Chris Fowler knows the perils of his occupation as a commercial fisherman, consistently ranked one of nation’s the most dangerous jobs. So a year after he began catching skate, whiting, squid, flounder and fluke from a vessel docked in New London, he took a day off from fishing to equip himself with the skills he needs to survive an accident at sea.
He was one of 36 commercial fishermen and state agency personnel who took part in a daylong safety and survival training course on May 10 sponsored by Connecticut Sea Grant, Fishing Partnership Support Services, the U.S. Coast Guard and UConn-Avery Point.
Sea Grant
Long Island Sound resource inventory moves toward completion
Despite 300 pages of data, maps and listings of the ecological resources and human uses of Long Island Sound, the inventory created as the foundation for the first-ever marine spatial plan for the estuary isn’t yet complete. At least that’s the view of two of the speakers at the public hearing May 8 on the draft version of the Long Island Sound Blue Plan Resource and Use Inventory.
30th Anniversary Photo Contest
CT Sea Grant will be celebrating its 30th anniversary year starting in August. From Aug. 20 through Sept. 30, we will accept entries for a photo contest of Connecticut waterways, from the rivers and streams that flow into Long Island Sound to the estuary itself. Send us photos picturing how you play, work and enjoy the natural beauty of our shores, or of the wildlife that inhabit these special places…
Workshop focuses on messages about coastal ocean acidification
Coastal regions that are some of the most productive areas for fish and shellfish harvests are seeing changes in water chemistry that are in part associated with atmospheric emissions of carbon dioxide. What those changes will mean for coastal communities and deciding how best to respond to them was the purpose of a three-day workshop April 10-12.
Guide to decapods of Long Island Sound available
“Keys to the Larvae of Common Decapod Crustaceans in Long Island Sound,” a 48-page guide to the early life stages of lobsters, crabs and shrimp, was published in 2017 by Connecticut Sea Grant and Project Oceanology.
Projects to advance knowledge of LIS water quality, marine life
Long Island Sound’s marine life and water quality will be the focus of five two-year research projects Connecticut Sea Grant will support in 2018. Proposals by four research teams from the University of Connecticut and one from Yale University School were chosen for the awards
Paper co-authored by Sea Grant’s Pomeroy cited for excellence
Congratulations are in order for Robert Pomeroy, CT Sea Grant extension specialist in aquaculture and fisheries, after the announcement that a journal article he co-authored has been chosen for an award by the Editorial Board of the Journal of the World Aquaculture Society.
Final 2018 budget increases funding for Sea Grant, aquaculture
The final spending package for fiscal year 2018, passed by Congress on March 22 and signed by Pres. Trump on March 23, provides $65 million for the National Sea Grant College Program, which includes Connecticut Sea Grant and 32 other Sea Grant programs across the country.
Long Island Sound Resource and Use Inventory comments sought
The first draft of the Inventory of Natural Resources and Human Uses for the Long Island Sound Blue Plan has been completed, and comments are sough by April 6.
Cleaner Mystic River could give shellfishermen room to grow
When the sewage treatment plant on the Mystic River was upgraded in 2015, probably few community residents here imagined local shellfish farmers might benefit, let alone oyster and clam growers across the country. But that’s a possibility, depending on the results of a $300,000 federally funded testing project now underway.