Saving Seafood

Pacific halibut fishery opens to reduced catches

March 21, 2025 — Combined coastwide catch for all users is down by nearly 16 percent, more than 18 percent for commercial fishermen.

The 2025 Pacific halibut fishery kicks off today, March 20, in regions spanning from the West Coast and British Columbia to the far reaches of Alaska’s Bering Sea. And once again, all users – commercial fishermen, sport charters, anglers, and subsistence – will get smaller takes of the prized fish as the Pacific stock continues to flounder.

The coastwide “total removals” of halibut allowed for 2025 is 29.72 million pounds, a drop of 15.76 percent from 2024. For commercial fishermen, a catch limit of 19.7 million pounds is an 18.02 percent decrease from the 2024 fishery. Last year, harvesters took just over 74 percent of their 28.86 million pound commercial catch limit.

The catch limits are set each January by the International Pacific Halibut Commission (IPHC), which has tracked and managed the stock for 101 years.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

ALASKA: Silver Bay Seafoods announces buyout of OBI

March 20, 2025 — Sitka-based Silver Bay Seafoods is buying out the international seafood processing giant OBI.

Silver Bay announced the acquisition on Tuesday, stating that it is partnering with the Bristol Bay Economic Development Corporation.

In a press release, Silver Bay says it plans to manage all OBI facilities and operations, including processing plants in Petersburg, Seward, Kodiak, Larsen Bay, Egegik, Wood River, Cordova, and Naknek, as well as a warehouse and labeling facility in Kent, Washington.

Read the full article at KFSK

ALASKA: Proposal to use beach seines in commercial fishery killed

March 20, 2025 — A proposal that would have allowed commercial setnet fishers on the east side of Cook Inlet to fish with set beach seines was transformed into a motion to strip setnets entirely from the Kenai River king salmon action plan before being defeated on a 3-3 vote by the State Board of Fisheries on Saturday.

When the State Board of Fisheries in 2024 established its action plan for the recovery of Kenai River late-run king salmon, a “stock of management concern,” it called on the east side setnet fishery — which has been barred entirely from operating since 2023 — to exercise “creativity” and find a new way to fish for the abundant sockeye salmon they target without killing king salmon.

That’s why Brian and Lisa Gabriel last summer operated a test fishery for set beach seines. They told the Clarion in July that they’d seen their nets work successfully — that they hadn’t killed a king salmon, that they could adapt the nets to different sites, and that they’d caught enough sockeye to be economically viable.

They brought the idea to the board last week, via an accepted request to hear the proposal out of cycle. Local fishing issues aren’t set to return before the board until 2027. They told the board on Tuesday, March 11, that they tested the nets on multiple sites, solicited input from other setnetters and hired a professional monitor in retired biologist Robert Begich.

A total of more than 20,000 sockeye were harvested across two permits and four fish sites, according to data included in meeting notes. While harvesting that target stock, the report says that they successfully released 31 silver salmon and 16 king salmon — only one king salmon seen and released during the test was a large king greater than 34 inches of length that would be counted by the State Department of Fish and Game.

Using the set beach seines, Brian Gabriel said to the board, they successfully harvested sockeye salmon while releasing king salmon alive.

The Gabriels in recent months also brought their presentation to a variety of local fish and game advisory committees, the Kenai River Sportfishing Association and others to collect feedback.

KRSA in a written statement by Executive Director Shannon Martin said they opposed the Gabriels’ proposal because the study “was not nearly comprehensive enough to allow for scaling up to potentially over 50 participants spread across the ESSN fishery.”

The Gabriels brought forward a proposed amendment to their proposal at the meeting, based on feedback received from the groups they engaged with. The amendment would have shortened the days available for fishing — including removing days in August to avoid interactions with silver salmon — reduced the allowable length and depth of the seines, required release of all silvers in addition to kings and required gear to be tended at all times, among other considerations.

Read the full article at the Peninsula Clarion 

Federal judge denies tribal claims in suit against federal fisheries managers

March 19, 2025 — A federal district court judge has denied a claim made by two regional tribal consortiums in Western Alaska that fisheries management in the Bering Sea violated environmental law.

United States District Court Judge Sharon Gleason denied the claims made by the Association of Village Council Presidents (AVCP) and Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC) in a judgement on March 11.

The Association of Village Council Presidents – the regional tribal consortium for the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta – and the Tanana Chiefs Conference – the regional tribal consortium for much of western Interior Alaska – had sued the National Marine Fisheries Service, which manages fisheries in the federal waters outside of Alaska. Two fisheries trade organizations with ties to the pollock industry – the At-Sea Processors Association and United Catcher Boats – joined in defense of federal fisheries managers.

The tribal organizations, along with the City of Bethel, claimed that recent groundfish harvest management in the Bering Sea wasn’t properly taking into account major changes to the ocean ecosystem, including fisheries collapses on the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers, and thus violated federal law under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

Read the full article at KYUK

ALASKA: Native fleets diminished by fishing limits- is change possible?

March 19, 2025 — For generations, Alaska’s Indigenous communities have relied on commercial fishing as both a livelihood and a cultural cornerstone. But decades-old federal policies restricting access to fisheries have left Native-owned fleets struggling to stay afloat.

Now, Indigenous advocates and tribal leaders are calling for changes that would restore opportunities for Native fishermen. According to a recent report from KTOO, the federal Individual Fishing Quota (IFQ) system and other limited-entry programs implemented in the 1990s had devastating effects on many Indigenous fishing communities. While designed to stabilize the industry, these systems made it increasingly difficult for younger Native fishermen to enter the trade, ultimately diminishing the presence of Native-owned vessels in Alaska’s commercial fisheries.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

ALASKA: Decades after commercial fishing limits gutted Native fishing fleets, advocates call for change

March 18, 2025 — A half-century ago, Angoon’s harbor was packed with small, family-operated fishing vessels. Salmon and halibut fed mouths and bank accounts.

Peter Duncan, Mayor of Angoon, remembers those days. But it’s not the same anymore. Fisheries limitation regulations have caused “devastating changes,” he said. “You just don’t find a troller in our harbors anymore.” That’s caused his village to depend more on government assistance programs, including food stamps, he said.

Duncan grew up fishing on his father’s seiner in the small Lingít village on Admiralty Island. He graduated to his own troll boat and commercially fished until the early 1990s, when he said he couldn’t make a living that way anymore.

He said the opening date for the king salmon fishery was pushed later in the season, when most fish had already gone further into the inside waters and up rivers to spawn. Folks weren’t catching enough salmon to make money, so permits became more valuable to sell.

“A lot of boats, you know, they just sold out, and they, they couldn’t do it anymore, and they’ve tried,” he said.

Many of those fishing permits left the island, and with them went the means for the village to sustain itself.

“It’s sad to know that at one time, we used to be a strong fishing fleet that took pride in going out and going fishing and making something for ourselves,” Duncan said.

Read the full article at KTOO

US judge dismisses lawsuit challenging Bering Sea pollock fishery

March 18, 2025 — A U.S. district court judge has rejected a lawsuit seeking a new environmental impact study of the Bering Sea commercial pollock fishery, allowing NOAA Fisheries to continue relying on studies from 2004 and 2007 to regulate the fishery.

“We are deeply disappointed by this decision, which allows the National Marine Fisheries Service to continue relying on outdated studies while our salmon populations collapse,” TCC Chief and Chairman Brian Ridley said in a statement.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Judge upholds decisions of federal trawl fishery managers amid Bering Sea salmon crisis

March 17, 2025 — Federal fisheries managers did not mishandle trawl fishing rules amid Alaska’s ongoing salmon subsistence crisis, a federal judge in Anchorage has ruled.

In a 45-page order published Tuesday, Judge Sharon Gleason ruled against the Association of Village Council Presidents and the Tanana Chiefs Conference, which sued the National Marine Fisheries Service in 2023 over its management of Bering Sea trawl fisheries in the years since a marine heat wave.

“This suit arises from the apparent tension between federal defendants’ management of the fishery and the needs of Alaskan communities in times of significant change in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands region,” Gleason wrote.

Read the full article at the Anchorage Daily News

Federal shakeup sparks uncertainty for Pacific fisheries

March 13 2025 — Federal actions are causing uncertainty in the scheduled openings of Alaska’s Pacific fisheries, raising concerns among fishermen and owner/operators about potential disruptions to the fishing season.

Recent personnel changes within the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) have cast doubt on the scientific assessments crucial for managing fish stocks in the region. According to the Alaska Beacon, three NMFS employees in Alaska were recently dismissed, creating unease about the continuity of scientific research that informs fisheries management. These individuals collected and analyzed stock assessment data, a key factor in determining sustainable catch limits. Their sudden removal has led to concerns that vital scientific work may be delayed or compromised just as fisheries prepare to open.

The potential gaps in research have alarmed commercial fishermen, who rely on accurate stock assessments to guide their operations. Without up-to-date data, fishery managers face challenges setting quotas, which could result in either overly restrictive or overly lenient catch limits, both of which carry economic and ecological risks.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

ALASKA: Science supporting Alaska seafood industry threatened by federal firings, biologists and fishermen say

March 11, 2025 — Rebecca Howard is a marine biologist who spent six years in graduate school — largely funded by federal scholarship dollars — to earn a doctorate at Oregon State University. Last April, she was hired by the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries branch to join in annual surveys off Alaska that gather data vital to the management of the nation’s biggest seafood harvests.

This year, the Seattle-based Howard was scheduled to spend three weeks aboard a chartered fishing boat sampling Gulf of Alaska marine life, and another three weeks on a Bering Sea survey. But on Feb. 27, more than 10 months into a yearlong probation, she received an email from a NOAA vice admiral informing her that she was being terminated. Her ability, knowledge “and/or skills” no longer fit the agency’s needs.

“This is what I wanted to do. I wanted to stay at this job,” Howard said in an interview from Seattle, where she worked at the main branch of the Alaska Fisheries Science Center. “It was a huge disappointment.”

Read the full article at Anchorage Daily News