Maine lobstermen are roaring about and pulling traps with power winches, their engines growling and radios blaring rock ‘n’ roll and country music. Hussey works in solitude, waves lapping gently against his boat, a bell buoy clanging gently in the background. Perhaps in Maine — earn a day’s pay rowing to his traps and hauling them by hand.
Actually lobstermen want to cut their fuel use as they believe that this is not a novelty act or a protest, it’s supposed to be a small freestanding business. Before the gasoline engine, lobster boats were powered by oar and wind. Nowadays, virtually all of Maine’s nearly 6,000 licensed lobstermen work aboard power boats with the latest sonar, radar and GPS and engines that can top out at 1000 horsepower or more.
Most of the lobstermen’s harvest and income will fall — sharply — fishing this way. They will be happy to make half the money they did working on a power vessel.
Lobstermen on Matinicus, the most remote of Maine’s 15 year-round island communities, are known to be protective of their rich fishing grounds. The island drew national attention last summer when a lobsterman shot a fellow lobsterman in a territorial dispute.
