Saving Seafood

NEW JERSEY: Longtime Jersey Shore mayor, commercial scalloping mogul dies at 71

September 5, 2025 — Kirk Larson, a fishing enthusiast who was mayor of Barnegat Light for nearly three decades, died suddenly over Labor Day weekend, according to an obituary and several public officials.

Larson, who died Saturday, was 71. A cause of death was not immediately known.

The mayor was likely best known for co-owning the commercial fishing docks at the Viking Village shops, a staple of Long Beach Island known for its seafood market. Using a fleet of boats, he ran a scallop-catching enterprise out of the docks, which supplied seafood for restaurants, wholesalers, fish markets and supermarkets across the area.

“Kirk Larson was a good friend and it is still hard to believe that he passed away,” Assemblyman Greg Myhre (R-Dist.9) said in a statement. “I got to know him well over the past seven years and my respect for him increased each time we spoke. He was a great conversationalist, always positive and was a tireless advocate for his town, the seafaring community, and the people of Ocean County.”

Read the full article at The Press of Atlantic City

NEW JERSEY: Historic Viking Village is a hidden haven for shoppers and seafood lovers alike

July 9, 2020 — Founded in the 1920s by first generation Scandinavian fisherman, Long Beach Island’s Viking Village is a place that will take you back to the days of quaint Jersey Shore fishing villages and salty sea captains.

Perched along the bay at the northernmost end of the island in scenic Barnegat Light, the seaside hamlet features a row of tiny fishing shacks that have been transformed into shops and commercial fishing vessels humming in and out of the harbor, which is a major hub for seafood in the state. Visitors can not only shop for treasures at assorted boutiques or grab a cup of coffee or casual meal, but they also have the opportunity to tour the busy docks in the summer and see firsthand where the sea scallops they order at a restaurant come from.

“Most people think seafood just ends up on your plate at a restaurant, they don’t realize what it takes to get it there,” said shop owner Pam Larson, whose husband’s family owns and runs Viking Village.

Almost a century after Norwegian brothers John and Ole Larson founded the Independent Fish Company, which was renamed Viking Village in the 1970s, the commercial docks, shops and eateries remain a family affair. Larson owns The Seawife, an antique store filled with an assortment of collectibles, and is married to Kirk Larson, whose father took over the operation when his own father retired and renamed it Viking Village.

Read the full story at Jersey’s Best

Virus Economic Damage to Commercial Fishing Grows Daily

April 2, 2020 — The pulse of Viking Village’s commercial fishing industry this year will greatly depend on how long the coronavirus extends into the coming spring and summer season, local leaders say. But boats are already tied up at the docks.

Viking Village Inc. Commercial Seafood Producers in Barnegat Light sells a large chunk of its catch right now to wholesalers, who last week were still buying product and freezing it, but with restaurants closed down to all but takeout and delivery, the chain is tightened.

“There’s no place to sell them in the restaurants,” said scallop fleet owner Kirk Larson, whose family co-owns Viking Village with the Puskas family. Larson was speaking about metropolitan markets beyond New Jersey as well. Prices paid had also dropped. “We’re selling a few in New York markets, but not as many as we’re catching.

“If it doesn’t get sold at a seafood market, it doesn’t go anywhere, because restaurants are closed. They can sell takeout, but that’s not like when restaurants are full-bore. In summer, I don’t know what’s going to happen,” Larson said last week. “There are plenty of stocks to catch; it’s whether we will have a place to sell them.”

Read the full story at The Sand Paper

New Jersey: Gov. Murphy Fills Sails of Fishermen’s Energy Wind Farm

March 1, 2018 — A new governor with a commitment to renewable energy is good for the proponents of off-shore wind energy, but has Gov. Phil Murphy’s tenure come too late for Fishermen’s Energy, which has all the permits to install six Siemens 4-megawatt turbines at a site 4.5 kilometers off the Atlantic City coastline?

Fishermen’s Energy, a consortium of commercial and recreational fishermen, has been trying since 2005 to build a demonstration project of five wind turbines off Atlantic City. Over the years, it has jumped through all the federal and state regulation hoops and received all their permits. However, it became embroiled in a dispute with the N.J. Board of Public Utilities over whether the project was eligible to secure a “power offtake agreement” that would set up a system of Offshore Renewable Energy Certificates that could be sold to power companies to offset their carbon footprint, much as solar power SRECs do today.

The BPU denied the consortium’s OREC application twice. Although the Legislature got involved and passed two bills in 2016 that would have sidestepped the BPU’s negative stance, then-Gov. Chris Christie pocket-vetoed them.

Since then, Fishermen’s Energy’s hopes have been left hanging in the wind, but the project is still alive, according to Barnegat Mayor Kirk Larson, whose Viking Village Seafood company invested in Fishermen’s Energy along with partners Atlantic Cape Fisheries, Cold Spring Fish and Supply Co. out of Cape May, Dock Street Seafood out of Wildwood and Eastern Shore Seafood out of Mappsville, Va.

Larson directed all future calls about Fishermen’s to the company spokesman and COO Paul Gallagher.

On Tuesday, Gallagher said Murphy’s proposals mean things are looking up for Fishermen’s.

Read the full story at the Sand Paper