Staff Spotlight: Meet Laura Skrobe

Laura Skrobe, Rhode Island Sea Grant Sustainable Fisheries Extension’s new co-leader, began working for Sea Grant shortly after receiving her Master of Science in fisheries from the University of Rhode Island in 1998.

Originally from Brooklyn, N.Y., Skrobe became interested in the marine environment as a child, when she summered with her family on Shelter Island, off Long Island, and spent every day at the beach. She majored in marine biology at Southampton College at Long Island University, where she developed her interest in fisheries. “I took one fisheries class, and said, ‘OK, this is what I want to do,’” she says.

Fisheries Extension, which undertakes outreach and applied research on fisheries issues, works with fishermen on a variety of projects, Skrobe says, often at the fishermen’s request.

“The fishermen have the ideas, knowledge, and skills in the field that combined with our scientific skills makes for a complete project,” Skrobe says. She adds that the fisheries program has an “open-door policy” towards the fishermen, who have come to them with ideas for research projects and gear designs to test. Skrobe says Fisheries Extension helps them write grant proposals and works with them collecting data or testing gear.

She cites the recent testing of a new haddock net, the “Eliminator Trawl,” that was designed by three fishermen and a net builder. Before they approached Fisheries Extension, the fishermen tested a version in the field and created a small-scale prototype of the net that was designed to target haddock and reduce the bycatch of other species. They had taken it to the flume tank at the Centre for Sustainable Aquatic Resources at Memorial University of Newfoundland (see www.mi.mun.ca/csar) for testing and modifying.

With Fisheries Extension’s help, they obtained funding from the National Marine Fisheries Service’s (NOAA Fisheries) Cooperative Research Partners Program for a full-scale study, which proved the success of their design. More information about that study is available on-line at seagrant.gso.uri.edu/fisheries/haddock.

In the case of a collaborative study, also proposed by fishermen, to study the use of ventless scup pots to supplement trawl survey information on scup populations, Skrobe doesn’t get to spend any time on the water at all. The project’s hypothesis is that the pots, which can be used in rocky, shallow waters, where trawlers are unable to go, collect larger scup, which are found around such rocks, providing a more accurate picture of scup size populations. Skrobe helped train the fishermen, who now conduct the research on their own, while she provides administrative support.

Skrobe is philosophical about the turn her work has taken. “The fishermen are the ones who have the real practical skills because they’re out there and have been doing it for years,” she says.

Her other roles in the fisheries program include administering the $2.3 million Lobster Research Initiative grant (see seagrant.gso.uri.edu/fisheries/lobster_initiative/index.html) and serving on the Haddock 2007 international symposium steering committee (see www.seagrant.unh.edu/haddock.html).

If Skrobe misses spending as much time on the water as she used to, she is looking forward to an event that will take her out of the office, at least for a little while—she is expecting fraternal twin girls on September 5 (or sooner, she hopes).

Skrobe lives in South Kingstown with her husband of nearly 10 years, Jim Gwiazdzinski, their two dogs, a cat, and several birds. But no fish.