At least 19 humpback whales, two blue whales and one leatherback sea turtle — each protected by the Endangered Species Act — were found tangled up in crab gear off the West Coast last year.
In 2015, there were 62 reported entanglements. Eleven of those entanglements were found with gear from the California Dungeness crab fishery, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found.
In the past three years, entanglement numbers have exceeded the yearly average of eight whales trapped in fishing gear and are the highest since NOAA began keeping track of fisheries in 1982.
Officials with the environmental nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity say those numbers are unacceptable. On Tuesday, Oct. 3, the group filed a lawsuit against the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, claiming the agency has fallen short in preventing Dungeness crab fishery gear from killing humpback, blue whales and leatherback sea turtles. The Fish and Wildlife Department is responsible for granting the fishery its permits.
Fish and Wildlife officials said Tuesday they do not comment on pending litigation.
Noah Oppenheim, executive director of the Fishermen’s Association, on Tuesday called the lawsuit disappointing. He said voluntary efforts are working and entanglements are down by 81 percent.
“California crab fishermen and women take the health of the ocean incredibly seriously,” he said in a statement. “This is why we do everything we can to avoid whales when we fish, and fishermen have risked life and limb to help whales escape in some of the rare instances in which they do become entangled.”
The Dungeness fishery, which in 2016 brought in 26.67 million pounds of crab, the highest landing of any commercial fishery on the West Coast, operates from Central to Northern California.
Center for Biological Diversity officials say the fishery sets heavy traps at the bottom of the ocean with a single rope running through the water column with a buoy at or near the surface. Sometimes fishermen attach trailer buoys to the main buoy, they said.
Whales get tangled up in these lines, they said. In some cases slack lines, which happen when traps are moved from deeper to shallower waters, act as a sort of noose for whales and sea turtles.
“This is just unacceptable,” said Kristen Monsell, an attorney with the center. “We’ve heard from fishermen and lawmakers that they want to change it but nothing has happened on the water.”
Monsell said her group hopes that the lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District, prompts the Fish and Wildlife department to adopt several measures to reduce entanglements: reducing the number of fishing permits it grants, restricting fishing gear in areas known to be whale hot spots and requiring the line on crab pots to be taut.
“They don’t know where fishermen are setting gear and how much they’re setting,” Monsell said. “We’ve been pushing them to get better gear marking so in the event of an entanglement they can better predict where it occurred. They just issue permits. Right now it’s a bit of a free-for-all.”
Monsell said the group wants the state department to change how the fishery operates, such as reducing the amount of gear allowed in important whale and turtle habitats.
In 2015, Fish and Wildlife, in partnership with California Ocean Protection Council and National Marine Fisheries Service, founded the California Dungeness Crab Fish Gear Working Group to address the increase in large whale entanglements in crab fishing gear. The group is made up of commercial and recreational fishermen, environmental organization representatives, members of the disentanglement network, and state and federal agencies.
But environmentalists say nothing has changed since the group was started.
Last year, a state law passed that provides fishermen an incentive to retrieve lost crab lines and gear. In April, state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara, introduced a proposal to provide emergency funding to rescue networks that work with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The bill passed the Senate in May and is on Gov. Jerry Brown’s desk for approval, Jackson said Tuesday.
Justin Viezbicke, marine mammal stranding coordinator for NOAA, has been responding to and monitoring the increased whale entanglements. He said there are several reasons that could explain why the number of entangled whale reports are up. There is an increased presence of whales, an increased pressure for more fish and better reporting by boaters on the water, he said.
Fishermen and commercial whale watch operators are often among the first to report a whale in distress, he said.
NOAA is also working with fishermen to develop better practices to keep their gear at bay, Viezbicke said.
This year, 20 whales have been reported entangled off California and 30 off the West Coast, which is double the number of entangled whales reported between 2000 and 2012.
On Sept. 20, an entangled humpback was sighted by Newport’s Coastal Adventure seven miles west of the Huntington Beach pier. A blue-green line came out from both sides of its mouth and was wrapped under its flippers and down its back. The whale has not been seen since.
On July 29, a 25-foot entangled juvenile humpback was spotted off San Pedro. A day later, it was found by a team of rescuers coordinated by Viezbicke just off San Onofre. The whale had severe cuts from where crab traps and lines had dug into its back. Rescuers were able to free those lines but a line running from the whale’s mouth to its fluke couldn’t be cut.
Viezbicke, who assisted with the rescue, said the situation left the whale with a guarded prognosis.
These whale rescue efforts can be dangerous. In June, longtime whale rescuer Joe Howlett was killed when he was hit by the fluke of a whale he had just helped untangle.
Dave Anderson, who operates Capt. Dave’s Dolphin and Whale Watching Safari out of Dana Point Harbor, and leads Orange County’s disentanglement task force, said rescue work shouldn’t be the solution.
“How much is a whale worth,” he said. “If 71 people, instead of whales, had died last year off the West Coast, wouldn’t something be done to prevent it?”
