Mark Harris writes that industrial-scale rockweed harvesting poses a risk for fish and wildlife and is not properly regulated.
Dear Editor:
“In the weeds: Seaweed proves a valuable cash crop” was the lead article in the insert on Hancock County’s economy published in the The Ellsworth American on Feb. 22. The article portrays rockweed as “an economic and environmental treasure for our state.”
There is no question that rockweed is a vital commercial fishery habitat for many species, including cod, pollock, herring and lobster, and is indeed an environmental treasure for Maine. Rockweed canopies protect young stages of marine organisms from physical stresses and at high tide fish such as rick gunnels and juvenile pollock enter rockweed canopies to feed on small invertebrates. Many bird species, including Eider ducklings, use the rockweed zone as a habitat for feeding, reproduction or sheltering.
And as explained by Robin Hadlock Seeley, Ph.D., an ESA-certified ecologist and executive director of the Maine Rockweed Coalition, “Rockweed is also a living buffer that protects our shoreline from storm waves; a major carbon absorber in Maine’s climate strategy; and wildlife habitat for declining shorebirds.”
There is a question, however, whether rockweed can be considered an economic treasure considering its value is pegged at pennies per pound. According to the “In the weeds” article: “In 2022, 14 million pounds of harvested seaweed — mainly rockweed — brought in $1.53 million.” In the same year the total value for all of Maine’s commercially harvested marine resources was $574 million (inforME, 3/3/23). So the critical question to consider is whether the very real risk to the fishery ecological system is worth the minimal reward from rockweed harvesting.
Small local rockweed harvesters might possibly maintain a sustainable rockweed economy but large industrial harvesters (including Canadian firms seeking to avoid the more strict Canadian regulations) could upset the ecological balance and devastate the rockweed commercial fishery habitat for many years to come. Maine’s Department of Marine Resources has a huge responsibility to closely monitor rockweed harvesting and work with marine biologists to update regulations to appropriately control rockweed harvesting.
Mark Harris
Lamoine