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Pacific halibut catches for 2018 won’t decline as severely as initially feared, but the fishery faces headwinds from several directions. Federal fishery managers announced just a few days before the March 24 start of the halibut opener that commercial catches for Alaska will be down 10 percent for a total of 17.5 million pounds. The industry was on tenterhooks awaiting the catch information, which typically is announced by the International Pacific Halibut Commission in late January. However, representatives from the U.S. and Canada could n...
“It’s what’s on the inside that counts” is the message Alaska crab marketers are pushing to their customers, encouraging them to put appearances aside. “We’re telling them to Get Ugly,” said Tyson Fick, executive director of the trade group, Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers, speaking of the new campaign launched last week in partnership with the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute at the big Seafood Expo in Boston. The promotion showcases Alaska crabs with darker, discolored or scarred shells or adorned with barnacles, that may be less appealing to...
The borough assembly on Monday approved a trip to Washington, D.C., where two Petersburg representatives will advocate for its federal priorities. The trip puts the borough over its travel budget by nearly $5,000, a point of dispute members had before voting. The borough on Monday scheduled a trip to D.C. for the end of January 2018. The borough manager and mayor will spend about three days in meetings with lawmakers trying to advocate for federal money for Petersburg. Kurt Wohlhueter began his discussion -- and later repeated it -- on the...
The biggest year classes of Alaska fishermen are phasing out of the business and fewer young cohorts are recruiting in. The Alaska Young Fishermen’s Summit has convened over a decade to help stanch that outward flow, and facilitate a future for fishing leaders. The average age of a commercial fisherman in Alaska was 50 in 2014 compared to 40 in 1980. At the same time, the number of Alaskans under 40 holding fishing permits fell to just 17 percent, down from nearly 40 percent of total permits across the state. The Summit coming up this year A...
The Southeast Alaska 2018 pink salmon harvest is predicted to be in the average range, with a point estimate of 23 million fish (80% confidence interval: 3–44 million fish). An actual harvest of 23 million pink salmon would be below the recent 10-year average harvest of 38 million pink salmon, but near the average even-year harvest since 1960 (25 million). The 2018 pink salmon harvest forecast was based on the average of 5 recent even-year harvests (2008, 2010, 2012, 2014, and 2016). Forecast Discussion: The 2018 harvest forecast of 23 m...
Fewer men and women went out fishing in Alaska last year, in a familiar cycle that reflects the vagaries of Mother Nature. A focus on commercial fishing in the November Alaska Economic Trends by the State Department of Labor shows that the number of boots on deck fell by five percent in 2016 to about 7,860 harvesters, driven by the huge shortfall in pink salmon returns and big declines in crab quotas. Fishing for salmon, which accounts for the majority of Alaska’s fishing jobs, fell by 6.4 percent statewide in 2016, a loss of 323 workers. T...
Preliminary harvest and value figures for the 2017 commercial salmon fishery indicate the season was a step up above the previous year's disastrous harvest. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game reported a 66.7-percent increase in exvessel value between the two years, with 224.6 million wild salmon worth around $678.8 million brought in by the state's fishing fleet. Chum salmon saw the biggest boon of the year, breaking records with 25.2 million fish, worth about $128.3 million. The haul...
First the bad news. Stakeholders were stunned to learn that surveys yielded the lowest numbers ever for Pacific cod in the federally managed waters of the Gulf of Alaska, meaning from three to 200 miles offshore. Seafood.com was the first to report the bad news as the North Pacific Fishery Management Council meeting got underway last week in Anchorage. Fisheries biologist Steve Barbeaux of the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle said the summer survey, done every other year, revealed that the cod year classes for 2012 and 2013 appeared...
August 31, 1917 – The Petersburg public schools open for the new term next Tuesday morning. Miss Burke, of Seattle to set to fill the vacancy left by Miss Murphy, of Montana. She is expected to arrive on the City of Seattle, together with Miss Kirchiem, from Tacoma. Miss Edna Miller, who has been attending the State Normal School at Bellingham for the summer term, has arrived back home on the Al-Ki. Miss Taylor, who has been here since early summer is the fourth member of the teaching corps. Arrangements as to grades to be taught by each w...
Alaska’s salmon season is winding down and while catches have made the record books in some regions, the statewide take will fall a bit short of the 204 million fish forecast. “We are within about 10 percent of the forecast, so that’s very positive and overall it’s been a pretty good season,” said Forrest Bowers, deputy director of the commercial fisheries division of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. The statewide salmon catch through Friday topped 191 million. The shortfall, Bowers said, again stems from the arrival of fewer pink salmon...
WRANGELL — One of Wrangell’s two seafood processors has drawn down production early for the season due to lower than expected returns this summer. Updated twice daily, on Tuesday the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Blue Sheet reported just over 143 million salmon have been harvested statewide, though numbers were not available for the Bristol Bay, Kuskokwim and Aleutian Islands districts. Seventy-four percent of these are pink salmon, with over 106 million already reported in. Coming off of last year’s season – declared a “disaster...
“It’s time for a checkup from the neck up” – meaning an industry time out to evaluate fishing operations and behaviors, advises Jerry Dzugan, director of the Sitka-based Alaska Marine Safety Education Association for over 30 years. Dzugan was speaking in response to the 11 fishing deaths that have occurred in Alaska so far this year. It’s the most in 13 years and follows a 76 percent decrease in commercial fishing fatalities since the 1980s. “The causes are still capsizing, sinkings, swampings and man overboards (MOBs). They haven’t cha...
As predicted, Alaska fishermen are getting higher prices for their salmon this year. It’s good news following a 2016 season that saw lackluster catches in all regions but Bristol Bay, a failure of pink salmon runs, and paltry pay checks nearly across the board. Prices paid to Alaska salmon fishermen depend on the region, the species, the type of fishing gear and, most importantly, global market conditions. Salmon prices also reflect bonuses for iced fish, dock deliveries and other agreements between a buyer and seller. As a fishing season u...
It’s been a fairly good start to the summer for king salmon fishermen. The first opening of that troll season started on July 1, abruptly ending by emergency order just before midnight on July 4. The order was based on preliminary catch rate and effort data. “It looks like we did take the target harvest,” reported Grant Hagerman, ADFG’s region troll management biologist in Sitka. That target is 63,000 non-Alaska hatchery fish, as laid out by the Pacific Salmon Treaty signed with Canada. A total of approximately 26,000 Chinook and 550 landings h...
China holds big promise to become a top customer for Alaska salmon, and not just for the bright red fillets. Since 2011 China has been the number one customer for Alaska seafood with purchases nearing $800 million and comprising 54 percent of all Alaska exports to China. In Chinese food culture, fish symbolizes abundance and prosperity, which plays into a growing middle class that now earns the equivalent of about $25,000 in U.S. dollars a year. That gives buyers significant disposable income to spend on more high-end foods, such as salmon....
Home grown shellfish and kelp are gaining momentum in Alaska, spurred on by growing markets and the steadfast push by Governor Walker’s visionary mariculture task force. Applications for more than 1,000 acres of oyster and kelp farms were filed with the Department of Natural Resources by the April 30 deadline, far more than usual. Fifteen are for new farms in the Southeast, Southcentral and Westward regions of which seven plan to grow kelp exclusively. Two farms at Klawok also are adding kelp to their current oyster growing operations. ...
Alaska salmon managers are hoping for the best and planning for the worst as lawmakers extend into a third special session to try and agree on a state budget. It is the third year in a row they have not finished their legislative session on time due to budget differences. The haggling, which could last up to 30 days, means pink slips could go out to all state workers in less than two weeks in advance of job layoffs. “It’s similar to what happened last year. Pink slips go out on June 1 and then we have to start getting people out because they ca...
Alaska’s salmon season officially gets underway in less than two weeks! The first fishery for sockeye and king salmon is set for May 18 at Copper River and the town of Cordova is buzzing, said Christa Hoover, executive director of the Copper River/Prince William Sound Marketing Association. “The mood changes at the start of May with all the folks back in town and boats going in and out of the water,” she said. Enthusiasm among the fleet of more than 500 drift gillnetters has not been dampened by a reduced harvest projection. Fishery manag...
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game released its forecast for commercial salmon harvests this year, projecting a strong run of pinks for Southeast in 2017. If panning out as projected, the news should come as a relief to the region's fishermen after a disappointing 2016 harvest. The report details last year's commercial salmon season, which had come in about 30 percent lower than forecast. Alaska fishermen caught 112,500,000 salmon in 2016, of which 52.9 million had been sockeye and 39...
Alaska salmon fishermen could haul in a harvest that nearly doubles last year’s catch, due to a projected uptick in the number of pinks. An Alaska Department of Fish and Game report on 2017 salmon run forecasts and harvest projections pegs the total catch at 204 million fish. That compares to just over 112 million salmon taken by fishermen in 2016. The catch last season included 53 million sockeye salmon—the fifth largest harvest since 1970—but only 39 million pink salmon, the smallest harvest since 1977. For this year, the forecast calls for a...
WRANGELL – At its rescheduled meeting last week, the City and Borough Assembly approved a bid by the Stikine Inn to purchase adjacent tidelands for less than assessed value. Southeast Properties LLC, which has owned the hotel for a decade, proposed purchasing from the city 5,450 square feet of submerged tidelands and 2,000 square feet of uplands to the north and west of the property's current boundaries. The assessed value of the site was at $101,200, based on estimated fair market value as...
PETERSBURG (AP) – A seafood processing company will stop canning salmon at its facility in the southeast Alaska city of Petersburg this year in response to a growing demand for frozen salmon. Tom Sunderland, vice president of marketing for Ocean Beauty Seafoods, said the company will make more money selling frozen salmon than canned salmon this year. He said the company will focus on freezing salmon at its plant northwest of Petersburg in Excursion Inlet, which has “substantial freezing capacity,” KFSK-FM reported. “And by doing so, the hope is...
Shellfish, sea cucumbers, geoduck clams, seaweeds and biofuels are crops envisioned by a group of Alaskans who are crafting a framework for a statewide mariculture industry expansion. An 11-member task force created last February by Governor Walker has wasted no time advancing its mission to put a comprehensive report on Walker’s desk by next March. The group, which has been meeting regularly, also has attracted wide interest from Alaskans who want to serve on advisory committees as the plan takes shape. The advisory committees include r...
Though last year’s season may have hurt, Alaska fishermen may take some comfort in a disaster declaration made by the Department of Commerce last month. Then-Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker determined it and eight other commercial fisheries along the West Coast to have been failures, in a January 18 announcement. Low pink salmon runs across the Gulf of Alaska led to a significant drop in 2016 harvest numbers. This declaration provides Congress with a basis to appropriate disaster relief funding for economic assistance to affected c...
More Pacific halibut will be going to market this year due to an overall boost in the harvests for the West Coast, British Columbia and Alaska. The coast wide catch of 31.4 million pounds reflects a 5.1 percent increase, and for the first time in decades, not a single fishing region met with a decline in halibut catches. The International Pacific Halibut Commission, overseer of the stocks since 1923, released the heartening news on Friday. Halibut catch limits are determined by summer surveys at more than 1,200 stations from Oregon to the...
