There were no problems Thursday as Canadian lobstermen moved into a disputed fishing area off Grand Manan and began setting their traps alongside Maine fishermen, according to the Maine Marine Patrol.

Lt. Alan Talbot said there was a thick fog as approximately five Canadian fishing boats showed up and began setting gear. The few Maine lobstermen who were there carried on with business as usual, he said.

“There were no problems,” Talbot said.

Maine and Canadian law enforcement officers were on hand for the first day Grand Manan lobstermen were permitted to exercise a special license condition allowing them to fish out of season in the 110-square-mile gray area off Grand Manan Island.

New Brunswick lobster season runs from the second Tuesday in November until the end of June, but the Canadian government gave 20 Grand Manan fishermen permission to begin fishing Aug. 15 in response to a situation that Grand Manan lobstermen saw as unfair.

The gray area has some very fertile lobster ground that is most productive in the summer months, according to the Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association.

Melanie Sonnenberg, project manager for the fishermen’s association, said earlier in the week that Maine fishing pressure on the area has increased to the point that the area was “fished out” by the time the Grand Manan fishermen arrived in November.

But Nick Lemieux, one of the Cutler lobstermen who fish the gray area, said Thursday that there may be increased fishing pressure, but the reason Grand Manan fishermen don’t catch lobster there in November is because the lobsters have already begun migrating to their winter hibernation grounds.

“They seem to migrate a little earlier every year, ” Lemieux said.

Lemieux said he and other area lobstermen believe the Canadians should open their season in October as opposed to November rather than issue special conditions that allow the 20 Canadian fishermen to begin lobstering in the gray area in mid-August.

The 20 fishermen will be permitted to set 7,500 traps in an area that the Maine Department of Marine Resources estimates is already home to 12,000 Maine lobster traps.

Lemieux said all of those traps will be in the most productive areas and, although he’s afraid of potential gear conflicts, his biggest concern is the difference in Maine and Canadian lobster conservation measures.

“They’ll be fishing on our brood stock and our v-notch,” he said. “That’s our strongest reason for opposing this and we’re very upset about it.”

Lemieux said Maine lobstermen have to throw back large lobsters – where the carapace measures 5 inches – and the Canadians do not.

The Canadians have a v-notch program, but it is nowhere near as strict as Maine’s, he said.

Maine’s v-notch program began in the mid-1950s when lobstermen – looking for a way to build the resource – created a seed lobster fund through a surcharge on licenses, he said. The money was used to buy female lobsters, which were distributed all along the coast.

The females are marked with a v-notch cut into their second flipper so that the lobsters could never be sold. Maine has strict prohibitions on taking lobsters with mutilated tails, he said.

The Canadians have a v-notch program as well, but they’ll take lobsters with mutilated tails, which – if you read between the lines – means someone could just nick or cut off the flipper, he said.

It will be difficult fishing alongside someone who can catch what you have to throw back in, he said.

Despite those concerns and his fear that so much additional gear will cause problems in a small area, Lemieux said he’ll go out Monday as usual to haul his traps in the gray area.

“I’m afraid it’s going to be a complete mess, but it looks like that’s the way it’s got to be,” he said.