South Coast scallopers are rejoicing at President Trump’s pledge, on Thursday, to reopen a prime scallop fishing area off Massachusetts.
But the process could take more than 18 months, and Cape Cod scallopers may not benefit as much as those in New Bedford.
“From an industry perspective, access to the Northern Edge would be a blessing,” said Eric Hansen, owner of two New Bedford scallop vessels. “The loss of resource and revenue for the scallop industry for the last 30 years has been huge.”
The Northern Edge, a section of Georges Bank, has been closed to scalloping since 1994.
Aubrey Church, policy director at the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen's Alliance, said some of the smaller commercial vessels on Cape Cod Cape are unlikely to be able to make the 15-hour trip to the Northern Edge.
Many of Cape Cod’s commercial fishing vessels are dayboats, meaning they go out and return on the same day.
Church said the alliance wants to hear more from its members before taking a position on access to the Northern Edge.
“Understanding how different sectors of the fleet may be affected will be an important part of our discussions with members,” she said.
In a post from the president on Truth Social and a written announcement from NOAA Fisheries, the administration said it plans to allow scalloping in the area on a rotational basis.
The New England Fishery Management Council would need to approve the change.
Hansen, a member of the council, said the earliest the area could open is April of next year, “and that's if everything goes perfectly. It'd more likely be a year later than that.”
The council uses a priority-setting process, and right now, the Northern Edge is not listed as a priority. Changing the priority list requires a two-thirds vote, Hansen said. The next meeting is in September.
Kevin Stokesbury, dean of the School for Marine Science and Technology at UMass Dartmouth, has been researching scallops for more than 25 years. He said reopening the Northern Edge is worth considering.
“It's certainly the right time to take a close look at it,” he said. “If I had to say yes or no right now, I would say probably it is the right time to open it.”
He said the area was closed largely to protect cod-spawning grounds, but the closure does not seem to have helped the Georges Bank cod population as intended.
“The idea was that it was an important nursery area because these cod have, like, a molted camouflage look and that they use that gravel to hide from predators,” he said. “But in our drop camera, we have seen a few cod, but not — not many. And … I don't know that that theory really holds true.”
Still, maintaining closed areas on Georges Bank does have value, he said, because it allows scientists to observe how the scallop population fluctuates naturally, without fishing.
John Lees of Mattapoisett, who owns five New Bedford-based scallop vessels, said the Northern Edge is one of the richest scallop grounds on the eastern seaboard. And because of an international fishing boundary called the Hague Line, Canadians have been scalloping nearby for years.
“What people need to realize is that literally five miles from that area is where … the Canadians are fishing, and they're catching scallops right now,” he said.
Lees was part of a group of commercial fishermen who visited the Oval Office in June. He spoke to Trump about access to the Northern Edge.
The Trump administration also plans to allow “stacking” of scallop permits, which means a single vessel could harvest more than one permit worth of scallops and spend less time idle.
Other fisheries use the Northern Edge already — notably for lobstering, Hansen said.
“The lobster fishery is up there right now, and they are against having anyone fish there, because right now it's their private sandbox,” he said.
The New England Fishery Management Council has members who represent lobster interests, environmental interests, and others. Hansen proposed opening the Northern Edge four years ago, when he first joined the council, but the proposal failed, he said.
If the council does not approve what the Trump administration is seeking, the secretary of commerce could make the change, but secretarial action in such a case is rare, Hansen said.
Scallop landings have declined sharply in the last several years.
Stokesbury said part of the decline represents a natural rebalancing of the scallop population in response to predation by sea stars.
A 2012 die-off of sea stars, a scallop predator, led to a scallop boom, he said. The starfish have since recovered, bringing the scallop population down.
