Federal regulators working to save plummeting cod stocks in the Gulf of Maine may decide this week to ban lobster fishing in parts of the ocean where cod spawn – an unprecedented step that raises jurisdictional questions over who calls the shots in managing commercial fisheries.

The New England Fishery Management Council is expected to vote on the lobster-gear proposal Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday when it meets in Newport, Rhode Island, to set rules for the 2015 groundfishing season, which begins in May.

The regulators are considering several steps – including closing some areas to all fishing during certain months – to protect cod stocks in coastal areas of the Gulf of Maine, where the cod population is at 3 to 4 percent of a level considered sustainable, its lowest since scientists began tracking the species 40 years ago.

Regulators are now examining whether the region’s lobster fishery is partly at fault. In 2008, the year for which the most recent data are available, an estimated 177,000 cod were captured in lobster traps in Maine state waters. If each fish weighed a pound, which would be small for that species, it would total 80 metric tons. A scientific committee last week recommended that the council set a catch limit for Gulf of Maine cod of 386 metric tons.

Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, said the proposal to ban lobster gear in the protected waters raises a “grave concern” among her members.

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