New rules have been announced for the crab fishery as a way to help protect North Atlantic right whales from becoming tangled in fishing gear.
Federal Fisheries Minister Dominic LeBlanc announced four measures, including a large reduction in the amount of rope that can be left floating on the surface.
Other rules require gear to be colour-coded for the area it’s being used, to have serial numbers to identify the owner and that any lost gear must be reported — along with its last G-P-S location.
At least 17 right whales died in Canada and the U-S last year, with a number of them found to be the result of entanglement in fishing gear.