Urchin Swipe Card on the Way

by Laurie Schreiber

A tractor trailer carrying urchins overturned and spread its load along US Route 1 in eastern Maine in this undated photo. Fishermen’s Voice photo

ELLSWORTH—The Department of Marine Resources (DMR) implemented a swipe card system for the elver fishery in time for the 2014 season.

Now it’s time for the urchin fishery.

DMR representatives have been meeting with the Sea Urchin Zone Council (SUZC), harvesters, and dealers to acquaint them with the workings of the swipe card system for the upcoming season. The system – including the cards themselves and the card readers – has proven successful for the elver fishery, reps said.

The mandatory electronic reporting system, commonly called a swipe card system, is designed to better manage the resource.

The initial goal of using the system in the elver fishing was to wipe out illegal harvesting that was prevalent for a couple of years. Illegal harvesting is not an issue in the urchin fishery. The general goal for fisheries is to track harvests in real-time, in order to better manage fisheries, said DMR Marine Resource Management Coordinator Trisha Cheney.

Marine Patrol Officers are empowered to override the system if a breakdown occurs. The system doesn’t replace harvester reporting.

At a recent SUZC meeting, DMR officials said that, if someone loses their card, they can call the DMR, which will deactivate it within seconds, until a new one is made. The readers used in the elver fishery have been functioning well in all kinds of weather. Harvesters simply show up at their dealer with their product, and the dealer will have the program up and running.

The system allows the DMR to have up-to-date, real-time data on the harvest. The DMR will be looking at whether the system can be used to allow harvesters to pick their own harvest days, said Cheney.

“This is the first year, and we want to make sure everything is working,” she said. “The next step is to see if this a way that we can verify how many days people fished. And if it is, then we can have a broader conversation about allowing people to pick their days.”