Flotsam? Or jetsam?

There is more than one fish in the sea.....

....or even all of the fish. All this was piled on top of a float in a parking lot near the municipal pier in Bar Harbor recently. I have no idea how it got there.

Blaine House Derby

The deadline for official party-affiliated gubernatorial candidates has passed, which has whittled down the field (!) of would-be governors to 21.
That’s five more than there are counties in the state, but not surprisingly not all counties are represented in the race, if you go by the towns or cities the candidates call home.
The state Ethics Commission has a list of all the candidates (and then some; it includes inactive candidates and some who did not get enough signatures to run in the party primaries), but the addresses listed there are for the campaigns, not necessarily the candidates themselves. The Maine Secretary of State's official list of all the primary candidates correctly lists the official municipality of residence for each one.
There are two Hancock County candidates still in the race, even after Green candidate Lynne Williams of Bar Harbor failed to get enough signatures to get on the June ballot. Bill Beardsley, former president of Husson College, is an Ellsworth resident and running as a Republican. J. Martin Vachon, an unenrolled candidate (though he calls himself a Republican on his Web site), lives in the nearby town of Mariaville. If either is elected, he would be the first Maine governor to call Hancock County home.
Washington County has never had one of its sons (or daughters, for that matter) elected to the highest office in the state, and isn't offering any candidates this time around. Neither is Aroostook County, which has been home to three Maine governors (according to the state's official historic list).
Besides Beardsley, neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have anyone in the governor's race who lives east or north of Waterville. Among Republicans, Les Otten lives in Greenwood, Peter Mills in Cornville, and Bruce Poliquin in Georgetown. None of these towns could be accused of being among Maine's bigger or more centrally located municipalities, but none can be confused with eastern or northern Maine, either. No Democrat in the race lives further north or east than Vassalboro.
Outside of Hancock County, what other eastern or northern Maine candidates are there? Only three more independents: Alex Hammer and Augusta Edgerton, both of Bangor, and Christopher Cambron of Greenbush, which is on the Penobscot River north of Old Town.
None of this is to say that geography is more important than ideology when it comes to electing a governor. But it is interesting sometimes to see how well some candidates from one of "the two Maines" connect with residents from the other.

P.S. - When possible, I've tried to link candidate names with their corresponding campaign Web sites. Those with such sites whose names do not appear above are:

• Steve Abbott of Portland.
• Samme Bailey of Gorham.
• Eliot Cutler of Cape Elizabeth.
• Matthew Jacobson of Cumberland.
• Paul LePage of Waterville.
• Patrick McGowan of Hallowell.
• Elizabeth Mitchell of Vassalboro.
• John Richardson of Brunswick.
• Steve Rowe of Portland.
• Rosa Scarcelli of Portland.
  
• Kevin Scott of Andover.
• John Whitcomb of Sidney.

Dominika Greisgraber's sculpture "Transitory" overlooks the Narraguagus River in Milbridge in the fading light of Saturday, March 13. The piece was created during the 2007 Schoodic Sculpture Symposium at the Schoodic Education and Research Center in Acadia National Park.

Sardineland

Seeing this comic book, one might assume the Maine Sardine Council (which produced it in 1995) was concerned about the declining popularity of sardines and so wanted to try to get children to become interested in sardines, and in eating them, too.
Considering the state of Maine's sardine industry 15 years later, one might also assume the gambit didn't work.
The sardine cannery in Prospect Harbor, which is the last such cannery in the United States, is still slated for permanent closure next month. Bumble Bee, which has owned the facility since 2005, plans to move production of its Beech Cliff sardine products to New Brunswick. When it does, the only remnant of "Sardineland" left in Maine will be the boxes of this comic that the company likely will leave behind in Prospect Harbor. The comic tells a story about the history of herring fishing and sardine processing in Maine, so it won't be applicable to Bumble Bee's operations north of the border.
Surely the firm also will leave behind the 30-plus foot tall fisherman sign pictured on the comic cover, which now sits outside the Prospect Harbor cannery. The fisherman sign used to greet motorists in Kittery as they drove across the Piscataqua River from New Hampshire, but was moved north in the 1980s, according to local officials. I am sure there are many people in Maine who hope the sign doesn't move north with the Beech Cliff canning operation.
If the efforts now being made by many people to convert the cannery in a lobster-and-more processing facility pan out, it certainly would be appropriate to keep the iconic sign in Prospect Harbor, even if it continues to say "Beech Cliff Sardines."
But maybe the sign would be changed.
"Lobsterland," anyone?

Forum Revisited

The 2010 Maine Fishermen's Forum has come and gone, and to me it seemed more sedate than the 2009 version. The likeliest reason for this is the lack of impending federal rope rules hanging over the lobster industry. The rules were about to go into effect at last year's forum, which had a lot of Maine's fishermen feeling sour about their industry.
Of course, things aren't great this year. Fishermen are dealing with significant scallop closures imposed by the state because of declining scallop stocks. They are concerned about the sharp reduction in the federal herring quota, which has been cited by Bumble Bee Foods as the reason it plans next month to shut down the sardine cannery in Prospect Harbor, where 128 people are expected to lose their jobs. It's the last remaining sardine cannery in the United States.
Lobster fishermen also are concerned about the availability and price of fresh herring, which is their preferred choice of bait for their traps. Another concern for lobstermen is the average annual boat price (what they are paid for their catch), which last year fell below $3 for the first time since 1998. But that's a reflection of the market, not of any direct government regulation on the lobster industry.
The list goes on. New groundfish regulations are set to go into effect in May. The prospects of wind, wave and tidal energy being developed on Maine's coast means fishermen will have less room in which to ply their trade. And there is mounting evidence that the oceans are becoming more acidic, which isn't good for most living things.
But, as I said, the mood seemed lighter this year than last. Despite the low price of lobster, the recorded landings in Maine for the tasty crustacean were higher in 2009 than they ever have been, which is a good sign for the health of the resource and for the future, whenever the price picks up again. Shrimp landings are on pace to hit their highest level in the past 13 years (see DMR's historical data) and the price is higher this winter than it has been in about half a dozen years. These aren't necessarily reasons for celebration - given the likelihood that no Maine fisherman makes his or her living solely off of shrimp - but they help to undercut lingering pessimism about the economy.
Maybe the lighter mood was a reflection of 12 certain people who were at the forum on Friday morning. They all seem to think they have a chance of being Maine's next governor, so they have to have some sort of confidence about the future. Not surprisingly, they all pledged to help support Maine's commercial fishing industry but, because there were so many of them, they weren't able to work much else into the session's two-hour time limit.
Anyway, everyone at the forum has to be a little hopeful about the future, or they probably wouldn't be there.
NOTES: Which gubernatorial candidates were there? In alphabetical order: Steve Abbott, Eliot Cutler, Matt Jacobson, Paul LePage, Peter Mills, Libby Mitchell, Les Otten, John Richardson, Steve Rowe, Rosa Scarcelli and Lynne Williams - and that's only half the number running. Other political notables past and present at the forum included Linda Bean, Legislature members Leila Percy, Dennis Damon, Hannah Pingree, Ed Mazurek, and all four members of Maine's congressional delegation (Sen. Susan Collins, U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud, U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree, Sen. Olympia Snowe). . . People in the know remain relatively upbeat that the Bumble Bee cannery in Prospect Harbor will be reborn and a lobster processor with other species capabilities. Who the new owner might be, and whether they plan to do it solo or with Bumble Bee's help, is being kept under wraps. Some suggest there could be news to report as early as next week. . . Supermarkets continue to focus on making sure their foods are sustainably cultivated, including seafood. A Hannaford executive told a group at the forum that the Maine-based grocery firm plans to have independent sources verify the sustainability of their seafood, but the word "verify" connotes something slightly different than "certify," which is the word people tend to use when they refer to the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC). Wal-Mart has said it plans to sell only MSC-certified seafood, a label some in Maine's lobster industry want for themselves. But not everyone in Maine's lobster fishery likes the idea. . . Attendees say one of the most popular items at the forum's Friday night auction was a reusable Hannaford shopping bag with a photo of a lobsterman on one side (and a cow on the other). The lobsterman depicted is Steve Train of Long Island, who is on the forum's board of directors. Hannaford brought at least a few boxes of the bag, so many people got the chance to take one home without having to bid on it. But the auction raises money for scholarships, so whoever bid highest for the bag (see below) did so for a good cause.

2009 Lobster Numbers

DMR has released its preliminary numbers for 2009 lobster landings, and it turns out it was a record year - for reported landings at least.
Maine lobstermen brought ashore nearly 75.6 million pounds of lobster last year, or about 5.7 million pounds more than the nearly 69.9 million pounds harvested in Maine in 2008.
But it was not a record year for the value. Last years' gross revenue for harvesters is estimated to be $221,661,390, or about $23 million less than the value of the 2008 harvest, which is estimated to be $244, 851,977.
Divide the total value by the total volume, and you get a pretty telling figure. The average statewide boat price last year - what fishermen get for their catch - was $2.93 per pound, the lowest it has been since 1998. In 2008, it was $3.50, and for four years before that, it stayed above $4 per pound. (For more info, check out the official DMR stats here.)
Of course, expenses for fishermen have not returned to 1998 levels, and probably the best example of that is fuel. Most fishermen run their boats with diesel, the cost of which in 1998 ranged from $1.15 to $0.97 per gallon. Last year, diesel prices ranged from ranged from $2 to $2.80 per gallon, at least twice as much as they did 12 years ago, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Not all fishermen fish the same way, or rely on lobster as their sole source of income, so not all lobstermen caught more in 2009 than they did in 2008. For those that did, the higher landings volume helped take some of the bite out of the lower prices, but likely not a whole lot. For those that might have caught less lobster last year than in 2008, the lower price will sting that much more.
The previous high for recorded landings was in 2006, when 75.3 million pounds of lobster were brought ashore. But dealers weren't required to report landings to the state until 2004, so stats from prior to that year are not believed to represent the actual amount that fishermen brought ashore in Maine. DMR scientists think the year with the highest landings volume was in 2002, when they estimate that 88 million pound of lobster was caught in Maine.
As for total value, the best year for Maine fishermen was 2005. That year, they caught 68.7 million pounds of lobster worth nearly $318 million dollars. The resulting annual average statewide boat price of $4.63 per pound that year also stands as record.
For Downeast fishermen, 2009 represents a record year for them as a group in terms of landings. Hancock County surpassed Knox County as the highest producing lobster county in Maine, catching 22.4 million pounds. That's 3.1 million pounds more than what they caught in 2008. Knox County's 2009 total of nearly 20.3 million pounds is only 80,000 pounds more than it was the previous year, and it is not as high as it was in 2004, '05 or '06, according to DMR's historical county breakdown.
Washington County's volume for 2009 was 12.7 million pounds, or more than 1.7 million pounds more than the nearly 11 million pounds they caught in 2008. The volume totals for Hancock and Washington counties are the highest they have ever been. That's a good sign for the health of the resource. Now if the price can just pick back up, even just a little bit, it will be good sign for fishermen and the coastal communities they live in, too.
If you want to see the stats released by DMR earlier today, you can check them out for yourself here.