June 10, 2014 — As the Bering Sea's largest fishery opened on Tuesday, pollock fishermen were looking forward to a strong B season. They were also wading through a tide of criticism from rural users, who believe the industry's catching too much salmon.
Brent Paine represents more than 70 pollock trawlers for United Catcher Boats.
"I think a lot of the cooperatives are going to start early — like right now or this week — because of their concern for Chinook salmon bycatch," Paine says. "That tends to increase in the later part of the B season."
On top of that, many vessels will be using excluder nets to let salmon escape. And Paine says they'll all participate in the rolling hotspot closure program — avoiding areas where other trawlers have run into high concentrations of salmon.
But those tactics aren't enough to relieve tension between commercial and subsistence fishermen. It came to a head last week, when the North Pacific Fishery Management Council met in Nome.
"It was probably one of the toughest meetings I’ve attended in 20 years," Paine says.