism, has been detected off the west coast of Florida. SECOORA partners Friday, August 1, released gliders to monitor and map the bloom. University of South Florida’s (USF) glider Bass is swimming along the West Florida Shelf, collecting and sending data back and was retrieved August 16, 2014. Bass was redeployed on September 8 starting at the western edge of the bloom on the surface and progressing WSW offshore out of the bloom area.
Fisheries To Cut Catch Of Endangered Bluefin Tuna
The multi-nation fisheries body that monitors most of the Pacific Ocean has recommended a substantial cut to the catch of juvenile bluefin tuna, a move conservationists say is only an initial step toward saving the dwindling species.
The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission announced the decision Thursday after meeting in Fukuoka, a city in western Japan. It said the catch should be cut to half of its average level in 2002-2004.
The commission, a grouping of more than 20 nations that monitors the western two-thirds of the Pacific, also endorsed catch limits for adult bluefin and set a 10-year target of rebuilding the population to 8 percent of its original size.
Japanese eat 80 percent of the world’s bluefin tuna, or “hon maguro,” a sushi mainstay, and demand elsewhere in the world has kept growing. At a ritual new year auction, the top price for the fish jumped to about $7,000 a kilogram in 2013 but was a more reasonable $300 per kilogram this year.
(Above: Pacific Bluefin Tuna – credit AP Photo/Chris Park)
Hemingway Grandsons Push for Marlin Conservation in Cuba
Ernest Hemingway’s grandsons sailed into the fishing village that inspired “The Old Man and the Sea” on Monday in a campaign to save game fish like the giant marlin that dragged the fictitious Santiago out to sea.
John and Patrick Hemingway arrived in Cojimar, on the eastern outskirts of Havana, to begin a weeklong visit to try to enlist Cuban marine scientists to join an effort to conserve billfish in the Straits of Florida.
Billfish include species of marlin, sailfish and spearfish that Hemingway was instrumental in cataloging 80 years ago, when he first took his fishing boat Pilar from Key West to Cuba.
“This we feel very strongly about because it ties in with my grandfather and his love for fishing and his love for Cuba,” said John Hemingway. “We think it’s vitally important that both countries work on this together. Both of them use this water.”
More than 100 townspeople, including cheering schoolchildren, greeted the Hemingways’ yacht as it sailed into Cojimar from the Hemingway Marina on Havana’s western edge.
(Above: John Hemingway (L) and Patrick Hemingway (R), grandsons of the U.S. author Ernest Hemingway, pay tribute to their grandfather at his statue in Cojimar village, Havana September 8, 2014. Credit: Reuters/Enrique De La Osa)
Thank you to ROFFS™ client Frank Goodhart fishing aboard the “Brenda Lou” out of the Ocean City Marlin Club last week for sending in the nice action shots of the beautiful white marlin. (See Photo Above.)
Be sure to visit the section titled “Catch Reports” located under the “Insights” tab on our ROFFS™ website that will feature current catch reports from areas such as the Northeastern U.S., North Carolina/Hatteras, South Carolina/Georgia, Florida, the Florida Keys, the Bahamas, and the Gulf of Mexico. We continue to post weekly updates in this category so please check back often.
Please click HERE to view last week’s catch reports…
Thank you to ROFFS™ client Frank Goodhart fishing aboard the “Brenda Lou” out of the Ocean City Marlin Club last week for sending another nice action shot of the beautiful white marlin. (See Photo Above.)
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