Conditions in the Gulf of Maine have changed rapidly over the last decade, and fishermen have been at the front-lines of these changes. Many of the ecological changes being discussed, including the explosion of green crabs, the collapse of northern shrimp, and the appearance of southerly species like black sea bass, were reported by fishermen well before they were noted by the scientific community.

Given that the pace of change is accelerating, there is a growing need to detect changes in the water quickly. This project is an effort to collect observations submitted by fishermen and other interested marine users to begin to build a database of observations over time to document change. less ↑