This is the first of a series stories relating to my 48 year (and counting) history as a Maine commercial fisherman.
In 2003. after six years as a sternman on an historically successful lobster boat, two years of which were spent participating in a required apprenticeship program, I began my ‘career’ as a lobster fisherman.
A lobster license is a very difficult acquisition. The zone in which I was sponsored had no waiting list at that time, but now does. More on the subject of the apprenticeship program will be the subject of a later post.
As I neared the completion of my apprenticeship I had several crucial decisions to make. Lobster fishermen are notoriously territorial, and any new participants are certain to experience years of resistance in the form of verbal threats, theft of lobsters, missing traps, and even sunken boats.
I first had to decide the color combination on my buoys. Each fisherman has a color pattern and combination that is unique to the area in which he/she fishes. I chose a set of colors that I felt was subtle enough not to stand out from a distance as beacon announcing ‘new fisherman...stranger danger!’
Next came the critical choice of boat name. Nearly all lobster fishermen are Republicans and claim to be Christians, so I factored that into my choice of the name ‘Thy Neighbor’.
Next came the choice of what type of boat to start out with. I made the stupid choice to father children rather than accumulate assets early on in my life, so the resulting ‘hand to mouth’ nature of being constantly challenged financially limited my choice considerably. This limitation worked in my favor as a new, shiny, expensive boat is guaranteed to be provocative.
My friend Todd fronted me a clunky, ugly, crappy little 16 foot boat from which I had to haul my traps by hand. It was so ugly and impractical I prayed that its mere existence would evoke a smidgeon of sympathy and not appear threatening.
Lastly, I had to choose where to set my traps. I chose to fish around the margins of the desirable locations, primarily in shallow waters where the typical huge, expensive boats could not safely navigate.
So, armed with 100 patched up, old castaway junky traps I began. One of the first locations where I encountered both excellent lobster populations but a serious problem was in very shallow cove northwest of Alley Island. The water was so shallow that even my little boat had difficulty navigating the myriad hazards there, and I could only haul around the time of high tide. I knew that any pilferage was likely to come from one of the dozens of camps which dotted the adjacent shore. Fortunately, I began hauling in huge catches of large lobsters…I had stumbled onto the mother lode.
Right away I found traps moved, trap tags missing, and lobsters stolen. I told Todd about it and said that I was going to report the gear molestation to the Maine Department of Marine Resources. His response was...” Whatever you do, don’t report it, You will piss off the other fishermen by inviting wardens into the area. You will piss off the wardens by asking them to enforce the law, they expect fishermen to police their own problems. And worst of all, you will make yourself a target of the wardens’ anger.”
I didn’t listen...I called the DMR.
A few days after that ill-fated call, as I approached the area, I saw one of my buoys floating in about two feet of water close to the shore. As I attempted to get closer to said trap I saw a DMR boat with two wardens bearing down on me from behind the island. I motored back out to deeper water so that we could safely heave two and converse.
The ‘alpha’ warden told me that I was guilty of two violations. First, there was no tag in my trap. I told him that part of my reported problem was stolen tags, that I had 400 tags but only fished 100 traps, that the tag had obviously been stolen. Second, he informed me that the trap had float rope on top of the water.
Each trap typically has a length of floating rope to keep it from getting tangled in rocks on the bottom. Above that is sinking rope to prevent the floating rope from presenting a hazard to navigation. Said trap had six feet of float rope and twelve feet of sink rope. Prior to its being dragged into shallow water, it was perfectly legal.
Before this incident, I had been a licensed commercial fisherman for 33 years with zero warnings or convictions. As a result of this encounter with the wardens, I was issued a written warning for those two bogus violations.
In the interest of full disclosure, I will relate a prior incident involving this ‘alpha’ warden. Years earlier, I was digging clams in front of a camp owned by my in-laws. The tide was low and the water very shallow. Far down the shore I noticed a wardens’ boat attempting to reach shore, but struggling in the shallows. This same warden got out of the boat and was immediately mired in the deep mud beside the boat. After a considerable struggle, he slogged his way to shore and plodded up the 150 or so yards to my location. This whole process gave me ample time to come up with a sufficiently sarcastic comment to gift him with. It was a blistering hot day, and he was sweating and muddy from his exertions. When he got close I said...” That was a very impressive swat operation you just pulled off.”
He proceeded to check my license, and after a rancorous verbal exchange he left. I suspect that the two incidents were possibly related.
The DMR is in no way the lobstermans’ friend. When a fisherman encounters problems with theft or gear molestation, he is expected to deal with it himself. How? By cutting off buoys in the affected area...buoys of the suspected offender and buoys of the other fishermen. The theory is that the other fishermen will know who is the likely thief and will stop him in their own self interest.
In the 16 years that I have been lobster fishing on my own, I have never cut a buoy. I have a very good idea who is messing with my gear, but will not repay evil with evil, and will NEVER call the DMR to report a problem again.
My next post on this subject will explain how the wardens arbitrarily interpret and enforce certain laws to intimidate and harass the lobstering community.