P.E.I.'s fall lobster season wraps up with high catches, prices

P.E.I. fishermen hauled in as many lobsters this fall as they did last year more, in some areas and the P.E.I. Fishermen's Association is crediting the good weather.

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The season, which began the first week of August, wrapped up Monday for 225 Island fishermen, who share the waters with nearly 500 from New Brunswickand a handful from Nova Scotia.

"The weather this year was unheard of,"PEIFA president CraigAvery enthusiastically told CBC Radio: Mainstreet's Angela Walker.

"There was only probably a couple of lost fishing days and you know with that, that kind of helped the catches for sure."

Better prices, too

Fishermen in both the spring and fall season saw better prices than the previous year.

The current price for smaller canner-size lobsters is $6.25 per pound, and $6.50 a pound for the larger market lobsters.

A 12-member Lobster Marketing Board will sit down in the coming weeks, Avery said, to put a marketing plan in place to spend the cent-per-pound levy collected from fishermen for the first time this season, expected to be in the range of $300,000.

"I'm hoping they'll put a plan in place within the next couple of months and we'll get the thing going," said Avery.

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