Away from a wee pool, to the biggest pool.
Thursday, July 2, 20265:48 PM Truth Social
Today I am declaring a National Scallops Day to celebrate an action taken by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that will open up the Northern Edge of Georges Bank to Scallops Fishing, fulfilling the dream to our Great Fishermen who were so badly treated by the Obama and Biden Administrations, and by the Country of Canada. That will mean millions more pounds of beautiful Wild Scallops a year on the kitchen table of Americans, and more Jobs in Norfolk, Virginia, Cape May, New Jersey, New Bedford, Massachusetts, and essentially all parts of the East Coast. This is in addition to freeing up a massive area off the East Coast for our Great Lobster Fishermen, and others (An Environmental Monument declared by Barack Hussein Obama and Sleepy Joe Biden, that I terminated!), and a half a million square miles of the beautiful Pacific Ocean, where every country was allowed to fish except for our Great American Fishermen! I have opened up the Oceans, Rivers, Lakes, and Seas to our Fishermen, and freed them from ridiculous Environmental restrictions that allowed other countries to take advantage of the United States' Waters under Barack Hussein Obuma, Sleepy Joe Biden, and the Dumocrats. It is my Great Honor to have done so because I am the Fishermen's Friend -- GO OUT AND VOTE REPUBLICAN IN THE MIDTERMS, BECAUSE IF THE COMMUNISTS GET IN, YOU'LL NEVER FISH AGAIN! Thank you for your attention to this matter. President DONALD J. TRUMP
Ahem. This bit.
"BECAUSE IF THE COMMUNISTS GET IN, YOU'LL NEVER FISH AGAIN!"
Actually, Mr T, the communists, as in the CCP are notorious worldwide for emptying the sea of fish. It's something I follow. For anyone interested, look up what they done to the Galapagos Islands waters, as one example.
Scallop fishing is incredibly destructive. They basically trawl the sea bed, scraping everything up.
Map attached shows the area affected. Note how it is a tiny part of the whole bank. And it is right on the limit of the US EEZ. The EEZ on the other side is Canada.
This small area has been left unfished since 1994. It has been protected from fishing because it is a breeding ground. From here the baby scallops drift out into US and Canadian waters, where they can be caught. It is also a Cod spawning ground.
This Fishing press article from 2024 explains it:
Fishermen protest ongoing closure of Northern Edge | National Fisherman
"We know there is a high density of scallops there. But you need those dense aggregations to have spawning success in the future,” said Jonathon Peros, who is the Council’s lead fishery analyst for sea scallops. He explained that scallops spawning in the region act as a seed source to other active scalloping grounds. "
Check out the catch data as discussed in 2024
"In recent years, they said, scallop populations in the areas currently open to fishing have reached the end of their cycle. Domestic landings have declined from 60 million pounds in 2019 to about 30 million pounds in 2022. Meanwhile, scallop populations in the Northern Edge have boomed, growing from an estimated 11 million pounds in 2017 to 27 million pounds last year, according to a combination of government surveys presented in April."
So here we are. The politics of it are up to the individual. But the science is pretty clear. Fish need protected places to breed in order to survive. But Trump is destroying that, in US waters, for short term gain.
Oh, on "leopards ate my face". There be oil and gas there, and a ban on exploring that. The fishers support the ban for obvious reasons. Hmmm.