Saving Seafood

Science to Support Sustainable Shellfish and Seaweed Aquaculture Development in Alaska State Waters

August 12, 2022 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

The Alaska Fisheries Science Center released its new strategic research plan for shellfish and seaweed aquaculture in Alaska. This strategic research plan will be used to guide science center aquaculture-related research over the next 5 years. It will provide needed information for state and federal regulatory agencies and coastal communities in Alaska. It supports NOAA Fisheries efforts to ensure a sustainable seafood supply and economic opportunities for U.S. citizens.

“This science will support the state and NOAA’s efforts to promote shellfish and seaweed production to stimulate job growth and ensure resilient coastal communities. This research will provide an important foundation for sustainable development,” said Bob Foy, Alaska Fisheries Science Center Director. “Marine aquaculture contributes to restoration efforts in Alaska, and is increasing economic opportunities for coastal communities through the farming of shellfish and seaweed.”

As of January 2022, the Alaska aquaculture industry is relatively small-scale, consisting of around 82 permitted farms. Another 24 farms have permits pending. The combined economic value of the industry is around $1.5 million.

At present, commercial aquaculture operations have largely focused on Pacific oysters, kelp, and blue mussel production in state waters. Finfish aquaculture is prohibited. The main regions of aquaculture development in Alaska are Southeast and Southcentral (Prince William Sound, Kenai Peninsula, and Kodiak).

However, NOAA Fisheries is interested in increasing shellfish and seaweed production for the long-term benefit of Alaska’s economy, environment, and communities. The state of Alaska hopes to build a $100 million per year industry to promote job growth and marine resource products in state waters over the next 20 years.

Read the full release here

 

ALASKA: Regardless of party or office, Alaska candidates are targeting trawling

August 11, 2022 — Republicans, Democrats and independents seeking a variety of elected offices across Alaska appear united by a desire to restrict deep-sea trawling.

In candidate questionnaires submitted to the Alaska Beacon, candidates for statewide and legislative races — regardless of party — say the restrictions are the best way to improve salmon returns on the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers.

“I support efforts to reduce the wasteful bycatch of Alaska’s seafood by Seattle-based high seas fishing corporations,” said Mary Peltola, the Democratic candidate for Alaska’s U.S. House seat.

“Science provides the best guide. However, I think most Alaskans agree it is past time to get high seas trawler bycatch under control,” said Tuckerman Babcock, a Republican candidate for an Alaska Senate district on the Kenai Peninsula.

Their comments were typical of those submitted to the Beacon, and Linda Kozak, a Kodiak fisher who has been following fisheries issues for three decades, said she’s seen a public reaction unlike anything in her career.

“For the first time in as long as I’ve been involved in fish politics, bycatch is a household name in Alaska. It’s something that the public is interested in,” she said.

Though Bristol Bay’s red-salmon fishery is enjoying a record year, fishing for king and chum salmon on the Yukon has been curtailed for a second straight summer because of low returns, leaving traditional subsistence fishermen unable to catch fish. Similar restrictions are in place on the Kuskokwim.

The low returns have been blamed on a variety of factors, including climate change, habitat destruction and bycatch, which occurs when ships catch salmon while pursuing other fish.

Read the full article at the Frontiersman

ALASKA: Hatchery Chums are Returning Strong in Southeast Alaska

August 2, 2022 — While chum salmon runs in the western part of the state are crashing, hatchery chum salmon returns in Southeast are strong. The runs this year are promising to either meet or exceed expected numbers.

Southeast’s main hatchery operators are private non-profits that rear and release salmon to supplement commercial fisheries. Hatchery chums in the region are genetically indigenous fish but they’re raised in captivity and the fry are released into the ocean by the tens of millions. A small percent return three to five years later, nearly all of them caught by seiners, gillnetters, and trollers.

Hatchery chums are worth millions of dollars every year. The top season was in 2012, when they were valued at nearly $63 million.

Last year’s haul was worth about $25 million. This year will probably be better.

Read the full article at Seafoodnews.com

 

ALAKSA: Surveys bode bad seasons ahead for Bering Sea crabbers

July 27, 2022 — Alaska’s Bering Sea king crab crash has reached proportions it hasn’t known since 1994 and 1995, when the population surveys warranted a shutdown of the fishery. The outlook appears equally dismal for Bering Sea opilio crab.

In last year’s 2021-2022 red king crab season the fleet stood down after trawl surveys indicated that the biomass had fallen below the threshold of 8.4 million mature females. Though complete data for this year’s surveys won’t be out until sometime in September or October, preliminary data from the first of three surveys indicates another season in which crabbers will stay tied to the docks.

“We’re seeing some preliminary information that shows that we’re going to continue to be low in abundance,” says Mark Stichert, a groundfish and shellfish fisheries management coordinator with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, in Kodiak. “We’re seeing some very similar trends. The number of mature females is going down, and mature males are slightly up. What we’re not seeing is the entry of small crab into the fishery.”

The Total Allowable Catch (TAC) is based upon data gleaned from three phases of trawl surveys conducted in late summer. In the 2008-2009 season the TAC was set at around 20 million pounds. In the last decade the TAC’s have risen from 7.8 million pounds in the 2011-2012 season to 9.97 million pounds in the 2015-2016 season, then declined.

The TAC for the 2017-2018 season had been set at about 3 million pounds and was reduced to the 1.2 million pounds in the 2020-2021 fishery.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

ALASKA: Bristol Bay run hits all-time record of 76 million sockeye

July 27, 2022 — The sockeye salmon run in Bristol Bay, Alaska, U.S.A. has surpassed 76 million fish, setting an all-time record.

As of 21 July, the latest day for which a count is available, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game reported a total run of 76,583,856 sockeye, with a cumulative catch of 58,298,771 sockeye between Bristol Bay’s Ugashik, Egegik, Naknek-Kvichak, Nushagak, and Togiak fisheries. The count  surpassed AFDG’s pre-season estimate predicted a run of 73.4 million sockeye salmon, the largest inshore run ever, with a potential harvest of over 61 million salmon.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

ALASKA: Tale of two salmon fisheries: Bristol Bay breaks record, but Yukon River collapses

July 25, 2022 — In the Bristol Bay region, the sockeye salmon run and harvest amounts set new records, as was predicted in the preseason forecast. As of Monday, the run had totaled over 73.7 million, with a harvest of over 56.3 million. The previous record was set just last year, with a 67.7 million run of sockeyes and a third-biggest-ever harvest of nearly 42 million of the fish.

But along the Yukon River, a prized salmon run is heading toward a worst-ever season.

The number of Chinook counted by sonar while swimming up the river at Pilot Station, a village near the Bering Sea coast, was the lowest on record for this time of the year, the department said. Things are looking grim for the rest of the summer, Fish and Game said in its most recent update; “the drainage-wide run may be under 50,000 fish, which is so small that escapement goals may not be met in any tributaries,” the update said. Chinook fishing has been closed all along the river and its drainages.

Opponents of the controversial Pebble Mine say two consecutive years of record sockeye runs demonstrate the value of protecting the Bristol Bay watershed, site of the world’s biggest sockeye runs, from that proposed development. They are urging the Environmental Protection Agency to invoke a rarely used provision of the Clean Water Act to preclude any wetlands-fill permit for the mine.

Read the full article at Alaska Public Media

ALASKA: Fish for Families aims to bring Bristol Bay sockeye to Alaska communities facing low salmon runs

July 21, 2022 — Bristol Bay’s sockeye run is the largest on record this season. It has been an astounding summer: More than 70 million sockeye have returned, and fleets have pulled in record harvests of more than 53 million fish.

Fish for Families is a new program that aims to share that catch. The program is an extension of the Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association and the Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust. Since 2020, these groups have helped coordinate sockeye salmon donations from Bristol Bay to Alaska Native communities in southwest Alaska.

At the end of June, it sent out its first shipment of the season — 1,000 pounds of salmon to Chignik communities on the Alaska Peninsula. The program plans to send a total of 8,000 pounds of salmon there this month.

The group also wants to send salmon to communities on the Yukon and Kuskokwim Rivers that are facing record low chum salmon returns. That will require more funds. They’re asking the Alaska Department of Fish and Game for help shipping the salmon there.

The donations build off other efforts to bring salmon to communities in need in the past. In 2020, the fishermen’s association helped coordinate tribes, fishermen, local governments and Native organizations and nonprofits to donate fish from areas around the state, including from Bristol Bay and southeast Alaska. To date, the association said it has deployed $2.5 million to buy salmon and donate more than half a million meals.

Read the full article at KTOO

Bristol Bay’s sockeye run is already the biggest on record

July 18, 2022 — Bristol Bay’s 2022 sockeye run is now the biggest on record: 69.7 million fish have returned this summer. That surpasses the previous record of 67.7 million fish, which was set last year.

More than 3 million sockeye have swum up the Wood River to spawn in the tributaries around Lake Aleknagik, about 20 miles from Dillingham, according to the state’s counting tower on the river.

Bristol Bay’s commercial fleet hauled in the most fish on record this year. Fishermen in the Nushagak, one of the bay’s five commercial districts, harvested more than 2 million sockeye in one day this season.

William P. Johnson just finished his sixty-second year as a boat captain. He grew up set net fishing near Igushik in the 1940s with his family. After more than six decades of fishing, he wasn’t phased by the large returns this season.

While sockeye have returned in droves, chinook and chum salmon runs have dropped. Scientists don’t know why that is, either.

River systems on the west side of Bristol Bay have seen an especially large sockeye boom over the past few years.

The total run is now 69.7 million sockeye, but the season isn’t over yet. Fish and Game forecast a run of 75 million fish, but it could go as high as 90 million this summer.

Read the full article at KTOO