The Trapdoor That Saves Sea Turtles From Shrimp Nets

0:00 Picture a shrimp trawl net moving slowly along the bottom of the warm, shallow bay. shrimp pour in as the boat moves forward and the net moves forward. Then a Kemp Ridley sea turtle, the most endangered sea turtle on Earth, gets swept into the net. It hits a metal grid, slides down, and pushed out through a flap in the bottom of the net, and swims away. The shrimp stay where they are in the net, and they get taken up and put on the deck. But here's what people don't know. That little trapdoor is one of the greatest success stories in ocean conservation and fisheries management, and we're gonna be talking about that on this episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin. I'm a marine biologist and science communicator here to give you information on ocean news, ocean science, and ocean conservation, break it all down for you, 'cause this is what I love to do, so that you can kinda learn more about the ocean, have less ocean anxiety or climate anxiety, 'cause that's what we all talk about.

0:55 And now, this week, we've been talking about sustainable seafood, we've been talking about fisheries, and, last episode, we talked about how we take too many fish. And today is all about the animals that we never meant to take at all. All these bycatch animals, because obviously we don't wanna have a lot of bycatch. And if you listen to Monday's episode, where I talked to Dr. David Shiffman, who's the author of Why Sustainable Seafood Matters, you're gonna learn more about that if you listen to that episode after this one, because I talk all about these types of themes, and you get his take on it as well. So you can pre-order his book if you go to the link in the show notes down below, or description if you're watching this on YouTube, and you can see what we've been talking about and all that wonderful stuff.

1:35 You can see what sustainable seafood is all about and learn how to do it without a PhD. That's the big thing. It's just for everybody that wants to learn more about how to order sustainable seafood and understand what sustainable seafood is. So now let's go back to this, devices, these fisheries devices. \ Now you've heard that shrimp nets drown sea turtles, that fishing lines strangle whales, that dolphins die in tuna nets. They drown, So every time you buy seafood, there's a background guilt a little bit. What else got caught as this fish was getting caught that I'm about to eat today? But today, I wanna swap that guilt for something more useful, knowing some of the fixes that have been working and how to find seafood caught with them, that's an important aspect.

2:19 Early in my career, I worked as a marine mammal observer, and I learned quickly that what happens on the back deck of a boat is only known if someone is there to see it. if I'm not there, if I wasn't there as a fisheries observer or as a marine mammal observer, the people that are doing the seismic survey the boat that I was on Are probably not gonna stop, with the guns when these marine mammals come into the radius of the boat where they could be affected by the noise of the acoustic guns that are happening with the seismic survey. Same thing with a fisheries observer, it's difficult to find out what's happening and understanding how things are being caught, what bycatch is being caught or anything like that. Now, bycatch is anything caught that the fisher wasn't trying to catch in the first place, and that happens a lot with trawl fishing, the one conservation scientists like worry about the most are endangered, threatened, and protected species, so sea turtles, sharks, sea birds like albatross, whales, and dolphins of course in the marine mammal section, they're usually swimming near the target fish 'cause they're eating the same food and using the same water.

3:21 And so sometimes when they see fish aggregated in one area, they're gonna go and start feeding on them, but the net or the line doesn't know the difference between these fish. Although there are like net sizes, mesh sizes for the nets that allow some of the smaller animals to go out so they don't catch juveniles and some of the bycatch that are smaller, and they only catch the larger fish, but when you have sea turtles or whales or dolphins or, anything else like that, it's really hard to not catch those, Because they're bigger and they'll get caught in the net Now, one of the things we've discussed a number of times on here is the North Atlantic right whale. It's one of the most endangered whales on the planet. Scientists estimate there's 384 of them alive at the end of 2024.

4:04 Now, I talked about this on Ocean Decoded. We have seen an increase for the first time. I think it was like 23 offspring this year, and so it's the first time in a long time where we've seen an increase, but it's still dire need for these species. And people often ask how a whale can be caught in a lobster trap. It's not a net by any means, But the danger is the rope, every trap or every string of traps has a line running, from the sea floor up to a buoy on the surface. Off of New England and Atlantic Canada, there are a huge number of those vertical lines in the water, and the right whales feed in the same areas where these lobster traps are and crab traps are. A whale, like, swims into the line, it wraps it around its flipper, or it gets caught or the fluke, like the tail, or even the mouth.

4:48 Sometimes it goes right around the mouth. And some will drown because they can't get up to the surface because they're caught in so many lines. And then some are just so badly injured that as they drag the net, they get entangled, and then the line starts to, cut into their pectoral fins or their mouths or anything like that. Those cuts get infected, some of them, they drag, like, heavy gear behind them for months and months and months. So entanglement and ship strikes tend to be, like, the two leading causes of death or serious injury of the species, of the North Atlantic right whale. in September 2022, Seafood Watch, which is, like, an app that you can use for sustainable fishing, and it tells you what to avoid and what to take or what you can eat and how it's caught and all that kind of stuff to ask the right question.

5:31 They moved American lobster from the US and Canada to its red, quote-unquote, "avoid list." Basically because of the risk to the right whales. In December 2022, after a US federal court ruled that whale protections in the fishery didn't go far enough, the Marine Stewardship Council suspended the Gulf of Maine lobster fishery certification. And the independent auditor noted it had found no direct evidence that Maine's fishery had harmed right whales. But the suspension came because the legal protections around it had been found inadequate. So the lobster fishery itself, is well-managed. It's considered it's well-managed. But the problem is the rope that is attached to the trap that goes up to the surface to the buoy, that's the problem Now, this got pretty political.

6:17 Like within weeks, Maine's congressional delegation introduced a bill to block federal funding to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which runs Seafood Watch. So they wanted to stop Seafood Watch from working, which is probably the best thing we can have for a sustainable seafood app. Marine Stewardship Council has sustainable seafood, but it's not really an app, it's more they work with the supply chain and the retailers. But then Congress paused right whale rules for the lobster fishery until 2028. And in September 2026, the House voted to extend that pause to 2035. So lobster families are facing, warmer water, shifting stocks, and rising costs, and their frustration is pretty real. Like, I get it. And the whales still need that fixed.

6:58 So there are two options to how to fix this. We can do a weak rope, which are lines strong enough to, haul traps, but weak enough to snap when a 50-ton whale basically hits them or goes through them. And if a whale hits your line, you lose that gear either way. So, at one point, weak ropes means, the whale doesn't lose its life too. You're already gonna lose your gear, but because the whale's going through it, but what can you do? Now, the other option is something that's growing in demand, is that on-demand or ropeless gear. So no line sitting in the water. The trap waits at the bottom with a lift bag or like some kind of spooled line. When the boat arrives, to grab the trap, it sends an acoustic signal, and the trap rises to the surface.

7:40 and when it first came out, I remember talking to fishers. They disliked it because it was expensive, it was new, and it didn't work very well. But it's different from how lobsters had been fishing for generations, and nobody loves that type of change. So I can understand that. But a growing number of fishers in the US and Canada are testing it. And because some of the crab and lobster fishery has shut down in certain areas, especially where right whales are known to go, they start to embrace it a little bit more. And so grants are helping to cover the cost, and the gear keeps getting better and better with each trial. So, some people are gonna be like, "Hey, this actually might work eventually." Now, let's move over to the sea turtle bit that I talked about at the beginning of the episode. Sea turtles, of course, breathe air, A turtle caught in a shrimp net, like that's dragged around for an hour or more will drown.

8:26 It can't get to the surface. Although it can hold its breath for a long time, it's something that's really important for them to do is to get up there so they can breathe. Now, the fix for this is called a turtle excluder device, or a TED. Not the speeches, not like the TEDx or anything like that. Not online. This is a TED, a turtle excluder device. It's basically like a metal grid sewn onto the neck of the net, so like at the part of the net where it kinda extends. and it has an escape flap. So the small shrimp pass through the bars into the bag at the end, which is great, and a turtle's too big to fit through that bag. So it hits the grid, slides along it, and b- gets pushed out through the flap. So if used correctly, TEDs cut sea turtle deaths and shrimp deaths by about 97%, and the shrimp catch, they don't change that much.

9:13 And that's why it works really well. The fix has saved pretty much every turtle, but empty the net would never be used. But the thing is, the TED works. for years there was a gap. Smaller shrimp boats using a type of net called a skimmer trawl were allowed to fish without TEDs, on the condition that they limited how long each of the nets stayed in the water. Observers found that rule was often ignored. In some years, fewer than thirty-five percent of the monitored tows stayed within that time limit. So in twenty nineteen, the US government required TEDs on skimmer trawls for boats that were forty feet or longer. and Louisiana Shrimpers group, they sued. On August 28th, twenty twenty-six, the Fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously upheld the rule, finding the agency had given a rational, evidence-backed explanation.

10:00 And Louisiana waters are prime feeding ground for Kemp Ridleys, these are the most critically endangered sea turtles. And Lou- and its waters are prime feeding grounds for Kemp Ridley sea turtles, the world's smallest and most endangered sea turtle. Those turtles now have a trapdoor. I want you to notice, like, the pattern here. Like a loophole for small boats will look harmless because each boat is small. And you add up a lot of small boats, and you get a pretty big problem. And if they're not following the rules, then you get a bigger problem. So the court followed the data, made its ruling, and now we're gonna start to see TEDs that's going to be included for the skimmer nets in shallower waters.

10:40 And also, like I should mention in this story, is that the federal data with observers was very different than the state data. The state data did not show any changes or show a lot of sea turtles drowning from these catches from these skimmer trawls. But the federal data from the observers did. So that's a very interesting, change in data. And so the, the Louisiana Shrimp Trawlers Association was asking to follow the state data when the federal data had more. It was like three thousand, sea turtles that died within those nets. So it was quite a difference and change, and the courts went with the federal data just to be on the safe side to make sure, 'cause it was such a big miss, let's talk about dolphin safe tuna, 'cause that's something that's really interesting.

11:22 It's a question I get a lot. You've probably seen the dolphin safe logo on a canned tuna, and here's what it actually covers. So in the eastern tropical Pacific, tuna often swim under dolphins. Fishers used to spot dolphins, then set like huge purse seine nets around the whole group to catch like the tuna below, 'cause once they saw dolphins, that was where we knew where tuna was. Millions of dolphins in the past died this way from the late 1950s onward. Some populations fell to 20% to 30% of their original size. So a huge, huge problem. Now, dolphin safe means the tuna was caught without setting nets on dolphins, and with no dolphins killed or seriously injured in that set.

12:02 Now, the one thing to learn is that it's never promised that no dolphin anywhere has been harmed in any part of this fishery. Critics who found a dead dolphin near a dolphin safe fishery and called the label meaningless were dredging it against a promise that it never made. and the thing is, is like reported dolphin deaths in that fishery dropped from hundreds of thousands a year to roughly a thousand. And some of those dolphin populations are showing early signs of recovery. That's a huge win in this case. Like obviously, nets aren't perfect, this fishery isn't perfect, and we're gonna have some dolphin deaths. But to go from 100,000 deaths or hundreds of thousands of deaths a year to roughly a thousand, that's a huge win for conservation and for the fishery as well.

12:45 Now, every number that I've mentioned in this episode depends on someone counting, so if you ask the boat to count its own bycatch, there's a built-in incentive to report less. There's a bias there. that's why there are fisheries observers. They're independent, it's a great experience for young biologists, and often one that is the best paying job straight out of a marine biology degree. But it also can be dangerous. So all you young scientists here, I want you to make sure you do your research on what to expect, how to live on a boat, understand what it's like to live with other fishers, because it's different out there on the ocean, there are a lot of protections, and a lot of these fisheries boats are happy to have these observers.

13:27 An observer is often the only person aboard, who doesn't work for that boat to make money for that boat, and some people might look at that as saying, "Hey, you're actually gonna prevent us from making money." So you just have to be careful. But the Association for Professional Observers has documented more than a dozen observers who died or disappeared at sea in unclear circumstances since 2009, mostly in the Pacific tuna fisheries. Now, these cases are rare, extremely rare in North America, and it still happens elsewhere. So if you're going somewhere other than North America, be very, very like careful. Now, there is something that's coming out that's emerging. That's the electronic monitoring. So high-definitions cameras on deck, footage reviewed by analysts on shore, which is great.

14:09 Studies suggest that it can cost 15 to 50% less than a human observer. And fishers often like the gadgets, of course, and the camera doesn't like need a bunk or a special type of meal, so it's cheaper for them. So the next time you buy tuna, look for a pole and line, or a troll or, hand line caught. In a pole and line fishery, a crew stands at the rail and catches tuna one at a time with rods, it's loud, it's chaotic, it catches almost nothing except tuna. And it's usually printed right on the can, so if it isn't, your Seafood Guide app will tell you which brands tend to use that. But every fix in this episode comes down to the gear. When you choose the gear, you choose the bycatch.

14:51 So if there's pole and line, you get less bycatch. If you have purse seine nets that are dolphin-safe, you tend to get less dolphins caught in these tuna nets, In these purse seine nets. So it's important. Tomorrow's episode, we're gonna be talking about the fishing method from a famous documentary that wants it banned everywhere. And the protected areas that aren't protected, and the fish farms you're probably already eating from. So we're gonna talk a lot about that on next episode. It's gonna be a very interesting episode. don't forget to follow so you can tune in. but I want you to think about this, like- the boat hauls in a net, like a shrimp, and the bag is full of shrimp. And a few minutes earlier, out of sight, like a Kemp Ridley slid along a metal grid and swam out through a flap and, like, maybe a little bruised, but it's alive.

15:38 And that's the important thing. Seafood and sea turtles can share the same water, They do, 'cause a lot of times these, Kemp Ridley's turtles are actually eating these shrimp. But better nets make it possible to ensure that these sea turtles are protected, and we already have them. We're already using them, and now they're being applied to more boats from a different variety, and I think that's a great thing. We're saving more species by doing this. It's all about fisheries management. It's all about data driving this and the science that drives it to ensure that the law can uphold everything that happens. This is how we do fisheries management. This is how we do ocean conservation, and this is what you just learned on how to protect the ocean. I wanna thank you so much for joining me.

16:20 If you're watching or if you're listening to this on Spotify, there's a comment section. Please like, send me a comment. I'd love to hear what you thought of the episode. If you're watching this on YouTube, you can do the same thing in the comments below and there's information in the description. And of course, if you're listening to this on your favorite podcast app, hit me up in my socials. The links are in the show notes. I'd love to hear from you. Thank you so much for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time, and happy conservation.