Brief history of the groundfishing industry of New England
Part 1
Topics:
Groundfishing, the catching of fishes that swim in close proximity
to the bottom, was the first colonial industry in America. During
the past 400 years, changes in the methods, people and productivity
of groundfishing have paralleled the technological, ethnographic
and environmental conditions ashore. Now we are faced with
unprecedented low stocks of groundfish species, and an industry
shrinking in regional importance, struggling to support historical
fishing communities such as Gloucester and New Bedford,
Massachusetts. This review is intended to look back to the
beginnings of the 20th century, and to follow the development of
groundfishing to the current times. Many of the problems currently
faced by the industry were foreseen as early as the first decade of
the new century. Increasingly efficient fishing methods, competition between
fleet sectors employing various gears, inability to act in harmony
with international partners, and the failure to heed scientific
advice sound like current themes, but in fact have been echoed
repeatedly since the turn of the century. The diversity and
productivity of New England fisheries was once unequalled. A
continuing trend over the past century has been the overexploitation and
eventual collapse of species after species. Atlantic halibut,
ocean perch, Haddock and Yellowtail Flounder once fed millions of
Americans.
Now even the venerable Atlantic Cod, resilient to years
of overfishing, could join the ranks of species written-off
as commercially extinct.
How we came to the current situation, and missed opportunities to
put the fishery on a sustainable basis form the thesis of this
review. Understanding the historical, scientific and human
dimensions that influenced the fish, fishermen and management
decisions is a necessary step to begin harmonizing the fishery
with the ecosystem.
The fishing industry of New England has, for over 400 years, been
identified both economically and culturally with groundfishing. A
mixture of bottom-dwelling fishes including cod, haddock,
redfish and
flounders constitute the groundfish resource. Once, great
fleets of vessels sailed from Gloucester and Boston to the eastern-
most reaches of North America -- the Grand Banks of Newfoundland.
Catches of salt cod supported nearly 400 schooners in each of these
ports, and a multitude of shore-side businesses including salt
mining, ice harvesting in fresh-water ponds, and a boat building
industry that made the shipyards on the Essex River among the
busiest and best known in the world.
The industrial revolution caught up with the fishing industry
around the turn of the century. The introduction of the steam-
powered trawler from England heralded a sea change in how
groundfish were caught, and rapidly replaced the schooner fleets.
More over, the community and social dynamics of fishermen was
changed forever. Even then there was concern that the new
technology was quite powerful, and could threaten the productivity
of the stocks. Scientific investigations of the time warned that
the new technology should be applied judiciously - but had little effect on
fishing.
By 1930 there were clear signs that the fleet had grown too efficient
in relation to the capacity of the stocks to sustain growth in
landings. A new round of scientific investigation, begun in 1930
at Harvard University, showed just how powerful the new
technology was. In 1930 the fishery landed 37 million haddock at
Boston, with another 70-90 million baby haddock discarded dead at
sea! The very small mesh size used in the nets was judged the
culprit. Yet not until 1953 did the first regulations specifying the minimum mesh size for
trawl nets come into force.
Prior to WW II the fleet was large in size, but profitability was
low. Consumption of fish in America had nose-dived as the
daughters and sons of immigrants abandoned old-world traditions of
fish consumption. The war years were again prosperous for the
industry as fish was canned for the GIs, and protein demands and
rationing necessitated a return to fish consumption. The fleet was
reduced at this time, as many of the largest trawlers were
requisitioned for war duty as mine sweepers. The return of these
vessels from war, along with reduced demand resulted again in hard
times in the industry. Development of new markets such as selling
ocean perch in the midwest as a substitute for Great Lakes yellow
perch sustained the offshore fleet. Many government subsidy
programs, that would come back to haunt the industry decades later,
were launched after the war.
The beginning of the 1960s saw the development of the gravest
threat yet to the sustainability of the fishery. Ocean-going
fish factories, comprising the distant water fleets 'discovered'
haddock, hake and herring resources off Georges Bank. Soon fleets
from the USSR were joined by those from East Germany, Poland,
Spain, Japan and others. Not until the early 1970s could an
international commission settle on fishing restrictions, too late
to avoid the virtual collapse of most groundfish stocks.
The clamor for the U.S. to assert control over waters out to 200
miles was great. Congress enacted the Magnuson Act of 1976, taking
control of the exclusive economic zone (EEZ), and setting up a
system of regulation of the domestic industry. Fueled by great
expectations and aided by subsidy programs in place since the
1950s, the U.S. began to build new, modern fishing boats.
The fleet, once dominated by wooden side-trawlers, was replaced
quickly with steel stern-trawlers, miniature versions of
the factory trawlers used by the distant water fleets. Quota-based
regulations, a hold-over from the last days of international
restrictions, seemed to be in the way of the revitalized
U.S. groundfish fleet. Catch quotas -- a method of directly
controlling the percentage of the stock harvested each year -- were
discontinued in favor of what proved to be ineffective measures to control the size of
meshes in the nets, and the minimum length of fish landed.
The high water mark for the industry in the post-200 mile limit era
occurred in the early 1980s, when strong year classes of cod and
haddock, spawned in 1975 and 1978, became harvestable size. These
resources were scooped up, this time by those who had seen same damage
caused by the distant water fleets.
Resources have since declined to levels lower than those recorded during the
era of the DWFs. Now the clamor for regulation comes not just from the
fishermen, but from environmental groups, the general public and
elected officials. Years of supporting industry growth have left the federal government
vulnerable to charges that its policies helped collapse the fish
stocks, and harmed the environment. Congress has begun to develop
programs to help failing fishing communities through vessel buy-outs,
job retraining, and subsidized health insurance for fishing families.
The history of 20th century groundfishing in New England can be
divided into six time periods, based on a combination of factors including
technological development, changes in species abundance,
development of markets for new species, or improved marketing of
existing fishes, and major changes in the regulatory regime. Some
of these factors span more than one time period (e.g. shift from
cod to haddock as the primary target species), whereas others were
single events, so dominating the scene that they are clearly
demarcate new eras (e.g. passage of the Magnuson 200-mile limit law
in 1976). The intent of these chapters is to describe and
illustrate the periods from three separate perspectives: the
industry (e.g. people and commerce), the fishes (biology), and
management institutions (political and institutional).
"...there was no sound except the splash of the sinkers overside,
the flapping of the cod, and the whack of muckles as the men
stunned them. It was wonderful fishing".
Captains Courageous
Rudyard Kipling
Prior to the introduction of steam trawling in 1906, groundfish
were caught exclusively with baited lines, fished from schooners
and their dories. The novel 'Captains Courageous' by Rudyard
Kipling, published in 1897, accurately describes the lives of the
'salt bankers', as they sailed from Gloucester, Massachusetts to
the Grand Banks of Newfoundland in search of cod. Owing to the
length of their journeys, and the lack of refrigeration and
freezing, most of the cod catch was salted at sea. The salt cod
fishery was in every respect an industry. Salt was imported from
as far away as Sicily and England. The fish were marketed world-
wide, and particularly in countries such as Surinam, who had
earlier participated in the 'triangle trade' of slaves-rum-salt
fish. The change from schooners to trawling was the death-knell
for the traditional ways. At the time there was considerable
debate as to the social and environmental consequences in the shift
of technology. Ultimately, there were no explicit management
decisions made, and the fleet types engaged in fierce competition.
This chapter introduces the end of the schooner era, the switch to
trawling by steam-powered vessels, and the consequences of the
industrial revolution, both ashore and at sea, to the fishery and
the fish.
History of the groundfishing industry of New England Part 2
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