Lobsterman Donn Page Lobsterman Donn Page is pictured here after rescuing his sinkable rope from falling through the murky depths to the ocean floor. Page has been fishing outside the three-mile zone for 35 years and has never seen a right whale. (Photo Lisa Kristoff)

The situation gives a whole new meaning to the phrase, `caught between a rock and a hard place.'

Maine's lobstermen have received word that the gear modifications specified in the National Marine Fisheries Service's (NMFS) New Whale Rules of the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) regarding ground lines will go into effect October 2008.

In 1997 the National Marine Fisheries Service was aided by the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Team (ALWTRT) in developing the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan (ALWTRP) to reduce the level of serious injury and mortality of three strategic stocks of large whales (North Atlantic right, humpback, and fin) in commercial gillnet and trap/pot fisheries.

The plan combines regulatory and non-regulatory programs including gear modifications, time-area closures, expanded disentanglement efforts, extensive outreach efforts in key areas, gear research, and an expanded right whale surveillance program to supplement the Mandatory Ship Reporting System.

The new ruling specifies the use of sinkable ground lines for lobster traps - no floating lines at the surface or below are acceptable - in another attempt to protect the near extinct right whales who can become entangled in the gear.

The use of sinkable rope in waters above a sandy ocean floor, such as in southern Maine, will not be as problematic as using the same rope in waters where a rocky bottom surface and strong tides and currents are the norm.

Unfortunately, 90 percent of Maine's 7,000 licensed lobstermen fish in waters above craggy, rocky bottoms - all of the time, or at some point during the season - and use of this rope in those areas could result in safety issues and extra gear loss for the lobstermen, including the Boothbay region.

Lobstermen up and down the coast who have used the sinkable rope report less durability due to a higher incidence of chafing, snagging and breaking as compared with the poly, floating rope.

Clive Farrin, a Boothbay Harbor lobsterman for 25-plus years, and president of the Downeast Lobstermen's Association, said manufacturers of this rope couldn't produce enough by the October deadline to make all of the state's licensed lobstermen compliant.

It is estimated that the typical lobstermen will need about 5,000 pounds of rope, and, if he or she fishes outside the exemption line, the amount increases significantly by millions of pounds of rope on an annual basis.

Exemption areas were set up in 2005 by the NMFS along the coast of Maine and in Long Island Sound. In the FEIS, it is described as a line that basically parallels the dividing line between state and federal waters three miles offshore, but comes closer to shore depending on location.

Farrin identified the exemption line for our area as running straight

through Bantam Ledge, just below Damariscove Island.

"Inside that line you don't have to use breakaway links (which give way at 600 pounds) or some weak link that separates the buoy from the buoy line and you can use float rope for the ground lines," said Farrin.

Lobstermen will still be able to use floating ground lines in the exemption area, three miles from shore, beyond the three-mile zone are federal waters that carry another set of regulations.

However, the three-mile zone will move two miles closer to the shoreline in October 2008, which will impact this region's lobstermen, most of whom fish within the three-mile line.

This will create a host of issues, particularly in our area since most of the lobstermen fish within the three-mile zone.

Shrinking back the line will create overcrowding of traps and an increase on lobsters within one small area that could easily create a "shortage" in that area.

The Maine Lobstermen's Association (MLA) must present scientific data that demonstrates there is no scientific data to support the location of the line and that it should, in fact, be pushed further out rather than in.

The MLA and the Department of Marine Resources (DMR) both support the use, and development, of "low profile" rope that neither sinks to the bottom nor floats too high along the water column.

DMR Commissioner George LaPointe said the low profile rope is a combination of polypropylene and polyethylene and is still in the testing phase.

"The combination of the two materials alters the rope's density in water," said LaPointe. "I believe that at a density greater than 1.030, rope will sink."

DMR has been conducting statewide testing on the low profile alternative with lobstermen since 2005.

Erin Summers, large whale biologist and marine research scientist at DMR, said approximately 100 coils (1,200 feet per coil) were distributed statewide in July of 2005.

In 2006, 63 lobstermen statewide tried out the low profile rope from July to December, and in 2007, 60 coils were distributed to lobstermen in the midcoast and downeast areas.

"In the 2006 study there was extensive reporting on data depth loggers measuring how high the rope would float at various depths," said Summers. "This year the lobstermen's findings on the low profile rope will have to get to DMR before the spring TRT meeting with the feds."

The Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation (GOMLF) organized efforts for regional collaborations on testing and created a logbook, database and developed survey protocols for all of the rope testing.

Other rope being experimented with and tested is known as buoyantly neutral rope.

Data on ropes was also acquired via a remote operated vehicle (ROV) in 2003 when DMR contracted with the MLA and the Ocean Eye Underwater Inspection Service of Warwick, R.I. to document groundlines between lobster traps.

The ROV filmed gear while in use, charted depth set, size and type of rope, length of groundlines between traps, where traps were set, etc.

As recorded in the February 2004 DMR Lobster Newsletter,

"Several modified gear sets were filmed throughout the project, including combinations of poly and sinking warp on the same section of groundline; adding a length of lead-line to the warp; wiring the warp with solder wire; and inlaying one strand of poly to replace it with a strand of sink rope. The best of these options will be tested by nine fishermen, in three different coastal locations, to determine which modifications lower the overall profile of the groundline, yet still allow gear to be fished in even the most rugged areas."

"We have taken steps to ensure we have enough rope out there to reach logical conclusions to present," said LaPointe.

LaPointe recently contacted Maine's only rope producer, Orion Rope in Winslow.

"Typically they would need a three-month lead time to meet demand; so, if we are not successful in delaying the implementation in 2008, we would have to be sure about how much rope was needed to place orders in June," LaPointe said.

"June would be a much better time because then lobstermen are switching out tags and putting out their traps. October, November and December are very busy months for lobstermen."

There has been much written about the increased expense to lobstermen that this rope conversion will cause. Estimates for the conversion are reported to be between $12,000 and $14,000 - figures LaPointe concurs with.

LaPointe said it was important to remember where some of the components of rope come from - oil.

"As oil prices go up, the price for the rope is sure to increase as well; to what degree is unknown," LaPointe said.

LaPointe quoted the rope manufacturer as saying that you can make sink rope as tough as steel, but it is how that rope travels through the hauler that determines how workable it is.

This brings up the safety concerns lobstermen have regarding this new rope.

A rock down, where lobster gear - pots and or rope - has caught can create safety issues for the lobstermen which could result in being struck by components of the hauler that could break free, and a variety of other scenarios.

"We want to work out a reasonable solution that takes fishermen's safety into consideration," said Mike Dasset, treasurer of the Downeast Lobster Association. "Rock downs can cause severe damage to boats - the wheel house for example. And, guys with 19 to 20 footers could be pulled overboard."

LaPointe acknowledges that fishing with sink rope will require "relearning fishing, to some extent."

In addition to safety issues, increased gear loss could become quite costly, not only to the lobstermen, but also to the ocean environment as the collection of "ghost traps" grows due to trap separation from lines in the rocky bottom areas.

According to Downeast Lobstermen's Association executive director Sheila Dasset, who works closely with Farrin, the average annual salary for a typical Maine lobsterman is $30,000.

"We usually estimate these expenses to be 10 percent off the top of a lobsterman's annual gross," said Dasset.

That percentage represents the net after gear replacement and maintenance, fuel costs, sternman's pay, insurance, tags, boat repair and maintenance and a bevy of other expenses are deducted.

So, how often are right whales observed anyway? In our area, Farrin and other lobstermen will tell you they have never seen a right whale while earning their livings.

According to data presented at the Maine Fishermen's Forum in March, between the years 1990 and 2005, almost all whale sightings along the coast of Maine were beyond the 50-fathom line.

It has been reported by the NMFS that there are approximately 300 to 350 right whales left in existence.

According to a variety of sources, including the NMFS, gear entanglement and collisions with vessels are the two major causes of death in the limited remaining population.

These mammals weigh in at up to 220,000 pounds and travel along the eastern seaboard.

Farrin says scientists have said that the right whales cannot reproduce fast enough to endure.

Researchers affiliated with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute have documented the following contributing factors in the declining numbers of right whale populations:

Over the last few decades, females are not only giving birth to fewer calves but the number of years between births has broadened.

According to the MLA, less than 10 right whales have been sighted in Maine in the last 35 years - until this week.

Dynamic Area Management programs (DAM) were implemented when a group of Right whales was sighted by a report from a "qualified individual."

On October 16, seven Northern right whales were sighted south of Portland setting gear modifications into effect in an area of 2,305 square nautical miles from October 27 through November 10.

Within a DAM, groundlines must be sinking or neutrally buoyant; fishermen are allowed to use two buoy lines per trawl (a section of five to six traps connected together); a weak link (the connection between the bottom of the buoy and the connecting line) with a maximum breaking strength of 1,500 pounds must be placed at all buoys.

Another DAM was established when 11 Right whales were sighted southeast of Portland. Gear modifications affected an area of 2,031 square nautical miles from November 8 through November 22. In this case, the maximum weak link breaking strength was no more than 600 pounds.

Locally, fishermen will tell you they have never seen a right whale.

Donn Page has been lobstering for 35 years - outside the three-mile zone and has never seen a right whale, nor has he ever seen a whale entangled in gear.

"It's ridiculous," Page said as he dropped down onto the dock to save some rope that had fallen out of his hands. "There goes my sinkable rope!"

"The right whales just aren't around here - I don't know what they are going to do, but it is going to be expensive.'

But the question is, are they just passing through en route to a feeding ground or are they feeding as they travel?

Whales follow their food and known feeding grounds of the right whale are Cape Cod Bay, the Great South Channel, the Bay of Fundy and the Banks south of Nova Scotia.

Right whales feed while swimming near the ocean floor by keeping their mouths open while the baleen does the filtering. It is while they are feeding that the whales become entangled in lobstering gear or gillnets.

Becoming entangled in the gear causes the mammals to sometimes endure long, painful deaths due to injuries.

The MLA has said that most of the gear entangling the mammals has not been from Maine (Maine has a red color code).

Another human related primary cause of death among right whales is collision with vessels. Recorded observations state that right whales appear not to be able to get out of the way of a large ship, or perhaps even hear it coming. Little is known about the hearing capabilities of the right whale.

The MLA also asserts that Canada and other industries with direct involvement in fishing should have to be as accountable for marine mammals.

Much more must be learned about the right whale - difficult because of the vast treks that take them from West African shores to the east coast of the United States.

So why do lobstermen keep fishing? Why don't they just stop and find another way to earn a living - perhaps one with less restrictions; one where they can set the prices for their product?

Farrin grins when I ask him just that. His response: "To be your own boss, to be out on the water is just the best thing in the world."

"You have to remember, too, that fishing is all a lot of these guys have ever known, they have been out there since they were 12 years old - they don't know how to do anything else," Farrin said. "And I don't think they want to."

Lobsterman Brandon Pinkham has been lobstering since he was "knee high to a grasshopper."

"I fish within the three-mile limit and have never seen a right whale," said Pinkham. "I think that float rope, if it's fished correctly, really does more good than harm."

Pinkham, like Farrin, says he loves being out on the water every day - a perk of the trade.

Where will it end? What other regulations are to come?

It would seem the sea is the limit when it comes to layering regulations on lobstermen up and down the coast.

For now, the lobstermen will adapt and cope with whatever legislation is handed down.

They will continue to head out on the water to earn their living in an industry where they have no say over the price for their own product.

Meanwhile, the MLA, DMR and other Maine lobstering groups will continue to work toward moving the date of compliance to June of 2010, but, as LaPointe said, "We know it is an uphill battle."

The MLA, DMR, the GOLMF, NMFS and ALWTRT all continue to try to find a solution that addresses the needs of the lobstermen and the whale population.

Let's hope such a solution can be found.