With Light Landings, Possible License Cap
ELLSWORTH — The glass eel fishing season opened last week, but the fishery’s future is less than transparent.

Fyke nets in the Union River and an elver buyer’s sign are sure indications that Spring has sprung in eastern Maine, whether there’s still snow on the riverbanks, the earth has turned to mud or, like this strange year, winter and mud season seem to have passed by with scarcely a nod.

As of early this week, the Department of Marine Resources (DMR) had issued 423 elver fishing licenses for the season that opened March 22 and ends May 31. If the Legislature gives its approval to pending legislation as expected, that number won’t increase. LD 2020 requires that, beginning in 2007, applicants for elver licenses must have held a license in the previous year. Any license that isn’t renewed would no longer be available to be issued.

Both fishermen and elver dealers said that the catch during the first few days of the season (no fishing is allowed over the weekend) was small and the price low. A few fishermen reported selling their catch for $70 per pound, while a major dealer in Hancock County said he was paying fishermen $50.

Although either price might sound good compared with what fishermen get for other species, the big number is deceptive. It takes about 2,500-3,000 glass eels to make 1 pound.

Glass eels can fetch as much as $300 per pound, but it takes 3,000 of the gummy worm-like critters to make that weight, and when a night’s fishing brings in only few netfulls like this it’s hard money whatever the price.

“The overall market doesn’t look good,” said Bill Sheldon, a longtime Hancock County elver buyer. “There’s no U.S. market. They all go overseas.”

Glass eels are a juvenile form of the American eel (Anguilla rostrata), which hatch in the Sargasso Sea in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and migrate to streams and rivers along the East Coast. Most of the elvers that make it past the gauntlet of nets that clog Mid-Atlantic and Maine streams spend the next eight to 25 years in fresh water (a small number stay in brackish, tidal water) before returning to the ocean to spawn and die.

The glass eels caught by Maine fishermen are exported to the Orient, primarily Japan and China, where they are raised to adult size in aquaculture facilities. Those fish farms also buy elvers from eastern waters and from Europe, which are ready to be caught months before the Maine season begins. If the fish farms are full, there is no interest in elvers from Maine.

“There are plenty of places to catch eels,” Sheldon said.

That’s the problem this year. In December and January, Japanese fishermen reportedly harvested more than 242,000 pounds of elvers, and Europe put another 88,000 pounds on the market.

“Those Asian farms are all full of eels,” Sheldon said. “We’re the last ones to come on line. We can’t influence the price.”

A decade ago, hordes of fishermen set out thousands of fyke nets in a quest to capture the tiny eels on their annual journey from the sea to fresh water. The funnel-shaped nets clogged even the smallest Maine streams, and fishermen battled one another for prime fishing space along the banks.

The incentive was clear. In 1995, with some 2,000 or more licensed fishermen at work, Maine elver landings reached nearly 17,000 worth more than $3.8 million.

Landings and prices remained strong through 1999, then the Japanese economy plummeted, and so did the Maine elver fishery. In 2000, elver landings dropped to just 655 pounds and brought in just $16,000 — a price of just $24.75 per pound. A year later, though landings increased to 1,700 pounds, the price hit rock bottom — $24.12 per pound.

In 1999, concern about overfishing and about a fishery that had developed a Wild West atmosphere, led the Legislature to cap the number of elver licenses. It also established a lottery in case there were more applicants than licenses.

Worries about the status of the American eel have only increased in recent years. A petition has been filed with the U.S. fish and Wildlife Service to have the eel listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act, and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) is studying whether it should impose new controls on the elver fishery. How those regulatory currents might affect Maine’s glass eel fishermen is uncertain, but one thing was clear.

This week, Sheldon was paying $50 per pound for glass eels, and he didn’t think the price would get much better this season.

“I don’t know if fishermen will fish for $50,” Sheldon said.