Saving Seafood

Alaska snow crab stock assessment bodes well for coming TAC

September 27, 2018 — The US state of Alaska’s Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) could announce catch limits for its Bering Sea crab fisheries as soon as next Tuesday. And, based on the latest stock assessments delivered to the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC), the snow crab harvest looks to be a big improvement.

But catch limits for red king and Tanner crabs aren’t likely to be so great.

ADF&G staff have been meeting this week via teleconference to discuss the recommendations contained in the 43-page “Stock Assessment and Fishery Evaluation (SAFE) Report for the King and Tanner Crab Fisheries of the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands Regions”. The paper, which addresses the health of 10 different Alaskan crab stocks, was compiled by the NPFMC’s 14-person crab plan team, a group that includes a combination of federal and state agency officials as well as some academics.

The NPFMC is set to begin meeting early next week in Anchorage, Alaska, where its Science and Statistical Committee (SSC), a similarly composed group, will make its recommendations, which can be expected to closely follow those of the SAFE report, Mark Stichert, ADF&G’s regional shellfish management coordinator, told Undercurrent News.

It’s unusual for the NPFMC to disagree with its SSC, though it will also likely hear from an industry panel, he said.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Alaska crab report: King and tanner crab stocks drop as snow crab rebounds

September 27, 2018 — It was a mix of good but mostly bad news for Bering Sea crabbers at this month’s North Pacific Fishery Management Council meeting. The results from the summer trawl surveys showed “substantial” drops in numbers of king and tanner crab. Conversely, the snow crab stock appears to be on a big rebound.

The news was presented last week in the annual Stock Assessment and Fishery Evaluation Report for the North Pacific council.

For red king crab in Bristol Bay, numbers of mature males dropped more than 40 percent from last year, and mature females were down 54 percent. Even worse, the survey continued to show no sign of younger red king crab coming into the fishery.

“We haven’t seen recruitment in years,” said Bob Foy, director of the NMFS lab at Kodiak and leader of the council’s crab plan team.

In the report, the team noted that “it feels that the rather unusual environmental conditions in the eastern Bering Sea this year (e.g., elevated bottom temperatures, lack of a cold pool) and the model’s poor fit to the 2018 survey data increase the uncertainty associated with this stock and warrant additional precaution.”

The red king crab catch last year at Bristol Bay was 6.6 million pounds, a 20 percent drop from 2017.

For tanner crab, the number of mature females dictates the fate of a fishery and those numbers declined 70 percent in the eastern fishing district, continuing a trend over several years.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

ALASKA: Roundtable discussion focuses on salmon sustainability, culture

August 24, 2018 — With participants from a broad swathe of the salmon spectrum, the Kenai River Sportfishing Association’s Classic Roundtable discussion Wednesday focused on new research and management tools to preserve troubled salmon returns in the state.

Part of the Soldotna-based sportfishing association’s annual Classic event, the roundtable discussions invite experts and stakeholders to address various issues related to fishing and fisheries management. This year, the panelists focused on science related to recent changes in salmon size and age, the cultural and economic impacts of the declines and market-based strategies to change salmon fishery allocation.

Presiding as the keynote speaker was National Marine Fisheries Service Assistant Administrator Chris Oliver, who previously lived in Alaska for 27 years and served as the executive director of the North Pacific Fishery Management Council. Since taking the role as the head of the National Marine Fisheries Service, which among other functions regulates fisheries in federal waters and enforcing the Marine Mammal Protection Act, he said he’s made a few adjustments to overall identified goals and gotten a broad perspective on issues in fisheries nationwide.

Read the full story at The Peninsula Clarion

ALASKA: Golden King Crab Quota Increases for First Time in Twenty Years

August 8, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS –For the first time in 20 years, the small fleet of vessels harvesting golden king crab in the remote waters of the Aleutian Islands can take 3.9 million pounds of golden king crab east of Adak and 2.5 million pounds west of Adak, increases of 18 percent and 11 percent respectively over last year. The 9-month season opened last week under a management system that relies on data from federal observers and fishermen themselves.

This is good news for Adak marketers of golden king crab, who last year shipped live by air directly to Shanghai and this year want to expand the market.

Golden king crab, also called brown king crab, is found throughout Alaska but in highest numbers in the deep water in an 800-mile swath of ocean east and west of Adak, AK. The crab live in deeper waters than any other commercially harvested species in Alaska, and on rocky bottoms. Fishermen use pots that are set on a longline, a hybrid approach not used for any other crab.

The remote location of the fishery, the relatively small stock size, the difficult terrain, and the short window of good weather all made surveys problematic. Historically the fishery used triennial surveys with commercial vessels and commercial gear: crab pots on longlines.

But the cost was prohibitive for such a small fishery, so in 1996 ADF&G adopted a constant catch harvest policy which set a cap that could not be increased, even when catch data, such as Catch-per-unit-effort (CPUE) radically increased. The quota dropped occasionally in the past twenty years, but for the most part, it worked.

“It’s been quite successful,” said Mark Stichert, shellfish management coordinator for ADF&G in Kodiak. “We’ve not seen a closure in twenty years, we have a tremendous amount of stability in that fishery. We found a sweet spot; 3.3 million pouds in the east and 3 million pounds in the west turned out to be a pretty good ball park estimation of what we could catch from this stock.”

But when the fishery became rationalized in 2005, moving from a competitive, dangerous effort by 20-some vessels competing against each other in a short season, to a reduced fleet of about five boats, each with their own quota they can harvest over nine months.

Crab rationalization split the management between the federal managers, tasked with setting allowable biological catch (ABC) and overfishing limits (OFL), and the state managers who set the total allowable catch (TAC) and the season dates.

In order to set ABC and OFL limits the federal managers needed a stock assessment, which is usually based on surveys. In this case, the scientists worked on creating a stock assessment of golden king crab with the data they had, calculating the uncertainty limited data gives managers and running the model through the peer review process many times.

Finally last year, stock assessment model was approved by the North Pacific Council last year. The Alaska Board of Fish gave the state managers authority to increase the quota, but didn’t provide specific direction. The state managers needed to set a harvest policy.

“We’re taking a hybrid approach to partner with industry,” explained Stichert. “We have the benefit of working with a small fleet, we can all get in the same room together and find common objectives. What are your priorities? Do you want stability? We’re developing some exploitation rates to be reviewed.

In the process, the fleet has brought in their own stock assessment reviewers.

“We want a strategy that advances the science and allows us to make better decisions, but we don’t want to forget that we don’t know everything. We need a harvest strategy allows management to grow along with the improvements in data,” Stichert said. “It takes cooperation and committment.”

Since 2015, the fleet has worked with the state to conduct a hybrid survey on the eastern stock of golden king crab. The plan benefits both the managers and the harvesters. The first trip of the season will be a data collection effort using smaller mesh gear to catch sublegals, females, and males. The controlled catch will give managers information on recruitment, stock size and demographics.

“We’ll take care of the science if you take care of the gear,” Stichert said he told the fleet.

“On the very first trip you take, we’re going to tell you where to put the gear and we’re going to put out small mesh pots,” he said.

Meanwhile, Stichert said, “They get to sell the legal catch, the scientists onboard will document everything, then they’re off when the trip ends. The second trip they’re on their own.”

This week, the scientists are on crabbers fishing both eastern and western stocks for the first time. With the added information from both areas over time, the fishery could have the most data-rich management in its history.

The state approach will be reviewed by the Board of Fish for final approval later this year.

This story originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

ALASKA: Federal council names 5 commercial fishermen to committee

July 20, 2018 — A committee of five fishermen, four of whom live on the Kenai Peninsula, will help provide advice to the council that will write a new management plan for Cook Inlet salmon fisheries in federal waters.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council, the federal board that regulates fisheries in federal waters in of the North Pacific Ocean, announced the membership of a Cook Inlet Salmon Committee at its June meeting in Kodiak. The committee will provide feedback to the council on the formation of a new plan to manage salmon fisheries in the federal waters of Cook Inlet.

The council passed an amendment to its fishery management plan in 2013 that delegated management of salmon fisheries in federal waters in Cook Inlet, the Copper River area and part of the Alaska Peninsula to the state, but Cook Inlet drift gillnet fishermen objected. The United Cook Inlet Drift Association, which represents the drifters, sued over the decision, and in September 2016, a federal court overturned an earlier court decision in the state’s favor and sided with UCIDA. The council began the process of revising the plan in April 2017.

Read the full story at the Peninsula Clarion

North Pacific Council Looks at Limits for Cod Deliveries to Motherships in the Bering Sea

June 21, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Twelve years ago Amendment 80 was adopted by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council to allocate several non-pollock groundfish among trawl sectors, and help form cooperatives in that sector. The amendment covered dozens of competing concerns and succeeded in striking a balance that has worked well in the last decade.

But Amendment 80 was silent on whether the catcher/processors (CPs) in that fleet could act as motherships in the Bering Sea limited access cod fishery.

Last winter, AM80 CPs acted as motherships taking deliveries from their own catcher vessels and others in a reduced allocation cod fishery. That resulted in an increased percentage in the amount of Pacific cod delivered to the AM80 sector, an increase in the number of catcher vessels delivering Pcod to motherships, and a decrease in the amount of cod delivered to shoreside processing facilities.

To correct this, the Council is considering options that would restore balance to the shore-based and off-shore processing facilities. In the process of understanding how best to address that, a latency issue has emerged.

The Council revised its problem statement at their June meeting in Kodiak to reflect that.

“Information shows a large number of AFA endorsed vessels are not participating, but whose catch history contributes to the AFA Pacific cod sideboard in the Bering Sea trawl cod fishery,” the new statement reads.

“Despite a high level of latency, the pace of the fishery has increased shortening the season, resulting in decreased ability to maximize the value of the fishery and negatively impacting fishery participants. Additional entrants could exacerbate these issues and threaten the viability of the fishery. The Council is considering options to improve the prosecution of the fishery, with the intent of promoting safety and increasing the value of the fishery.”

Prior to the Council’s early June meeting, there were four Alternatives on the table. Now there are six. As always, Alternative 1 is status quo.

Alternative 2 has two Options, the first of which was revised at the June meeting to allow an AM80 CP may take directed fishery deliveries of Pcod from catcher vessels if the CP acted as a mothership and received targeted Pacific cod deliveries during 2015-2017, with sub-options of in any one of those three years, in any two years, or in any three years. Those sub-options will be analyzed and considered by the Council later this year. A second Option under Alternative 2 is for non-AM80 CP acting as motherships during 2015-2017.

Alternative 3 was also revised at the June meeting to clarify that the allocation will be set for “A” Season and “B” Season and apply to all catcher processors limited by the action. Options for what final allocations will be included the percentage of Bering Sea subarea Pacific cod delivered to CPs acting as motherships, relative to the total BSAI Bering Sea subarea catcher vessels trawl catch between a variety of time periods ranging from 2008 to 2017.

A sub-option was added to Alternative 3 that would exempt a CP from the sideboard limit if it had received deliveries in 7 or more years from the BSAI cod trawl fishery and the catch delivered would not accrue to any sideboard limit established for CPs when acting as a mothership.

Alternative 4 was modified to clarify that both the catch accounting system and the fish ticket target definition would be considered when determining which catcher vessels would be eligible to deliver BSAI Pcod in the future.

An option was also added to exempt the 8 severable Aleutian Islands trawl endorsements on LLP licenses, established under BSAI Amendment 92, from the proposed BSAI landings requirements for trawl CVs.

The two new Alternatives went further to include American Fisheries Act, or the BSAI pollock fleet.

Alternative 5 would establish American Fisheries Act and non-AFA sector allocations for the cod “A” season. Specific allocation percentages or years to consider were not determined as part of the June motion.  Council staff will provide information on that and on ways for the non-AFA sector to develop a cooperative or cooperatives to fish their Pacific cod allocation.

Alternative 6 was added to ensure that AM80 CPs that have been replaced and no longer have an Amendment 80 quota share permit or an Amendment 80 LLP license would be prohibited from acting as a mothership for Pacific cod in the future. The restriction would apply to both the BSAI and GOA.

Initial review of the analysis is scheduled for the Council’s February 4-12, 2019 meeting in Portland, OR.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. This article is reprinted with permission.

NPFMC Separates Adak Cod Issue from Broader Cod Allocation issues, Expects Action by Dec 2018

June 18, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Management of Pacific Cod in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands is a study in complexity, founded on the earnest principles of protecting historical deliveries to the village of Adak and balancing the needs of the rationalized fishery with the non-rationalized Aleutian Island cod fishery.

Amendment 113 to the BSAI groundfish plan was intended to navigate this warren of concerns, but in the first year of its implementation a perfect storm of sorts resulted in the North Pacific Council asking certain fishing vessels to ‘stand down’ last February to allow other cod deliveries to Adak, while the body set out to correct the regulations.

At their April meeting, the Council created a Purpose and Need statement acknowleding that “changes in fishery participation patterns and total allowable catches in the BSAI, resulted in the fishery progressing in a manner that may have been counter to the intent of providing community protections in the Aleutian Islands.”

The Council went on to state it “intends to modify Amendment 113 such that the prosecution of the BSAI cod fishery aligns with the council’s original objective of addressing the risk that participants in BSAI rationalized fisheries may diminish the historical share of BSAI cod of other industry participants and communities that depend on shoreplant processing in the region.”

Thus the process began for alternatives to consider, analyses of the options, and public comment periods, with resolution now estimated for the 2020 fishing season.

But part of the perfect storm of complexities was another problem — the emergence of the Amendment 80 fleet (BSAI trawlers that mostly target flatfish and other non-pollock species) acting as motherships and taking deliveries that may otherwise have gone, at least in part, to shorebased plants.

Any reference to an imbalance in deliveries to on-shore and off-shore facilities triggers memories of perhaps the most contentious issue the North Pacific Council has ever addressed, the ‘inshore/offshore’ debate that resulted in the American Fisheries Act, which rationalized the BSAI pollock fleet.

The Council decided to treat each problem as a separate one, but asked that the discussion paper include “tradeoffs and benefits of combining this action with the BSAI [catcher vessel] cod action the Council will address in June.”

Action taken at last week’s meeting confirmed that the Adak cod set-aside issue will continue independently of the AM80 mothership issue.

The schedule for resolving Amendment 113 and fixing the Adak cod set-aside is to review the analysis of four alternatives in October with final action tentatively set for December 2018. With public comment periods and regulatory reviews, the final rule’s earliest publication could be late 2019 with implementation in the 2020 cod season.

June’s discussion paper crystalized the complexity of current regulations in the Aleutian Island fishery.  After describing the allocations and limitations for BSAI cod, NPFMC analysts Jon McCracken and Darrell Brannan describe what happened next.

“Participants began to realize that under the current regulations the AI shoreplant would not be able to take deliveries of the entire 5,000 mt AI set-aside after the BSAI trawl CV sector was closed to directed fishing for the A season.

“Prior to that time some participants were under the impression that the AI set-aside essentially guaranteed the shoreplants would be allowed to take delivery of the 5,000 mt AI set-aside if they achieved the 1,000 mt before February 28. However, after February 11 all of the federal Pacific cod CV sectors except jig gear were close for directed fishing in the A season in the BSAI.

“Given that 6,515 mt of Pacific cod was available to trawl CVs to deliver to any processor in the AI, at least two companies made plans to harvest a portion of that allowance and deliver the catch to processors other than the AI shoreplant. One company was using its CV to deliver to one of its C/Ps.

“However, this occurred during the February Council meeting, and when the Council was made aware of the issue it asked this company to not participate in the unrestricted fishery, due to the impacts to the AI shoreplant. This company had already taken a small amount of Pacific cod, but they agreed to stand-down from the fishery at the request of the Council.

“After the 2018 A-season was underway, a second company requested that their CVs be allowed to deliver to the AI shoreplant. In part due to capacity constraints and the timing of the request, the AI shoreplant did not offer a market to those CVs. The company decided later in February to have some of its trawl CVs deliver AI Pacific cod to Dutch Harbor.

“CVs that were delivering to the AI shoreplant are reported to have self-imposed trip limits and a one-day stand-down after a delivery to help reduce wait times at the plant. Trawl CVs set the trip limit at 400,000 lbs. for the larger CVs and 100,000 lbs for smaller CVs. These trip limits were abandoned when NMFS announced the BSAI A season trawl CV closure for March 4, 2018, which resulted in a larger volume of Pacific cod being delivered during a short period of time.

“The shoreplant operator has indicated during testimony to the Council that the shoreplant has a daily capacity of 1.2 million lbs. to 1.5 million lbs. At 1.2 million lbs. per day, the shoreplant could process the AI set-aside in about 9.2 days. During the 2018 A-season, daily processing of GHL and federal Pacific cod combined never exceeded 1 million lbs. and was typically much lower.

“Once trawl CVs harvested an amount that was projected to be equal to the BSAI trawl CV sector A-season allowance22, they were closed to directed fishing on March 11.

“NMFS In-season Management’s ability to close a fishery exactly on the amount a sector’s TAC is limited by variations in daily landings and the fact that closures are announced ahead of time for 12 noon on a specific day.

“Catch in the AI set-aside and unrestricted fishery resulted in the trawl CV sector AI season being closed in the BSAI prior to the entire 5,000 mt AI set-aside being delivered. That meant the only CV sector that remained open25 to directed fishing was the BSAI jig gear sector.

“The BSAI allocation to the jig sector was insufficient to allow the AI shoreplant to take deliveries of the remaining 5,000 mt AI set-aside.

“NMFS announced that the 5,000 mt AI set-aside had not been landed at the AI shoreplant by March 15th. Because the 5,000 mt AI set-aside was not reached by that date the BS non-CDQ trawl CV A-season sector limitation remained in effect until March 21 and the AI set-aside to not apply for the remainder of the year. The amount of the 5,000 mt AI set-aside that was delivered to the AI shoreplant cannot be reported due to confidentiality restrictions.

“The AI shoreplant could report their Pacific cod deliveries or agreed to waive the confidentiality restrictions associated with NMFS or the Council reporting the Pacific cod deliveries they received.

“The BSAI Pacific cod non-CDQ trawl CV B-season opened to directed fishing on April 1. The 2018 B-season allowance was set at 4,425 mt at the start of the fishing year. Directed fishing was closed on April 3 as a result of the B-season allowance being reached. The AI shoreplant took Pacific cod deliveries during the B-season.”

This story originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

Restrictions could tighten as data reveals salmon inflation

June 12, 2018 — The number of king salmon returning to an Alaska river has been inflated for decades, according to recent state data.

The state now is recommending that the body governing the Bering Sea pollock fishery adopt this new information about the Kuskokwim River, KYUK-AM reported .

If it does, restrictions on the fleet’s bycatch of king salmon could tighten.

Returns have been below this threshold since at least 2010, according to new data from the Alaska Fish and Game Department. Meanwhile, the Bering Sea pollock fleet has hauled in tens of thousands of king salmon each year, caught incidentally. Less than 3 percent of those kings are estimated to have been bound for western Alaska rivers.

With fewer kings swimming up the Kuskokwim River, fishermen have been told by state, federal, and tribal managers to fish less along the river. But fishermen have pointed downstream and said the problem is further away — in the Bering Sea.

“To me, I think more should be done out in the ocean,” said Darren Deacon, Tribal Chief of the Native Village of Kalskag, during a recent teleconference hosted by the Kuskokwim River Intertribal Fish Commission. “If we’re going to suffer in these rivers — every person, every village, every tribe is suffering — the trawling fleets should feel the same pain.”

Read the full story at the Associated Press

One fish, two fish: Are we counting too few fish?

June 3, 2018 — When fish are in short supply, every fish counts. To make every fish count, it’s important to accurately and comprehensively count the fish.

Three miles offshore, in the Gulf of Alaska’s industrial groundfish fisheries, counting fish is the job of fishery observers. These trained scientists gather data about what the vessels catch and keep, and what they discard as bycatch. The data collected is essential for monitoring and managing the fisheries.

Trawler boats that fish for pollock, cod, rockfish and flatfish are required to carry independent fishery observers for some of their trips. This is a requirement that makes sense; it is well-known to fishery managers that trawlers can easily end up taking more than their fair share of fish from the ocean. Large trawl nets, dragged through the water or along the seafloor, catch thousands to tens of thousands of fish in a single pass. Not all that fish is kept. Some species, such as salmon, halibut and crab, are required by law to be discarded. Those species are valuable as their own fisheries, so long-standing management measures have been put in place to prevent trawlers from targeting and selling them. Other species that are undesired or can’t be sold, like skates, sharks, snailfish and sculpins, are thrown back, dead or dying. The same goes for the corals, sponges and sea stars that make up the living structure of the Alaskan seafloor.

Read the full story at the Anchorage Daily News

Alaska: With New Report, CVRF Continues Its Fight for More Fish

May 9, 2018 — CVRF is one of six nonprofit groups that manage NOAA’s Community Development Quota (CDQ) program. CDQ was set up in 1992 to bring money into cash-strapped Western Alaska communities by setting aside a portion of Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands fisheries for local commercial use.

Coastal Villages has long been advocating for more fish. Michelle Humphrey is the group’s outreach manager.

According to the report, prepared by the Seattle-based research firm Community Attributes, the most impoverished communities in Western Alaska are served by CVRF and the Norton Sound Economic Development Corporation (NSEDC). These two represent nearly 70 percent of the total CDQ-eligible population. But they receive only about 40 percent of the total CDQ quota.

Sarah Marrinan is an economist with the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, which oversees the CDQ program. She says when the program started in the 1990s, each CDQ group submitted a business plan to the state, which determined the allocations based on a variety of factors.

Read the full story at KNOM