Turtle excluder devices
Turtle excluder devices (TEDs) are specialized grids inserted into shrimp trawl nets, designed to allow sea turtles and other large marine animals to escape while retaining shrimp and smaller fish. These devices have become a significant regulatory requirement for commercial shrimp boats operating in the United States, particularly during sea turtle nesting months from April to September along the southeastern Atlantic coast and Gulf of Mexico. The implementation of TEDs stems from concerns about the high bycatch rates of sea turtles, with an estimated 50,000 turtles caught annually in shrimp nets, leading to thousands of deaths, primarily of loggerheads.
While proponents of TEDs argue that they are crucial for protecting endangered sea turtle populations and are over 97 percent effective in preventing turtle bycatch, some shrimpers contest these regulations, claiming they result in significant losses of shrimp catch and may push the industry towards environmentally harmful shrimp farming. The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has mandated the use of TEDs since 1988 and has enforced import bans on shrimp from countries not adhering to these regulations. Critics often draw parallels to previous conflicts in the fishing industry, such as the debates over dolphin-safe tuna nets, highlighting ongoing tensions between conservation efforts and commercial fishing practices. Despite the challenges, many environmental advocates assert that TEDs can enhance operational efficiency by reducing bycatch and associated costs.
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Turtle excluder devices
DEFINITION: Grids inserted into shrimp trawl nets for the purpose of allowing sea turtles to escape
Many shrimpers object to U.S. regulations requiring them to use devices in their nets for the protection of sea turtles, asserting that the practice hinders their ability to harvest shrimp. Some also argue that the regulations have resulted in the growth of shrimp farming, an industry responsible for a number of negative environmental impacts.
Each year some fifty thousand sea turtles are accidentally trapped in drift nets on shrimp boats, and an estimated eleven thousand of them die. The large majority of those turtles killed are loggerheads, with a small percentage being Kemp’s ridleys. As sea turtles must go to the surface to breathe approximately every fifty minutes, shrimp boats trawling for more than one hour will drown sea turtles that are caught in their nets. When fitted properly with a turtle excluder device (TED), a shrimp boat net will catch only shrimp and small, nontarget fish of similar size. Larger marine life such as sea turtles, sharks, and large fish can escape through a hatch near the end of the net. A shrimp boat without a TED generally dumps 12 pounds of dead and useless bycatch overboard for each pound of harvested shrimp. The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), a division of the U.S. Department of Commerce, requires TEDs on commercial shrimp boats operated out of the United States. TEDs are used during sea turtlenesting months (April to September) along the southeastern Atlantic coast and the Gulf of Mexico.
Many commercial fishers have protested the requirement that they use TEDs, claiming that they lose 20 percent of their catches because shrimp are dumped through the escape hatches. The situation is comparable to the earlier conflict between tuna fishers and advocates of dolphin protection. According to the US National Marine Fisheries Service, TED devices are 97 percent effective in preventing turtle bycatch. A 2021 report from the organization recommended continuing the mandatory use of TEDs. The NMFS, noting that tuna fishers eventually acclimated to the use of dolphin-safe nets, requires shrimpers to modify their trawl nets to prevent a high rate of sea turtles. Some environmentalists argue that shrimp boats using TEDs are more efficient and economical because they reduce fuel costs by excluding the drag and excess weight of large sea turtles and other marine animals and fish. TEDs additionally prevent shrimp from being crushed or damaged by the weight of sea turtles pushing against them in the nets.
The NMFS requirement that all shrimpers use TEDs went into effect in May, 1988, and in 1989 the U.S. government passed legislation banning the importation of shrimp from any country that does not use equipment on its shrimp boats to prevent turtle drownings. A major supporter of this legislation was the Center for Marine Conservation, one of the world’s largest nonprofit agencies devoted to the protection of marine animals, plants, habitats, and resources. Earth Island Institute also led the way in convincing the federal government to enforce the ban by asking politicians to make saving sea turtles an international effort.
The countries most widely affected by U.S. TED laws are Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, French Guiana, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela. All of these countries have agreed to comply with the TED laws and have also promoted shrimp farming as an alternative to ocean trawling.
Bibliography
"History of Turtle Excluder Devices." NOAA Fisheries, 5 Mar. 2024, www.fisheries.noaa.gov/southeast/bycatch/history-turtle-excluder-devices. Accessed 24 July 2024.
Kaczka, David. “Use of Turtle Excluder Devices to Save Sea Turtles Around the World.” In Foundations of Natural Resources Policy and Management, edited by Tim W. Clark, Andrew R. Willard, and Christina M. Cromley. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2000.
Kennelly, Steven J., ed. By-catch Reduction in the World’s Fisheries. New York: Springer, 2007.
Safina, Carl. Voyage of the Turtle: In Pursuit of the Earth’s Last Dinosaur. New York: Henry Holt, 2007.