Seiners

small commercial fishing vessel
A small commercial fishing vessel of unknown type, although the bushels on deck would imply that she was after some kind of shellfish.

There are three basic types of commercial fishing vessels found in the Mid-Atlantic region: trawlers, seiners/gill-netters, and long-liners. A trawler or "dragger" operates by towing its fishing gear across the bottom. Weighted nets take bottom fishes, while cage-like steel dredges take clams and scallops. A seiner uses a floating net to encircle schools of surface-swimming fishes such as herring and tuna. A long-liner sets out miles of buoyed line with baited hooks to catch sharks, tuna, and swordfish. One could also add lobster boats and charter fishing or "head" boats to this list. And of course, dive boats.



Beach Haven reef
Originally built for menhaden fishing, converted to clam dredge.
Type:
artificial reef, purse seiner, clam dredge, USA
Built:
1949, RTC Shipbuilding Company, Camden NJ USA
Specs:
( 125 x 21 ft )
Sponsor:
Gifford Marine Company, Fish America Foundation, Artificial Reef Association
Sunk:
Thursday August 6, 1992 - Atlantic City Artificial Reef
GPS:
39°15.340' -74°14.017'


Type:
artificial reef, freighter, purse seiner
Built:
1944, JK Welding - Yonkers NY, as FS-355 (US Army)
Specs:
( 166 x 32 ft ) 542 tons
Sunk:
Thursday, Jan 21, 2021 - DelJerseyLand Artificial Reef
GPS:
38°31.340' -74°30.671'
Depth:
125 ft

John S Dempster Jr. is sister to Shearwater and Reedville, see those vessels for details, links in the sidebar. All three vessels were originally small Army transports, converted to Menhaden fishing by Omega Protein company. FS-355 was USCG-manned, and retained by USA as PVT Carl V. Sheridan (see below) until sold in 1972.

The aging Shearwater and Reedville were retired when Omega got two new modern vessels in 2017, but Dempster was kept as a reserve. Finally, almost 80 years old, the Dempster was sent to her reward as well. Another sister, Tangier Island, was reefed off Georgia in 2020. As of 2023, one old sister remains - Smuggler's Point, FS-400, launched in 1944!




Harbor Seal

Phoca vitulina

by Larry Sarner

Wild seals conjure up images of northern or even Arctic climates. But few people know that more than a hundred harbor seals call New Jersey home during the winter months, coming ashore into isolated estuaries and even upstream into a few rivers.

New Jersey is near the southern limits of the range for harbor seals on the East Coast. However, these seals are frequent visitors offshore in winter and even have been reported as far south as the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay in Virginia and off the coast of North Carolina. The winter seal-sighting season runs from December through March. Seals generally leave the New Jersey coast by the second week in April, probably responding to rising air and water temperatures and the increase in human activity.

Printed from njscuba.net