DANA MCINTIRE cuts a wire lobster trap from a grappling chain aboard his lobster boat, the Island Lady, on Tuesday off Harpswell. McIntire used the chain and his shrimp fishing winches to drag Harpswell Sound for “ghost gear” as part of a two-day local cleanup effort organized by the Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation.
DANA MCINTIRE, left, and Chuck Van Vlack haul a battered lobster trap aboard the Island Lady on Tuesday while dragging Harpswell Sound for ghost gear.
To the untrained ear, the change in the engine’s rumble was imperceptible. To the untrained eye, the winch cable’s tugging and wobbling wasn’t any different than it had been for most of the day.
Van Vlack, who has been working on the water with McIntire since he was a teenager, donned rubber gloves and grabbed a steel pipe, which he used to guide the cable onto the spool while McIntire worked the machine’s hydraulic controls.
Winching in a catch is nothing new for the Island Lady, though usually there are lobsters or shrimp at the end of the line. This time there was a tangled and corroded mess of rope, steel and netting that years ago was a working lobster trap. And that’s just what they were looking for as part of a coastwide effort to clean stranded fishing gear from the sea floor.
“Well, I’m just an old dog who’s done this over and over again,” said McIntire when asked about his ability to recognize a catch even when it’s still 30 fathoms under water.
In the span of about six hours, McIntire and Van Vlack, both of whom live in Harpswell, hauled up more than 30 lobster traps in various states of disrepair, ranging from rusty and twisted heaps to traps that with a little repair could be used again tomorrow. At day’s end, the freighted Island Lady returned to Ash Point and unloaded its mostly ruined cargo for recycling or possible reuse.
McIntire’s boat was one of four vessels in the Mid-coast region that participated in a “ghost gear” recovery project sponsored by the Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation. The effort, which started in southern Maine earlier this month, continues this week in the Tenant’s Harbor area.
To collect the gear, McIntire used a short 100-pound piece of chain of the sort that keeps cruise ships and aircraft carriers tethered to their moorings. Welded to the chain’s jumbo links are staunch grapple hooks designed to snare fishing gear. In 10 attempts, McIntire and Van Vlack came up with nothing only once, filling the Island Lady to capacity.
One look across the lobsterrich water around them made it evident that this mode of cleanup couldn’t possibly come close to finishing the vast cleaning job. But according to McIntire, that’s no reason not to try.
“Why bend over and pick up that piece of trash while you’re walking?” said McIntire. “I like to get this stuff up off the bottom and all of a sudden, you’re looking at a full 40- yard Dumpster and there’s one just like it in Portland and another one in Tenant’s Harbor. The next thing you know, we go through years and then decades with efforts like this. It is and it isn’t a needle in a haystack.”
The Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation is in its second year running the program, which is supported by grants from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and others, according to Erin Pelletier, the Lobster Foundation’s executive director. Funding also has come from unexpected sources, such as a recent donation from a group of Maine-based yacht clubs. The cleanup in Harpswell was the 10th the foundation has organized in the past two years.
“Yes, this is a drop in the bucket or the tip of the iceberg,” said Pelletier. “But it’s our responsibility to do the responsible thing with our trash. These lobstermen want to do the right thing.”
Pelletier said the Lobster Foundation is also planning a cleanup of washed- ashore fishing gear in Harpswell next month as well as a program that allows fishermen to dispose of their unwanted equipment for recycling.
Cleaning up lobster traps that have fallen victim to broken ropes or loss isn’t as easy as it sounds. It’s illegal in Maine to handle a lobster trap that you don’t own, even if it’s obviously far beyond its usefulness. To circumvent that, the foundation works with the Maine Department of Marine Resources for special permits that allow the handling and recycling of the gear.
“That’s where we can all help out for a community project like this,” said Pelletier.
As with anything to do with fishing, there’s a little competitiveness among the lobstermen in the ghost gear cleanup.
“We weren’t in last place yesterday, were we Chuckie?” asked McIntire of his sternman.
“We weren’t first,” replied Van Vlack dryly. Radio chatter Tuesday indicated that another Harpswell fisherman named Scott was already bringing his second load of ghost gear to the dock.
“Well, I hate to be outshined, but that’s great. It looks like Scott’s going to be the highlight this year,” said McIntire. “ Chuck, I think we’ll swing around and get uptide again for another pass.”
For more, see the Bangor Daily News at www.bangordailynews.comn
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