Fisheries Committee on April 1st, 2009

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Good question!

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

I thought I knew the answer, and I was right.

Now, Norma, I think you said in your comments that you didn't agree with DFO's conservation measures, but I don't know if you expanded on that.

Do you mean what Nellie does, that there are just so many of these measures coming forward, or is there anything in particular you're referring to?

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

I want to do this.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

You can both respond.

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

We have a little bit of time here.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Sure.

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

What we disagree with, number one, is that they come to the table and say, this is what you're going to do. They came up with a four-year plan to double egg production. Hello! That isn't anything fishermen believed in at all, but it was Ottawa-driven down, right?

We actually did go up the first time they told us to. The next time the fishermen said, no, we're not doing anything this year; we have four years to do it and we'll do something double next year. DFO said, no, you're going up, and we said no. So we had a stalemate, right? That's when it was decided that we would look at the tool box, as there might be something there that we would prefer.

They were going to try to make us go over the American measure, which is ridiculous, because this is your Maine lobster. The best lobster is the American measure lobster, right, and they were going to make us go over it. So we went and hatched the plan, as she said, so the v-notch came up and the fishermen supported it.

What we mean by saying this is that we don't agree on stuff where they say, this is right for your community or this is what your fishermen have to do.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

But you agree with, or do you agree with, the goal of doubling egg production, for example?

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

We don't agree with their model and how they think they know what's on the bottom. Fishermen do not think the scientists know what's on the bottom, because they say to me, well, how can they double it if they don't know what's there already? I understand it's a mathematical model, or whatever, but that doesn't mean anything to fishermen. So we didn't buy into that.

What fishermen do believe in is putting more eggs on the bottom. That makes sense to a fisherman. The more females you put back, the larger females there are, the more eggs, the more they're going to survive. You put a brooding stock, I call it, out there, and let them put more eggs on the bottom. That makes sense to fishermen.

So I think we're probably going to accomplish what DFO asked us to do, but in our own way.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Do you mean through v-notching?

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

Yes, through v-notching.

And what she didn't mention is that this is verified. We get an independent body. The fishermen and scientists may be there, but this is very important compared with the Maine fishery, or even, probably, Newfoundland or what Ashton was talking about. Our lobsters are verified by an independent body; they're weighed, and they make sure they're healthy, and they're put back.

She also mentioned the mutilated lobsters. If this flipper's mutilated in any way, shape or form, you do not bring that in, which is very different from the other v-notch program. You can bring them in, in a year or two. We've had lobsters that were tagged in 2001. Fishermen told me again this year at our meeting that they're still not bringing them in. They still are mutilated.

It might only be a small amount of lobsters—110 pounds—but we're getting the best bang out of putting those back.

[Norma Richardson]

That's 110 pounds per fisherman.

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

Yes, per fisherman.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Norma, did you want to respond to any of that as well?

[Norma Richardson]

No, that's fine.

We're not against conservation. Conservation is our main thing, but it's a matter of doing what makes sense to the fishermen, something they can buy into, something that's done in their words and their way, and not something that comes from on high down to their level.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

No, I see that point.

I guess what troubles me somewhat, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that I don't get a sense that anybody, whether it be the fishermen or the fisheries managers, really have a sense of what the biomass is out there. We know what we catch and we know what we maybe put back—if we happen to catch them—and so on, but do we know enough of what the biomass is. If we don't know that, we really don't know what the exploitation rate is. Am I wrong on that?

[Norma Richardson]

We don't know that.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Do you have any advice for us on—

[Norma Richardson]

Money. We need money.

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

We need more sea sampling.

[Norma Richardson]

We need more money for science.

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

We had a discussion at our meeting, actually, and there was no sea sampling because DFO does not have the money. Apparently, the sea sampling is very important for them to figure out what's out in the ocean. So we need funding for that. That would help.

Now, that's just one thing I heard. You should actually go to the scientists and say, listen, what do you need to do that you're unable to do now to find out what the biomass is? Those are the experts. Those are the people you should be talking to.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

I think you're right there. I think our fear is that we don't want to catch the last lobster. When they're referring to the cod problem, somebody said we kept harvesting apples, but we were cutting down the apple trees and finally we cut down the last one. We do want to be sure that we don't do that.

One of the things that the FRCC has recommended in their two reports is that we need to reduce the exploitation rate and reduce the fishing effort. I don't know what you think about that. Do you think there's overcapacity in 32 and 31B, or do you think it's about right?

[Nellie Baker Stevens]

No, it's actually very good. Our fishermen actually keep track. They have logs that they fill out for the association to track what's going on with the v-notch lobster and the berried, etc. I do a report every year on that.

It's impressive. You should see my charts, going like this for berried lobsters. It's just going like this. It's just unbelievable. We never thought we'd see it in our lifetime. I wish my father were alive to actually see it, because what we're seeing now is huge.

They're doing a study down in Canso now, and they're finding that the smaller lobsters are becoming mature earlier, at a smaller size. So I'm actually going to do a little project myself this year and get my husband to measure these small ones. I was talking to the scientists yesterday. If it's 71 millimetres—we're allowed 82 millimetres or something now—then it actually got its eggs one time more than what they've been giving us credit for. That's something new.

I must say that in our area we're doing very well, better than we ever thought we would, definitely in our lifetime or in my dad's lifetime. We have only 222 fishermen in those two areas, and it's a big area. It's not as big as their area, of course.

We feel we're managing our area in a responsible way, in a sustainable way, which we need to prove when we go to the MSC. I would advise you to focus your efforts towards 34.