Saving Seafood

ALASKA: Glacier Bay’s Alsek River predicted to shift course within a few decades due to climate change

April 16, 2021 — New research indicates that the Alsek River will change course dramatically over the next few decades. Geologists with the National Park Service predict that glacial retreat related to climate change may move the mouth of the river 20 miles away from its current location. This could pose challenges for raft trips and fishing in Glacier Bay National Park.

The Alsek River originates in the Yukon Territory and flows hundreds of miles south before emptying into the Pacific Ocean at Glacier Bay National Park. Near the end of its journey, the river widens into Alsek Lake. It’s currently separated from the Grand Plateau Lake by a glacier.

But when that glacier melts enough, the lakes will combine and eventually drain into the ocean down a steep embankment.

Michael Loso is a Park Service geologist who researches the Alsek changing course.

“Presently, the Alsek River can’t get there because this glacier, you know, this big pile of ice is in the way,” Loso said. “But really, the thrust of our paper is to make the case that once that glacier ice completely goes away, by a combination of melting and calving into the two lakes, you would be able to paddle your raft right on over to Grand Plateau Lake because the two lakes would be combined.”

Read the full story at KTOO

ALAKSA: Digitizing Quality Monitoring in Bristol Bay Enters its Second Year

April 16, 2021 — The following was released by the Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association:

Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association (BBRSDA), Certified Quality Foods (dba Seafood Analytics) and Digital Observers are teaming up for a second year to provide digital quality monitoring for the 2021 Bristol Bay sockeye salmon season. In 2020, despite of COVID challenges that infiltrated the region, the monitoring program was successfully completed. Quality measurements from over 6,000 sockeye salmon, off 200 boats, were taken by Digital Observers on five tenders through-out Bristol Bay. The Certified Quality Foods (CQF) cloud-based business intelligence platform analyzed the data and allowed for key takeaways around trendlines, comparisons between regions, seasons, boats, tenders etc. Generic reports were shared with leading industry professionals, while a detailed report with individual boat and tender names is available to the customer. A generic example of one of the reports can be seen here (https://mkcox.clicdata.com/b/bbrsdageneric).

Having a robust amount of data from the 2020 Bristol Bay sockeye season provides a valuable baseline for comparison of salmon quality and salmon fat content harvested each year.

During the 2021 fishing season, Quality Control technicians working on 15 tenders across Bristol Bay will measure the quality of salmon at the point of delivery using the noninvasive ‘Certified Quality Reader,’ a device that uses electrical currents to measure cell degradation of the salmon. It is a fast and objective way to measure the freshness of salmon that accounts for more than just temperature.

2021 is going to be a great year. The program is tripling its measurement capacity, and expanding from paper entry to digitized apps so other metrics such as odor, visual, temperature and whether the fish has been bled can be tracked in conjunction with quality measures. For an example of how a digital datasheet is used click here (https://youtu.be/rAQC0VZ1IEg).

Read the full release here

U.S. Seafoods apologizes to Unalaska after COVID-positive crew caused widespread exposure at local bar

April 16, 2021 — A Seattle seafood company issued an apology to the community of Unalaska after crew members from one of its vessels, at port in the island community, breached isolation protocols to visit a crowded local bar last weekend.

The resulting widespread exposure forced the city to move from the “medium” to “high” coronavirus risk level after nearly a month and a half at the lower threshold. Dozens of locals who visited the Norwegian Rat Saloon have been asked to quarantine and test for the virus, if they haven’t been vaccinated.

“We are extremely sorry about the events that occurred,” said Dave Wood, U.S. Seafoods’ chief operating officer. “We regret that these individuals made terrible decisions, put a lot of people at risk and harmed a lot of people. We are as outraged as you are.”

U.S. Seafoods officials said they’re still trying to figure out exactly what happened that night, shortly after the F/V Seafreeze America arrived in port.

The 240-foot vessel was fishing for yellowfin sole in the Bering Sea last week when a few of the 51 crew members on board started feeling COVID-19 symptoms. The company tested them on board, and rerouted the boat to Dutch Harbor to confirm the results and be closer to medical care, Wood said.

Read the full story at KUCB

ALASKA: Kodiak Fisheries Adjust to Tariffs, Pandemic and Climate Change

April 15, 2021 — For the first time in 20 years, China is not a viable market for U.S. seafood suppliers due to increased tariffs between the two countries, as well as complications caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. This uncertainty has raised concerns among Kodiak processors, harvesters and industry leaders.

In an effort to keep processors working, the trawl industry had requested that the rockfish season begin on April 1, one month earlier than is typically authorized.

Read the full story at Seafood News

King salmon in Western Alaska are getting smaller, and research suggests predators could be the reason

April 15, 2021 — The size of king salmon returning to Western Alaska rivers to spawn has been decreasing over the past few decades. Researchers at the University of Alaska Fairbanks think that they’re closer to understanding why.

Peter Westley and Andrew Seitz are fisheries scientists at the University of Alaska Fairbanks who helped publish new research on king salmon in February. To answer why these salmon are getting smaller, researchers attached tags to the fish that can record the depth and temperature of the water around them. Seitz said that many of the tags on the salmon were recording temperatures above 70 degrees Fahrenheit.

“And we thought, ‘Well, where is it, you know, in the high 70s in the winter in the Bering Sea, even at depth?’ And the only place that we can infer that is that warm is in the belly of a salmon shark,” Seitz said.

Westley and Seitz’s research indicates that returning king salmon are getting smaller because the bigger ones are getting eaten. They said that predators, like salmon sharks, may target the older, larger kings because they stand out. Seitz said that predators’ preference for larger fish may have always existed, but there could just be more predators now than in the past.

Read the full story at KTOO

Cod stocks creep back up for Gulf of Alaska, but remain down for Bering Sea, Aleutian Islands

April 15, 2021 — Pacific cod stocks have begun to rebound in the Gulf of Alaska, but the total allowable catch (TAC) for 2021 remains low at 17,321 metric tons. Last year, managers curtailed the fishery in federally managed waters after stock assessments put the biomass near the bottom of the threshold for conducting the fishery.

Though recruitment of younger cod and uncaught fish from last year have added to the abundance in most recent assessments, full recovery of the stock could take years. The warm-water “blob” of 2014 has been blamed for the crash.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Seafarers union looks to Alaska as it seeks hundreds of apprentice workers on contracted vessels

April 14, 2021 — Alaska fishermen displaced by the COVID pandemic are being recruited for seafaring jobs aboard U.S. cargo barges, tankers, towboats, military support vessels, research and cruise ships and more.

The Seafarers International Union is searching nationally for 300 apprentice workers on the vessels they are contracted to crew. Recruiters tout Alaskans as being at the top of their list.

“The reason for that is people from Alaska come with a work ethic already. They’ve been working since they could stand up. And that’s why they’re so good,” said Bart Rogers, assistant vice president at the Harry Lundeberg School of Seamanship in Maryland that has trained mariners for the union for over 50 years.

“It’s very appealing to people who live in Alaska because they can sail in a safe environment, earn a very good wage, get benefits and medical coverage for them and their family, advanced training is guaranteed, then they can go back home and spend the money they make,” said Rich Berkowitz, vice president of Pacific Coast Operations at Seattle’s Transportation Institute, who helps recruit and assess potential mariners, adding that it also includes options for veterans and Native hire.

Read the full story at the Anchorage Daily News

Alaska’s Herring Seasons Winding Down in Sitka, Ketchikan, and Kodiak, Togiak Ahead

April 14, 2021 — Herring sac roe harvests have begun winding down in Southeast Alaska and Kodiak, leaving the remaining fishery in Togiak for what used to be an early shot in the arm for seiners before salmon season started. While herring returns have increased in recent years, the market has fallen in size and value.

This year in Sitka, the herring sac roe fishery began March 27 and closed April 9 at 6 p.m. Preliminary estimates from processors put the total harvest at approximately 16,000 tons of herring. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game continue to conduct surveys as part of their stock assessment research. On April 12, the the cumulative estimate of observed herring spawn in Sitka Sound was 83.2 nautical miles.

Read the full story at Seafood News

ALASKA: Bering Sea fishermen likely had COVID-19 but still went to Unalaska bar. Now, locals have to quarantine.

April 14, 2021 — Unvaccinated people who visited Unalaska’s Norwegian Rat Saloon late Saturday are being asked to quarantine this week after officials say they shared the space with fishermen who broke their company’s own quarantine plans while they were awaiting COVID-19 testing results.

The fishermen came from a United States Seafoods vessel where COVID-19 cases were suspected, but they still visited the popular bar after 10 p.m., Unalaska City Manager Erin Reinders said Monday.

“There was a vessel that came into town on Saturday, and on that vessel, there’s been 26 confirmed individuals who tested positive for COVID-19 and then two additional presumed positive for COVID-19,” Reinders said. “There was a breach in the company’s isolation plan with some of those positive individuals, and due to that breach, that did cause a community exposure.”

Reinders said the fishing company is working on its plan for isolation and quarantine of its 51-person crew aboard the factory trawler Seafreeze America. She didn’t say whether they are quarantining on or off the boat.

The city, meanwhile, is considering what kind of action it could take against the crew members who knew they may have been COVID-positive and still breached quarantine to visit the saloon, said Reinders.

Read the full story at KTOO

As halibut decline, Alaska Native fishers square off against industrial fleet

April 14, 2021 — Each year in mid-June, Father John, dressed in long black robes, heads to the small boat harbor on St. Paul, a tiny island of 500 souls in the middle of the Bering Sea. It’s the start of the fishing season, and the Blessing of the Fleet is a community affair, an opportunity to give best wishes to the fishermen heading out into the unforgiving northern waters in search of halibut.

The island’s small, independent fishing fleet of only 15 vessels needs all the help it can get: Far offshore, factory trawlers targeting other fish species net and chuck overboard as waste millions of pounds of the valuable fish each year. “They’re killing our halibut,” says St. Paul fisherman Myron Melovidov, who fishes with his grown sons.

Pacific halibut are flat and bottom dwelling, and can weigh hundreds of pounds. About 20 years ago, the population started taking a dive, and St. Paul fishermen—as well as halibut fishermen across Alaska—faced increasing cuts in their harvest limits.

“A lot of people had to fold,” says Jeff Kauffman, a member of the St. Paul fishing fleet whose kids have grown up fishing on his boat.

Read the full story at National Geographic