Before dawn in the coastal Maine town of Jonesport, Nick Perreault wakes up, caffeinates, and prepares before his day fishing for lobster. Driving through town, Perreault mentally gears up for another day of captaining his fishing vessel. He boards his boat garbed in layers, waterproof boots, and oil pants, and navigates out of the harbor. Operating without a deckhand, he baits, empties, stacks, and drops traps. Much of his day involves rubberbanding the lobsters’ claws, checking regulatory requirements like size minimums, and returning undersize catches back to the ocean. The frozen fish bait is pungent, which for many fishers can worsen seasickness. (Perreault’s antidote: Dramamine.)
After a day out on the water, Perreault returns to the wharf, offloads his catch, and restocks bait and fuel before heading back to the mooring. Days are long. Record-keeping with the state’s regulatory agency, boat maintenance, and next-day preparations are all part of the daily routine of lobster fishers. Later in the evening he unwinds at home with a shower and checks the weather forecast for the following day. “Although [mentally unwinding] is easier said than done. As a fisherman, it seems the gears are always turning, and it’s difficult to totally disconnect from fishing,” he says.
A fifth-generation lobsterman who sees his work as part of his family’s legacy, Perreault is one of Maine’s roughly 5,000 lobster harvesters, and among the approximately 25,500 commercial fishers across New England. The regional fishing industry once used to employ even more. Numbers have decreased in recent decades due to a variety of factors, not least of which is climate change. By one estimate, climate change reduced direct fishing jobs in New England by an estimated 16 percent between 1996 and 2017. That figure is just for those working as commercial fishers, not the nearly 300,000 jobs across the region provided by the fisheries.
Much like the 58.5 million people worldwide who work in this industry, New England fishers, too, have been experiencing firsthand the impacts of a warming planet. They feel it not only in declining catches but also in the growing tension between sustaining their livelihoods and safeguarding our increasingly fragile marine ecosystems.
As New England works to adapt to climate change, those in the fishing industry hope they will be consulted on policy matters, something many feel has been lacking in past environmental policymaking. “When some practices are mandated without significant data or input from fishermen, this creates fear and tension within the local community and can severely impact the local economy, fishing businesses, and the well-being of fishermen themselves,” says Monique Coombs, who comes from a fishing family and writes about the industry.
“A fisherman’s perspective is very different from my own,” agrees Jessica Reilly-Moman, a social scientist affiliated with the University of Maine’s Darling Marine Center. Reilly-Moman, who researches coastal climate resilience, says that over time she’s learned that her work needs “to be about this broader social and physical infrastructure that supports communities.” After all, they are the people most invested in the health of their ocean ecosystem.
“Nobody cares more about the marine environment [than those] who make their living from it, and that’s the point we want to drive home,” Perreault says. “It means so much to us. We care more than anyone, and I can say that without hesitation.”
As the climate changes, tapping into that care while readying coastal and fishing communities for inevitable changes becomes increasingly important, whether that means altering traditional practices, adopting new technologies, or even relocating. But Perreault, like many lobster harvesters and other fishers, doesn’t plan to stop fishing anytime soon. “These are dark times. They really are, and none of that is lost on any of us,” he says. “But I think everyone will just put their head down and keep fishing because we have to. We have no choice but to keep fishing until we can’t anymore.”