Dumping day: Lobster fishing season opens in southwestern Nova Scotia

Nova Scotia’s fall lobster fishing season opened early today in the two most lucrative fishing areas in Canada.

The annual event off southwestern Nova Scotia is known as “dumping day,” as thousands of lobster traps will be dumped into the water in the days ahead.

Hundreds of boats set sail for the lobster fishing areas known as LFA 33 and LFA 34, which extend from Halifax on the Atlantic coast to Digby, N.S., along the Bay of Fundy.

Nova Scotia generated more than half of the $1.5-billion landed value of Canada’s lobster harvest in 2019.

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As well, more than half of the 3,000 commercial lobster fishing licences in the Maritimes are held by fishing enterprises in southwestern Nova Scotia.

Lobster fishing has been the backbone of the Maritimes’ inshore fishing industry for the past 20 years, supporting about 7,500 direct jobs.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 1, 2021.