To help protect North Atlantic right whales and other whale species, Fisheries and Oceans Canada had planned new regulations stating that non-tended fixed gear fisheries in Atlantic Canada and Quebec, including the snow crab and lobster fisheries, would be required to use whalesafe gear. While the timeline for implementing this is still being determined,  DFO’s Whalesafe Gear Adoption Fund (WSGF) has providing assistance towards the purchase, testing, and refinement of whalesafe gear in advance of making gear innovations fully operational. 


Whalesafe gear falls into two general categories: 1) low breaking-strength rope or links that are designed to break at 1,700 pounds of force, and 2) systems that allow fishing gear to be deployed without a vertical line in the water (either rope-on-demand systems that stow buoy lines at the sea floor, or inflatable bag systems that eliminate buoy lines). 


FNFA conducted a project under the WSGF program that tested a variety of innovative low breaking-strength devices for our lobster and crab fisheries from Spring 2022 to Spring 2023. The main goal of the project was to develop configurations of weak endlines for lobster and crab gear in the Bay of Fundy that would reduce the risk of entanglement to marine mammals, while being successfully fished. For a report of the results and data, please see the final report.