Fishing is temporarily halted at Grand Manan Island after the sighting of an endangered whale, to the dismay of fishermen

In 30 years of fishing for lobster in the Bay of Fundy between the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, Laurence Cook has been forced off the water by high winds, winter storms and icy conditions.

But until this summer, he had never had to stay home because of a whale.

Cook is among hundreds of fishermen in Grand Manan – an island of about 2,500 people – who have been temporarily banned from fishing afterthe sighting of a single North Atlantic right whale.

“This is unprecedented,” said Cook, chairman of the Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association’s lobster advisory board. “We’ve never seen this before, and hopefully we never see it again.”



The 15-day ban means the lobster fishery – the biggest employer on the island – lost out on what’s often the most lucrative final week of the spring harvesting season, Cook said.

But Canada’s federal government argues that the fate of the endangered whale species is too important to allow business as usual.



There are fewer than 450 North Atlantic right whales left in the world, and Canada is under international pressure to step up protection of the species, after 12 of the animals were killed last year in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence – many of them in collisions with ships and some after becoming tangled in fishing gear.

Scientists believe climate change is causing the species to shift its feeding grounds into the Gulf, putting it on a collision course with the shipping and fishing industries.

US lawmakers, meanwhile, say Canada isn’t doing enough to protect the whales and are threatening to block Canadian fishermen from selling lobster into the American market.

Quick guide Why are whales still endangered? Show Hide Population recovery will take decades Commercial whaling on a large scale took place for three centuries until banned in 1986. Most whale populations had been reduced to such low levels that it will take decades for many of them to recover. Additional problems of entanglement, pollution, climate change and ship strikes are also curtailing their recovery. Other threatened species include: the vaquita, a rare species of porpoise found in the gulf of California and rated the most endangered cetacean in the world – it is thought that only 30 or so remain in the wild; the blue whale, pictured, the largest animal ever known to have existed – between 10,000 and 25,000 remain; and the sei whale, the third-largest whale, with a population of around 80,000. Photograph: Franco Banfi/WaterFrame RM

The government argues conservation efforts and economic activity are not competing interests, and says protecting Canada’s marine life also protects the economic wellbeing of coastal communities like Grand Manan.



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“While these measures will have impacts on fishers and processors in the local community, the long-term economic risks of not adequately protecting North Atlantic right whales are greater,” said Vincent Hughes, a spokesman for the fisheries and oceans minister, Dominic LeBlanc.

But Moira Brown, the marine biologist who reported the whale sighting, said temporary fishing bans can do more harm than good. Conservationists like her need the help of fishermen to protect these highly endangered animals, and heavy-handed, reactionary measures make them less, not more, likely to cooperate, she said.

“This is not an easy issue,” said Brown, who is one of Canada’s top experts on right whales. “I don’t want to lose that long history of working together ... We want to see coexistence. We don’t want to lose these coastal communities. And we can’t keep harming the whales.”

Brown contends there’s “no evidence” the US has had any more success reducing fishing gear entanglements compared with Canada. She has been studying right whales in the Bay of Fundy since 1980, and said most of the entanglements she’s seen involve whales dragging fishing gear that came from more southerly American waters.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Fishing boats in the harbor on Grand Manan Island. Fishermen there say their own whale protection strategy, in place since 2006, has not harmed a single whale. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

Fishermen on Grand Manan, hundreds of kilometers south of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, say they have been caught up in an international seafood trade spat and are unfairly suffering the consequences.

They argue the recent ban in their local waters was a kneejerk reaction that did nothing to help the whales. They say their own whale protection strategy, in place since 2006, has not harmed a single whale despite dozens of sightings.

That includes voluntary closures when a right whale is spotted, a whale hotline for fishermen and working closely with a whale rescue team, a unit of specially-trained responders who free the mammals when they become entangled in fishing gear.

“We’ve operated in this area for a long time and we’re used to right whales. We’ve learned to fish around them,” Cook said. “We’ve never harmed one in all that time, then the ministry comes along and shuts us down on the sighting of a blow.”

Search planes and tracking boats were dispatched to find the 55-ton mammal when it was spotted in mid-June off Grand Manan, but it was not seen again. Fishermen argue the whale was just passing through, and was long gone by the time the ban came into effect.

“We called it Casper the Ghost,” Cook said. “Days before they enacted the closure, the whale had already left. They closed the area to protect nothing, because there was nothing there.”

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Two of the whales killed in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence last year died after becoming entangled in crab fishermen’s gear. But Cook argues no whales have been killed in Canadian waters by lobster trap lines, and says the government should not treat the two fisheries the same.

Fishermen are required by Canadian law to report any time they see a right whale. But Cook is doubtful many will cooperate now, after the temporary ban.

The crisis facing the right whales is a serious one, said Brown. The population has been shrinking since 2010, and much of the problem can be blamed on human-related activities. But alienating the people who make their living on the sea is not helpful to conservation efforts, she said.

“We’ve spent years working together. My goal this summer is to make sure those relationships are not lost. It’s only through working together we’re going to figure this out,” she said. “Fishermen really need to be involved.”