NMFS’ action follows a framework adjustment approved by the
New England Fishery Management Council, which seeks to affect multiple fishery
management plans, including those regulating New England groundfish (Northeast
Multispecies), Atlantic sea scallops, monkfish, the Northeast skate complex,
and Atlantic herring. The referenced
area
“would be within and around wind lease areas in Southern New
England, including Cox Ledge, to focus conservation recommendations on cod
spawning habitats and complex benthic habitats that are known to serve
important habitat functions to Council-managed fishery species.”
There is little question that Cox’s Ledge is important cod
habitat. For many years, it also
supported an important recreational fishery for cod, one that I became very
familiar with when I was young. I first
fished there in May 1968, when I was still in my last year of grade school, and
returned many times over the next dozen years until, around 1980, the fishery
began to wane.
But that importance raises a question about NMFS’ recent
announcement: Why did the agency—and more
to the point, the New England Council—wait so long?
Federal
regulations provide that
“[Fishery management plans] should identify specific types of
areas of habitat within [essential fish habitat] as habitat areas of particular
concern based on one or more of the following considerations:
(i)
The importance of the ecological function
provided by the habitat.
(ii)
The extent to which the habitat is sensitive to
human-induced environmental degradation.
(iii)
Whether, and to what extent, development
activities are, or will be, stressing the habitat type.
(iv)
The rarity of the habitat type.”
The NMFS notice states that
“if adopted, the [habitat area of particular concern] is
based on all four of those attributes.”
The notice also states that
“An area’s status as [a habitat area of particular concern]
should lead to special attention regarding potential adverse effects on
habitats within the areas of particular concern from various activities (e.g.,
fishing, offshore wind energy).”
As noted earlier, Cox’s Ledge has always been an important area
for cod fishermen. Not only recreational
fishermen, but also commercial harvesters, have long fished the spot. But up until recently, when wind energy
leases were granted and wind farm development appeared imminent, the New
England Council seemed to have little concern about human impacts on the region’s
fish habitat.
That was evident in the
years around 2010, when fishermen were surprised by an unexpected resurgence of
cod in the Cox’s Ledge area. As also
noted in NMFS’ proposed rule, those cod were winter spawners, which reproduced between
the months of December and April.
Although managed as part of the Georges Bank cod stock, genetic analysis
has shown such Cox’s Ledge spawners to be a part of a “Southern Complex” of
fish that are more closely connected to cod in the Gulf of Maine, and which
form a distinguishable subpopulation of cod.
Such
subpopulation can be described as a
“semi-independent, self-reproducing [group] if individuals
within a larger population that undergo[es] some measurable, but limited,
exchange of individuals with other areas within a population,”
but
might also constitute a finer-scale spawning component, which are
“segments of a population that do not differ in genetics or
growth, but occupy discrete spawning areas interannually.”
Some
research has suggested that
“Once a spawning site has lost its resident population, it
may remain barren even when spawning cod are present on neighboring grounds.”
That being the case, the
New England Council’s decision to declare the Cox’s Ledge area a habitat area
of special concern, not only for cod, but also for Atlantic herring, Atlantic
sea scallops, little skate, monkfish, ocean pout, red hake, winter flounder,
and winter skate makes perfect sense.
Such factors would have justified protecting the area's habitat many years ago.
After all, the Cox’s Ledge area was always important to the
local cod subpopulation, which had been spawning there for a very long
time. As noted earlier, cod abundance on
Cox’s Ledge increased sharply around 2010, after having fallen to very low
levels for a couple of decades. In
response to that brief resurgence, both recreational and commercial fishing
vessels concentrated on the new abundance of fish; while the recreational boats
didn’t cause habitat damage, the commercial trawlers undoubtedly did.
“The direct effects of trawling and dredging include loss of
erect and sessile epifauna, smoothing of sedimentary bottoms and reduction of
bottom roughness, and removal of taxa that produce structure. Trawl gear can crush, bury, or expose marine
flora and fauna and reduce structural diversity…
“Repeated trawling and dredging can result in discernible changes
in benthic communities. Many studies
report that repeated trawling and dredging causes a shift from communities
dominated by species with relatively large adult body size toward dominance by
high abundance of small bodied organisms.
Intensively fished areas are likely to remain permanently altered,
inhabited by fauna that readapted to frequent physical disturbance… [citations omitted]”
Yet, despite such settled science, the New England Council,
which is peopled largely by representatives of the commercial fishing industry,
made little or no effort to declare the Cox’s Ledge area a habitat area of
particular concern in order to recognize its possible vulnerability to commercial fishing gear. Such action
was only taken when commercial development for wind power loomed.
In fact, the area being considered for designation is
defined in the proposed rule as “within and around wind lease areas in Southern
New England, including Cox Ledge,” suggesting that wind power development was
the primary threat to the cod and other relevant species.
That doesn’t mean that wind development isn’t a potential
threat to the region’s cod. The
report from the 2022 National Saltwater Recreational Fishing Summit includes a
summary of a presentation made by Capt. Rick Bellavance, a Rhode Island charter
boat operator, who noted that when the five-turbine Block Island Wind Farm was
developed,
“During the construction period, opportunities for
recreational fishing were limited by an exclusion zone around the operation,
the underwater noise produced by driving the pilings, and a longer schedule
than planned…
“After construction…anglers felt that there are fewer cod
present now than before the turbines were constructed,”
although the abundance of other species, including black sea
bass, striped bass, bluefish, and dogfish, appear to have increased in the
vicinity of the turbines.
It’s not clear whether anglers’ perception in a decline in
cod abundance reflects reality, and even if it does, such decline may have been
caused by factors other than the turbines’ construction. However, there is no question that the noise
associated with such construction is substantial, and could conceivably negatively
impact the cod’s spawn; it is also at least possible that the intense human
activity associated with such construction could disrupt spawning activity.
At the same time, it is very clear that commercial fishermen
don’t like wind farms, and fear that wind development might hurt cod fishermen
as much or more than they impact the cod themselves. A 2021 article
quotes a Montauk, New York trawler captain, whose fishing area includes the
region around Cox’s Ledge, as saying,
“There’s so many things going against you as a commercial
fisherman in the United States. And now
these wind farms, it’s almost like that’s the final nail in the coffin.”
While such fishermen do fear that turbine construction could
impact fish stocks, their greater concern is that, although fishing will technically
be permitted within the wind development areas, the turbines will be spaced to
closely together to allow the use of trawl gear.
With such concerns, it’s hardly surprising that it took wind
farm development to spur the New England Council into considering habitat
impacts around Cox’s Ledge, while potential damage from trawls evoked little
concern.
With all things considered, there are good reasons to hope
that NMFS’ proposed rule to find the Cox’s Ledge region a habitat area of
special concern will ultimately meet with approval.
But there are also reasons to hope that the regional fishery
management councils won’t focus merely on wind farms, but will also consider
the impacts of fishing gear, including but not limited to trawls, on the health
of marine habitat.
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