The independent Maine Monitor reports (story here) that Maine’s fishing ports are doing well for now, but climate change is destabilizing the Gulf of Maine.
2025, like 2024, offered slightly cooler water temperatures after more than a decade of rapid and record-breaking warming in the Gulf of Maine. But the scientists predict that temperatures will warm again this fall, and will continue to rise long-term as the burning of fossil fuels releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. To weather these ongoing changes, fishermen and their communities need to diversify their businesses, experts say.
“Things don’t look particularly stable either in terms of the fishery or the ecosystem,” said Joseph Caracappa, a research biologist at NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center who edited the report.
Around 2012, the region suffered a major marine heatwave. In 2015, researchers published a now-famous study showing that the Gulf of Maine was warming faster than 99 percent of the ocean. But since about 2021, those temperatures have cooled down somewhat. The Gulf of Maine is still warmer than it was historically, but compared to the most recent very warm years, now is “kind of a nice reprieve” for marine species that prefer cooler water, Bachman said.
