{"id":713,"date":"2017-06-21T12:00:04","date_gmt":"2017-06-21T16:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine?p=713"},"modified":"2021-05-03T11:56:52","modified_gmt":"2021-05-03T15:56:52","slug":"catching-ghosts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/catching-ghosts\/","title":{"rendered":"Catching Ghosts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seven feet below the surface of Barnegat Bay, burrowed in the thick mud that coats the waterway\u2019s floor, sits a predator the size of a sea turtle. Hidden by sediment and organisms encrusted along its surface, it blends into the murky surroundings and waits, mouth agape, to trap unsuspecting marine life in its unyielding grip.<\/p>\n

But this predator is no creature. It\u2019s one of hundreds of derelict crab pots that coat the bottom of the bay. Considered marine debris, the traps are abandoned\u2014a sometimes intentional, sometimes accidental byproduct of commercial and recreational fishing that is having a devastating impact on this aquatic ecosystem.<\/p>\n

\u201cDerelict fishing gear can cause the death of a variety of marine organisms, cause economic loss to the fishing industry, and pose threats to human health,\u201d says Emily Heiser, a wildlife biologist with the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey. Of particular concern to ecologists is the danger these abandoned pots pose to northern diamondback terrapins\u2014a small, native turtle that is considered a species of special concern in New Jersey.<\/p>\n

The diamondback terrapins sometimes enter crab pots because there\u2019s a food source inside, such as leftover bait or blue crabs themselves, says Heiser. Many commercial crab pots have by-catch reduction devices (which minimizes the amount of marine life that become unintentionally trapped) and degradable latch connectors designed to wear away over time. But those mechanisms do not always function properly, and as a result, terrapins and fish species often become trapped. \u201cOnce the terrapins become trapped in the pots, they can easily drown,\u201d Heiser says. \u201cWe pulled up one pot that had over 11 dead terrapins.\u201d<\/p>\n

The derelict pots also get intermittently swept along the bay floor by strong currents and choppy storm waters and can cause serious damage to boat propellers or the hulls of vessels that run into them.<\/p>\n

In some states, as many as 30 percent of the crab pots dropped into the water remain unaccounted for, but it is unknown how many are lost each year in New Jersey, says Heiser. So two years ago, CWF partnered with Monmouth University, Stockton University, and the Marine Academy of Technology and Environmental Science on a project to assess how widespread the problem is and, at the same time, remove as many derelict pots as possible from the bay.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Amanda Kremer, left, and Kylie Johnson gear up to retrieve derelict crab pots in Barnegat Bay.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In The Bay<\/h2>\n

\u201cThe term \u2018ghost fishing\u2019 is used a lot,\u201d says Jim Nickels, a marine scientist at Monmouth\u2019s Urban Coast Institute<\/a>, regarding instances when gear such as crab pots are lost but continue to catch marine life.<\/p>\n

Nickels, who also teaches classes in Monmouth\u2019s biology department, supervised the university\u2019s involvement with the project. During the past two years, he and a team of student volunteers made more than a dozen trips aboard the UCI\u2019s 27-foot research vessel, Seahawk, traversing the northern portion of Barnegat Bay\u2014from Good Luck Point in Berkeley Township, New Jersey, up to the base of the canal near Bay Head, New Jersey\u2014searching for and retrieving derelict pots. Their work had to revolve around the closure of the commercial crabbing season so as to not disrupt the industry, which meant Nickels and his students could only go out on the water between December 1 and March 15.<\/p>\n

\u201c[It\u2019s] a lovely time of year\u2026 long, cold, miserable days,\u201d jokes Nickels light-heartedly and somewhat sarcastically. \u201cBut it gives [students] a chance to really see what day-in and day-out survey operations are like.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
\nEach expedition followed a one-two pattern: one trip focused primarily on finding the pots using high-tech equipment onboard the vessel, and a follow-up trip, made on a separate day, focused on physically grappling for the pots hidden below the surface.<\/p>\n

The task of finding the pots was done with side-scan SONAR\u2014a three-foot-long, torpedo-like piece of equipment, called a fish, which costs about $35,000. Students would launch the SONAR equipment overboard, where it sat about two feet below the waterline. Nickels would then typically maintain a steady speed of 5 mph as the instrument was towed below the surface, taking images in real time.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like two flashlights shining out sideways, so anything that is on or above the bottom, it sees and illuminates,\u201d says Nickels of the side-scan SONAR.<\/p>\n

Those images were transported via a long blue cable to three onboard computers. It was the students\u2019 job, for hours on end, to watch the computer monitors and essentially take screenshots of anything that resembled a crab trap sitting below. Nickels would then sit with Marc Mol\u00e9, a marine and environmental biology and policy major, who worked as a research assistant on the project both years, and together they would scan the images looking for rectangular blotches on the sheet\u2014indicative of a pot. Using GPS coordinates that were captured with each screenshot, the Monmouth team could then make a second trip to retrieve the pots.<\/p>\n

Along with the more than 600 derelict pots they identified during the past two winters, Mol\u00e9 says the Monmouth team found a plethora of other debris: tires, cables, propellers, an old anchor\u2014even a capsized boat that hadn\u2019t been recorded on any naval charts. It angered the students, many of whom plan to pursue careers studying marine life.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not so much the crab pots really, but the tires and electric cables\u2014they\u2019re what really get to me,\u201d says Mol\u00e9. \u201cThe solution to pollution is dilution\u2014it\u2019s what people used to think.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those pots are worth a lot of money to them, and they don\u2019t want to lose as much as they can help\u2014and it just [helps by] being good citizens and neighbors to everyone else.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"
Marc Mol\u00e9, front, and Kylie Johnson hook and retrieve a crab pot, which is about half the size of a commercial pot.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Two winters ago, when Nickels and his students were physically pulling up pots themselves, they retrieved about 25 traps\u2014no easy feat. Covered in mud and encrusted with various organisms, the pots are filthy, foul-smelling, and unwieldy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember the first time I was jumping around like, \u2018We\u2019ve got one!\u2019\u201d says Kylie Johnson, who was involved on the project during both seasons and was on the boat one day in February 2016 when the team recovered a string of 10 pots, which took them about 40 minutes to retrieve in the freezing conditions. \u201cWe saw one, and we\u2019re like, \u2018Let\u2019s go for it.\u2019 Then it was attached to nine others, and that\u2019s what made it really hard. We thought it was maybe tied down, but it was just being held down by the weight of the other nine.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Nickels, commercial crabbers often attach pots together, making them easier to retrieve with the day\u2019s catch. But if the pot connected to the buoy becomes detached, it can be hard to find any of the traps\u2014especially for crabbers who are often without their own side-scan SONAR equipment on board.<\/p>\n

As a way of retrieving more pots, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, one of the project funders, gave basic side-scan equipment to commercial crabbers who offered to help in the retrieval process. Nickels says that was a big help: It allowed the teams to retrieve twice as many pots in the second year and was a great incentive for the local crabbers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe actually worked very closely with several commercial crabbers because, obviously, it\u2019s in their best interest too,\u201d says Nickels. \u201cThose pots are worth a lot of money to them, and they don\u2019t want to lose as much as they can help\u2014and it just [helps by] being good citizens and neighbors to everyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n

Throughout the process, the commercial pots that were retrieved with their tags still attached were processed by students from MATES and Stockton and then returned to the crabbers. Untagged traps and recreational pots were sent to Covanta, a waste management company, for recycling.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Jim Nickels, professor and marine scientist at Monmouth\u2019s Urban Coast Institute, watches as student volunteers scan monitors for rectangular objects that are indicative of abandoned crab traps.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mol\u00e9, who landed a job working with the NY\/NJ Baykeeper prior to graduating this past May, says it was a great experience to connect with people from various schools and organizations who all shared the same end goal.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo many people have come together, and you don\u2019t often see the commercial fishermen actually working with the people doing the research\u2014they don\u2019t tend to like us too much because we just like to put regulations on things basically,\u201d says Mol\u00e9. Working with the MATES students, who processed the pots, was also rewarding, he says. \u201cIt\u2019s cool to help teach the next generation to do this type of stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Johnson and Mol\u00e9 say that it\u2019s experiences like this\u2014and the connections that faculty like Nickels have\u2014that make all of the difference when it comes to being prepared for life after Monmouth.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of what we\u2019ve learned is that you have to get your foot in the door using some project where you get involved with an organization, and it\u2019s a networking process,\u201d says Johnson. \u201cAnd as an undergraduate, it\u2019s good to participate in different research projects to get experience. \u2026 Because [Professor Nickels] can tell you how a boat works, but it\u2019s not until you\u2019re out on a boat that you understand.\u201d<\/p>\n

Impact and Experience<\/h2>\n

All told, Nickels says 1,274 pots were targeted and collected during the past two years. That amount of debris could fill twelve 30-cubic-yard dumpsters with a potential weight of 60 tons, he estimated.<\/p>\n

Heiser says the data collected during the project will be cross-checked with data collected from two similar projects happening in New Jersey\u2014one headed up by New Jersey Audubon that focuses on pots in the Delaware Bay and one headed up by Stockton University that focuses on pots in the southern reaches of Barnegat Bay and Great Bay.<\/p>\n

Nickels, who enjoyed working on the project, says all of the students involved expressed their appreciation for the real-world experience that it provided.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve all enjoyed it because it is a little bit of a different experience, and it\u2019s a really neat project because it does have a true outcome to it,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd that\u2019s important, so they can take some pride and knowledge that they worked on something that mattered.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the hunt with Monmouth faculty and students working to stop a stealthy killer that\u2019s decimating the Barnegat Bay ecosystem. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":724,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"image_focus":"","hide_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features"],"thumbnail":"\"\"","catString":"Features","issue":"Summer 2017","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=713"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13597,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713\/revisions\/13597"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}