Fisheries Committee on April 10th, 2019

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

We may have lost sound there.

I'll move on to my next question. As we're all aware, there were closures last year to protect the right whale migration. These closures were put in place despite the fact that none of the entanglements seemed to involve lobster gear previously. We're all glad to know that there were no known right whale fatalities last year.

What were your experiences as a fisherman, or your stakeholders' experiences, as organizations, in dealing with those closures?

[Melanie Giffin]

From the P.E.I. perspective, there wasn't a whole lot of area that overlapped, but we did discuss a lot with the Maritime Fishermen's Union, because they did have areas that overlapped with the closures that were directly to the coastline. We worked really closely with DFO this past year, to have blatant discussions about what worked and what didn't work—things that we could see improve this year. In all honesty, I think a lot of our recommendations came forward, which was great.

We now have the difference with the 20-fathom line and the 10-fathom line, because the majority of our inshore lobster fishers are within that 20-fathom line. Normally, the whales are never within that line, so it keeps a natural separation there.

We have precautions in place, in case the whales do come within that 20-fathom line. That was one of the biggest things we saw, in terms of the changes this year. We're suspecting some changes, and possibly some ships...with the calves that were born this year. We saw no calves in the gulf last year, but it's expectations we're waiting to hear about. We need to learn about the calves' behaviour in the gulf. Our experience is that we didn't have a whole lot of direct overlap. This year, we have avoided any possibility of direct overlap, which is great, from the P.E.I. perspective.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Okay.

Someone was speaking earlier about the movement into deeper water, 50-fathom depths, and so on. I don't recall who that was, but how would that impact those fisheries in that deeper water, where you're not exempt from those closures?

[Bernie Berry]

Actually, in LFA 34, we were very lucky last year. There were two closures very close to our fishing area. One was in the Roseway Basin. It happened on the last day of our season, but if it had happened two weeks earlier, we would have had a closure in a small section in our southeast corner. The same thing happened on our northern border. Grand Manan had a closure mid-June, which is two weeks after our season closed down. The size of that closure meant it would have come into LFA 34.

It could have had an impact, but we've tested a ropeless gear technology in different designs, and stuff like that. We have hydrophones out now, in specific areas, trying to garner information. The key, from our perspective, is that industry has to be proactive instead of reactive. You have to try to get out ahead of some of this. Sometimes you're caught off guard, but we have been trying to work with DFO.

All of this is new for everybody, I think. We have to do things like this, especially when it comes to the whales, because of the negative impact it could have on markets. Also, there is the MMPA that the Americans are pushing. We have to meet certain requirements there, so we are beholden, as an industry, to be very proactive and, as I just mentioned, to simply get out ahead, work with science Technical difficulty—Editor the best we can and make sure our fishermen are not negatively impacted here.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Gord Johns]

Mr. Finnigan, you have five minutes.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Mr. Le Bris, when you were here last week, we discussed an issue that hasn't come up yet today, water acidification. It's not the same phenomenon we saw in the 1970s, with acid rain. From what you've said, I gather that what we're seeing now is the result of climate change. Carbon dioxide combines with the water, acidifying it and creating a less than favourable environment for lobster.

Would you mind elaborating on that a bit further?

[Dr. Arnault Le Bris]

Not at all. Thank you for the question.

Carbon dioxide has two effects. First, it creates a greenhouse gas effect, which warms the atmosphere and the oceans. As far the second is concerned, it's important to understand that the vast majority of carbon dioxide, 70% to 75%, is absorbed by the oceans. When carbon dioxide mixes with sea water, it creates an ion of acid, or H+, in this case, calcium carbonate, which acidifies the oceans.

In the scientific community, we consider ocean acidification a climate change time bomb for marine ecosystems. We don't yet fully understand the impact of acidification, but we are starting to see a lot more studies emerge. The thinking is that, in 50 or 100 years, acidification could affect all ocean ecosystems everywhere. Some areas are likely to be more affected by acidification, especially those like ours, where it's colder.

Studies are beginning to show the potential impact of decreasing water pH, in other words, increasing acidity, on lobster. It is thought that the impact on adults will be fairly mild and short-lived, but that larvae will be more affected. As of now, we don't have a grasp on what those effects are. We think phytoplankton and zooplankton will be most affected, and because they form the basis of the ocean's food supply, the rest of the food chain could be impacted. This discussion began just 10 or 20 years ago, so we are only beginning to understand the phenomenon. In the long term—over the next 30, 40 or 50 years—though, it will really become a central issue.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Le Bris.

Mr. Pershing, you've been monitoring the water temperature, and we know that the lobster habitat has shifted for different reasons. Some people would say that this is just a normal cycle over time. Do you have data that would go back and show that this is not a normal cycle? Perhaps it is. Could you comment on that?

[Dr. Andrew Pershing]

There are natural cycles that have been going on forever in the world. What we're doing now, with our experiment of putting a lot of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, is introducing trends on top of those cycles. The warming that we've experienced recently in the northwest Atlantic has signals of both. We are seeing both a trend and the apex of a warm cycle on top of that trend. When the two add together, you get really rapid warming, which is what we've experienced.

The challenge going forward is that it's certainly possible that we might cool down a little bit as we go into, perhaps, a cooler phase of one of the major cycles in the North Atlantic, but that cool period will not be as cool as the cool periods in the past. Right now it looks like the climate projections, especially the newer, higher resolution climate projections, are suggesting warming rates very similar to what we've experienced over the last 15 to 30 years, which is that this region will continue to warm at about four times the global average rate.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Okay, thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Gord Johns]

Does anyone have any objections to my asking questions from the chair? Great.

I'm going to go back to the witnesses in P.E.I., in Charlottetown. I started by asking you about what your top recommendations are for the study. I'm sorry, I interrupted to ask Mr. Fitzpatrick a question, but did you have anything you wanted to add from there?

[Melanie Giffin]

I do, actually. We have a lot of concerns on P.E.I. about the carrying capacity of the species. Basically, there's a lot of talk about productivity and where things are right now in terms of our biomass. Right now our biomass is through the roof, which is great; this is not a complaint. The concern that we have is that there's also a commercial fishery for rock crab, and one of the main diets of lobster outside of the fishing season is rock crab. Our question is whether there is enough in terms of habitat and natural diet for the lobsters to sustain the population that we have out there.

It's one of the questions that we've been taking to DFO Moncton. P.E.I is in a bit of a different scenario from, say, Newfoundland and southwest Nova Scotia in the sense that we're more of a self-contained unit within the gulf. Our larvae stay within there; they drift around, of course, with the currents. We have a really close collaboration with DFO. We did put forward—and DFO is on board—this research in trying to understand the carrying capacity and making sure that there are enough resources available for the lobster themselves in our area. Unfortunately, when we requested funding through DFO in collaboration on a rock crab study to make sure there was enough nutrition out there for them, it was denied.

It was really disheartening to P.E.I. to know that something that seems to be so important to us—ensuring that our lobster population is sustainable—was denied funding. That would be another main source of research we would like to do, ensuring there's enough food out there for such a large population.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Gord Johns]

With your concerns around the interdependent species and the whole-of-ecosystem approach, are there other species that are.... Obviously there's the rock crab and then what they're feeding on that also should be looked at. Is there anything that you've identified there, and do you feel that's really where the big gap is, that holistic approach?

[Melanie Giffin]

Yes, I feel that looking at the whole ecosystem is definitely a key to understanding everything. We mentioned earlier not just understanding the temperature changes, pH changes, salinity changes and things that are shifting in the actual water chemistry, but how those are shifting as a result of climate change and industrial issues within the Northumberland Strait as well. It is a full ecosystem approach.

When talking about rock crab, it is a question of whether there's enough food for the rock crab and what's happening with those. Within our lobster larval collectors that we do, we collect rock crab as well and DFO analyzes what is going on with the young rock crab and the trends of their population.

We have some information, and it's enough information to be concerned and to want to do some more work.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Gord Johns]

Thank you.

Does anyone have any objections? Mr. Arnold has a quick question.

Go ahead, Mr. Arnold.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

One thing that I've been very concerned about across the country is aquatic invasive species. Particularly in your neck of the woods, I think green crab may perhaps be the biggest risk. Does anybody have any experience or information on that and how it's impacting the ecosystem?

[Melanie Giffin]

We've had a little bit of information on P.E.I. We see fluctuations in the green crab annually, and it usually comes down to winter temperatures and what we're seeing the following year, based on the temperatures over the winter and if there's a large fluctuation or a small one. In terms of numbers, I'm not sure if Bobby would have a better idea, being on the water and seeing it.

[Bobby Jenkins]

We're not seeing as many now as we did in 2013-14, and we think that's on account of the weather in the 2015 winter. It was a really harsh winter, and we figure that some of the stock must have been killed off. It seemed to be a little bit more predominant last year than 2016-17, but we'll have to see what happens.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Gord Johns]

Thank you.

We all want to extend our appreciation for your taking time out of your day to give us your important feedback and testimony. We'll definitely be taking that back as we put forward recommendations to the report.

For those who are in the room, we're going to be going in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]