Sorted by date Results 389 - 413 of 588
Seven times is the charm for building some momentum on a measure that aims to give personal use (PU) fisheries a priority over commercial and sport users. As it stands now, the three fisheries all are on equal footing in the eyes and actions of state managers. The priority shift has been introduced during each of the last seven legislative sessions by (now) Senator Bill Stoltze (R-Chugiak), but has never made it past a first hearing – until now. “It only took Sen. Stoltze, the bill sponsor, chairing the hearing committee himself,” quipp...
The Coast Guard Commercial Fishing Vessel Examiner will be conducting dockside examinations for commercial fishing vessels in Wrangell from April 1-3. Checkout our new vessel specific checklist generator located at www.fishsafe.info. This tool will allow you to print out a list of all safety requirements for your vessel prior to your exam. Mandatory exams are not required now but must be completed prior to Oct 15, 2015, for all commercial fishing vessels that operate beyond three miles off shore. Although you are not required to get an exam...
Print your licenses at home and go fishing. The Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game’s revamped Online Store is the go to place for all fishing (and hunting) licenses and it now offers two new features. “Fishermen, both sport and commercial, can now print their licenses at home. They can purchase it online, immediately print it and go out fishing,” said Michelle Kaelke, Financing and Licensing Supervisor for the department. “They can buy it before they go out to the fishing grounds, or if they’re traveling from Seattle or wherever, they can have ever...
PETERSBURG – The Sitka sac roe herring fishery will be done cooperatively this year, with processing completed in Sitka alone, meaning no fish tax for Petersburg. “This is an industry initiated cooperative,” Dave Gordon, area management biologist at the Department of Fish and Game, said of the co-op. He added that the sac roe herring market is “very poor right now,” and that the decision was made to eliminate competition and risk — to lower costs to “make it worthwhile to go after the product.” “The quota this year is quite small,” said Patr...
The Sitka Sound sac roe herring fishery opened at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday under a cooperative model. Dave Gordon, area management biologist at the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, said the decision was made by permit holders to eliminate competition and lower costs to “make it worthwhile to go after the product” as the market is poor. It wasn’t a popular decision among tenders, however. “There’s a lot less boats here,” said Tanner Mackiewicz, president of the Alaska Independent Tendermen’s Association. “A lot of people without jobs.” He said the...
A nearly $12 million cut in state funds is on tap for the Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game if state policy makers have their way. That was one early outcome of legislative House finance subcommittee meetings last week, as they wrapped up the first step in a budget process that will see cuts in agencies and programs almost across the board. According to Juneau Resources Weekly, the ADF&G budget reductions cut across all divisions with sport fishing facing the most personnel losses at 12 seasonal jobs. The Division of Habitat could lose $400,000;...
Right after the yearly halibut catch limits are announced each January, brokers usually are busy with buying and selling and transferring shares of the catch. But it’s been slow going so far, even with slight harvest increases in nearly all Alaska fishing areas for the first time in nearly a decade. The buyers are there – it’s the sellers that are scarce. “There’s less of a rush this year, but there are less quota shares available,” said Olivia Olsen at Alaskan Quota and Permits at Petersburg. “We’ve had some good sales in Southeast (2C),...
Last year was one of the busiest years ever for Alaska brokers who help fishermen buy, sell and trade fishing permits and quota shares. “I was really happy to see such a good mix of permits we were selling – it wasn’t just one thing,” said Olivia Olsen of Alaskan Quota and Permits in Petersburg. “We had a lot of Dungeness crab permits, charter halibut permits, salmon and shrimp permits, sea cucumbers, and then whatever IFQs we could find.” Salmon permit sales peak from March through May, and early indicators point to lower salmon prices this...
Lovers choose lobster as the top Valentine’s Day dish to share with that special someone. Crab legs and shrimp also get the nod as ‘romantic meals’ on Feb. 14 - one of the busiest dining out days for U.S. restaurants. In a national survey by Harris Interactive, chefs called lobster an “exotic delicacy that results in an intimate moment because it is hand-held and shareable.” In fact, respondents called all shellfish ‘a catalyst for connection like no other food.’ The links between seafood and love have a long history, including the belief th...
Freezer displays at Walmart superstores in Alaska and Washington now include a new lineup of 14 Alaska seafood items. The world's largest grocer announced the expanded commitment to Alaska seafood last week. "We are so proud to bring these to our customers, and we also know how important it is to local fishermen and folks across the state," said John Forrest Ales, Director of Corporate Communications for Walmart. Company stores already carry Alaska halibut and sockeye salmon. Added to the mix...
The need for a clear “fish first” policy in Alaska tops the list of priorities compiled by the Fisheries Transition Team for Governor Walker. The group also stated that “fish and fishermen in Alaska are viewed as barriers to development,” and that there is “irreplaceable optimism” that fish can coexist with development at any scale. Fisheries was just one of the topics that 250 Alaskans brainstormed about in 17 teams that newly elected Walker convened in late November. Their task was to identify the top five priorities in diverse categories,...
Alaska seafood marketers are ramping up promotions and bankrolling a $1 global million media blitz to counteract a tough sockeye salmon market. Sockeyes are by far the most valuable salmon catch, often worth two-thirds of the value of Alaska’s entire salmon fishery, but last summer’s unexpected surge of reds left lots of inventory in freezers, and record US imports of competing farmed salmon from Chile and Norway combined with the prospect of another big run at Bristol Bay make for a sockeye sales squeeze. Alaska’s approach will be patte...
Alaska seafood marketers are facing some strong headwinds heading into 2015, notably, for sockeye salmon and crab. Snow crab is Alaska’s largest crab fishery, underway now in the Bering Sea. The fleet has a slightly increased 61 million pound catch quota; boats also are tapping on a hefty bairdi Tanner crab catch, the larger cousin of snow crab. A 25% increase in snow crab, the unexpected 15 million pound Tanner fishery, a weak Japanese yen, plus several million pounds of Russian snow crab from a new fishery in the Barents Sea, (not to mention...
The Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (ADOT&PF) announced travel fares on the Alaska Marine Highway System will increase 4.5 percent starting May 1. The new fare structure went into effect with the new year, but will not affect reservations already made in advance. Some fares will not be affected by the new structure. The ADOT&PF release said fares that are “disproportionately higher” than the majority of AMHS fares will remain unchanged. The department reports the fare increase will help cover operating costs and mee...
7 Fish Picks and Pans Biggest fish wait and see: Senator-elect Dan Sullivan. Trickiest fishing conundrum: Sea otters vs. fisheries in Southeast Alaska. Best fishing career builder: University of Alaska/Southeast for its hydraulics and vessel electronics courses, fish tech training – all available on-line. Best Fish Givers: SeaShare, which has provided close to 200 million fish meals to food bank networks since 1994. Biggest fishing industry critic using questionable “facts:” Craig Medred, Alaska Dispatch News. Best fish reality show: Kodia...
Salmon will always be the heart of Alaska’s fisheries, and that’s why most people think of summer as the fishing season. But that’s not the case. The heart of winter is when Alaska’s largest fisheries get underway each year. On January first, hundreds of boats with hook and line gear or pots begin plying the waters of the Bering Sea and Gulf of Alaska for Pacific cod, rockfish and other groundfish. Then on January 20th trawlers take to the seas to target Alaska pollock, the world’s largest food fishery with annual harvests topping three bil...
Alaska seafood innovators are getting serious about ‘head to tail/inside and out’ usages of fish parts, and they see gold in all that gurry that ends up on cutting line floors. Fish oils, pet treats, animal feeds, gelatins, fish scales that put the shimmer in nail polish – “almost anything that can be made out of seafood byproducts has increased in value tremendously in the last few years,” said Peter Bechtel, a US Dept. of Agriculture researcher formerly at the University of Alaska. In today’s climate of planet consciousness “co-product...
It went down to the wire, but fishermen were relieved to learn they can continue to hose down their decks without fear of violating the Clean Water Act. Congress voted unanimously this week to extend a moratorium for three years that exempts commercial fishing vessels 79 feet and under from needing incidental discharge permits from the Environmental Protection Agency for deck wash. The current moratorium, which affects 8,500 Alaska vessels, was set to expire on Dec.18. The regulation is aimed at preventing fuels, toxins or hazardous wastes...
Local bird-watchers were pleased to see a specimen of White-winged Dove on the island this month, a species native to the Southwest United States, Central America and the Caribbean. Although it has been expanding into new habitat ranges, it is an unusual sight so far north. This is only the bird's third recorded appearance in Alaska; the first was in Skagway in 1981, and again in Wrangell in 2007. "It is rare," Bonnie Demerjian said. "Among birders, it's pretty exciting." Demerjian first spotted...
PETERSBURG – The Southeast Alaska Drift Gillnet and Purse Seine task forces met in Petersburg on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively, to review the 2014 season and discuss the 2015 season. On Tuesday, Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG) biologists from districts around Southeast presented a review of the 2014 season for various salmon species harvested by gillnetters. Justin Breese, ADFG biologist from Ketchikan, reported District 1, Tree Point, had an above average harvest for cohos and pink salmon and a below average harvest for sockey...
The Pacific halibut stock appears to be rising from the ashes and that bodes well for catches in some fishing regions next year. It would turn the tide of a decades-long decline that has caused halibut catches to be slashed by more than 70% in Alaska, Washington, Oregon and British Columbia. Three Alaska areas showed improvement in the annual stock surveys that range from Oregon to the Bering Sea, and could have higher catch levels in 2015. That’s according to information revealed at the International Pacific Halibut Commission’s interim mee...
SITKA, Alaska (AP) _ The Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced the preliminary guideline harvest level for the 2015 Sitka Sound sac roe herring fishery is 8,712 tons. That’s just over half of last year’s quota of 16,333 and the lowest expected GHL in more than 10 years. The preliminary harvest level is based on a 19.7 percent harvest rate of a mature biomass forecast of 44,237 tons, said Dave Gordon, area management biologist. The preliminary GHL is quite a bit below the 10-year average of 13,500, and far below the 2014 catch of 16,...
It’s the time of year when Alaska’s fishery meetings kick into high gear - with five set for this week alone. The industry will get a first glimpse of potential 2015 halibut catches when the International Pacific Halibut Commission convenes in Seattle, WA. It’s been a wait and see attitude among fish circles - will Alaska’s catch limits again be reduced, down already 70% over a decade to just 16 million pounds? Or has the Pacific halibut stock started to rebound as some of the science indicates? Tune into the IPHC meetings live via webinar...
Alaska is poised for some big fish stories next year based on predictions trickling in from state and federal managers. For the state’s (and nation’s) largest fishery - Alaska pollock - the Eastern Bering Sea stock has more than doubled its ten year average to top nine million tons, or 20 billion pounds. And the stock is healthy and growing, according to annual surveys. “It is one of the most stunning fisheries management successes on the planet,” exclaimed global market expert John Sackton when the pollock numbers were released by the (Seattl...
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries has released its annual report of commercial fish landings in 2013. The report outlines the top 50 ports by pounds of fish landed and value of fish landed. Nine of the top 20 major U.S. ports by millions of pounds of fish landed were in Alaskan communities, with Dutch Harbor ranking as the largest U.S. port with some 753 million fish landed in 2013 worth $197 million. Three Southeast towns ranked in the top 20 for 2013 including Ketchikan, ranked 12th with 144 million pounds...