Saving Seafood

SEATTLE TIMES: Congress must choose threatened salmon over sea lions

July 20, 2018 — State, federal and local governments have spent too much time and money restoring fish runs in the Columbia River Basin to let those efforts go to waste.

The U.S. House recognized this reality last month by passing legislation to make it easier to kill sea lions that feast on threatened salmon and steelhead in the Columbia River and its tributaries.

Now, the Senate must step up and push the bill through to the finish line.

Northwest senators must be unified in their support for this common-sense measure, which aims to safeguard the billions of dollars invested in preserving fish that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.

Regional spending to protect and restore salmon runs in the Columbia River Basin easily tops $500 million every two years, according to the state’s Department of Fish and Wildlife. That estimate doesn’t include the additional millions spent annually by federal wildlife officials, the state of Oregon, local governments and tribes.

But a few hundred hungry sea lions that have made their way upstream are putting those investments in jeopardy. Federal researchers estimated that a quarter of last year’s spring Chinook inexplicably disappeared on their way from the mouth of the Columbia River to Bonneville Dam, with sea lion predation most likely to blame.

Read the full opinion piece at the Seattle Times

Strong Management Safeguards Oregon’s Valuable Dungeness Crab Fishery

January 25, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Oregon’s most valuable commercial fishery for the state’s official crustacean, Dungeness crab, got underway north of Cape Blanco this week. While storms and price negotiations kept fishermen docked for awhile after the official opening, processors are expecting large deliveries soon.

A major reason Dungeness crab deliveries are large and that it’s the state’s official crustacean is due to successful management.

Dungeness crab have been harvested commercially along the Pacific Coast since the late 1800s. Current regulations allow only male crabs larger than 6 ¼ inches across the back of the shell to be taken. This protects the female and undersized male crabs that constitute the breeding population and produce the next generation of crab to be harvested in about four years, ensuring the sustainability of the overall stock and the industry.

This regulatory approach is working, according to an Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife press release. Preliminary results from a NOAA study show the population of legal-size males appears to be stable to increasing on the West Coast. Harvest rates are also stable to increasing. Last season’s ex-vessel value set a record of $62.7 million, with landings totaling 20 million pounds, 22 percent above the 10-year average, the statement said.

Washington and California have similar management structures.

State natural resource agencies in Oregon, Washington and California cooperate as part of what’s known as the Tri-State Agreement. They jointly set a season opening date for the area from Point Arena, Calif. to Grays Harbor, Wash., or divide it into two areas with different opening dates. This helps ensure the fishery is fair and certain areas aren’t over-targeted while others are closed.

While domoic acid did not play a role in this year’s delayed opening for the northern area, the fishery south of Cape Blanco remains closed because at least some crab are still above the domoic acid action level. Toxins present an ongoing concern for the state and the industry, and Oregon has a monitoring and response system in place for shellfish to protect public health and manage the risk of contamination. The Oregon Department of Agriculture oversees the collection and testing of shellfish samples. Crabs are sampled every two to four weeks when toxins are above a certain level in razor clams or another indicator species.

Since the first ever in-season commercial closure of a harvest area last year, when a single crab’s viscera tested too high for domoic acid, ODFW, ODA and the industry have adopted new rules to improve traceability in the market chain, resulting in better preparation and response to future domoic acid events.

Efforts to reduce commercial crabbing’s impact on the environment and other marine species are also underway. Since 2014, a derelict gear removal program collecting abandoned crab pots or other equipment has been in place. Commercial crabbers removed 957 old pots from the ocean in 2017 alone. A collaborative working group involving industry, agencies, and conservation organizations is also looking at ways to modify gear and other measures to reduce the risk of whale entanglements.

“We’re looking forward to many more years of a successful commercial crab industry and sustainable resource in Oregon,” ODFW state fishery program leader Troy Buell said in the statement.

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

 

Oregon: Price talks delay crab season

January 17, 2018 — Crab boats loaded with pots sat at the docks all weekend while fishermen and processors remained in a gridlock over prices.

The commercial Dungeness crab season was set to open Monday in most of Oregon and Washington state, but price negotiations and ocean conditions are keeping boats at home. The fishery is off to one of the latest starts that fishery managers can remember in over a decade.

The season traditionally opens Dec. 1, but was pushed back because crabs did not have shells full of meat.

At one point major processors had offered crabbers $2.30 a pound — not nearly enough to convince them to go out, local crabbers said. The price inched up during the state-sponsored negotiation period in Oregon, but by the time those negotiations ended the processors’ price still remained under last season’s average starting price of $2.89 per pound.

Processors had extended an offer to Coos Bay and Newport crabbers for around $2.75 per pound since crab meat there had already hit the required limit, but argued that crab off Astoria still had not filled out to the required 23 percent meat recovery. The last test in the area had the crab at 22.8 percent, according to John Corbin, chairman of the Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission. A local boat went out over the weekend to catch more crab for another meat test which revealed they are now at 24.6 percent meat recovery.

Corbin and others planned to go back to the processors Monday afternoon to try to negotiate a price for the whole area. However, fishery managers and crabbers said that with rough ocean conditions expected to follow a warm and sunny weekend, few boats would likely venture out even if they did settle on a price. Bar crossing restrictions were in place Saturday and Sunday on the Columbia River.

If price negotiations had gone differently from the start, fishermen could have set gear out over the weekend and started pulling it Monday, Corbin said. Sea swell and wind are expected to pick up later Monday, settle a bit on Tuesday and then roar back up again on Wednesday.

“Now it creates a different set of challenges,” he said.

The late start has been a blow to the local economy. Crews who spent months preparing pots and loading boats have yet to be paid and restaurants hoping to offer locally caught crab are still waiting. Fish processors are on standby. Fishermen who switch over to fish halibut or cod in Alaska are looking at a smaller and smaller window of opportunity to make some money crabbing.

In Washington’s Pacific County, fuel sales during the commercial crab season and the Buoy 10 summer sport fishing season make up the bulk of the tiny Port of Chinook’s revenue.

Read the full story at the Daily Astorian

 

At The Water’s Edge: Embracing Science and Education As Key Local Industries

January 4, 2018 — Many rural Oregon towns share the same problems; the natural resources they traditionally based their economies on no longer support them, and isolation and limited funds often make solutions hard to come by. But how these communities grapple with these changes can vary.

JPR’s Liam Moriarty takes us to Port Orford, on the state’s south coast, to see how people in one fishing town are working to carve out a potential future.

About two miles south of Port Orford — and less than a mile off the beach — is a cluster of rocks and reefs. Sitting in the cabin of his fishing boat on the dock at the Port of Port Orford, Orion Ashdown says the area known as Redfish Rocks has been a favorite fishing ground.

For years, the abundance of species there drew Ashdown and other Port Orford commercial fishermen. But that ended in 2012, when the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife closed what had by then become the Redfish Rocks Marine Reserve. Now, the only fishing done there is for scientific research …

Leesa Cobb, with the non-profit Port Orford Ocean Resource Team, says the idea of closing a productive local fishing ground was at best, counterintuitive.

Read the full story at KLCC

 

Oregon commercial crab fishery to open Jan. 15

December 22, 2017 — NEWPORT, Ore. — The commercial Dungeness crab fishery will open on most of Oregon’s coast on Jan. 15. Dungeness crab will be ready to be harvested from Cape Blanco to the Columbia River and north into Washington.

While the commercial season can open as early as Dec. 1, the opening can be delayed to ensure a high quality product for consumers by allowing crabs more time to fill with meat, according to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Prior to the opener, crab vessels may set gear from Jan. 12 onward, using the “pre-soak” period of time to set gear in anticipation of the first pull of ocean crab pots on Jan. 15.

The recreational crab fishery in Oregon is already open in this same region (Cape Blanco north to the Columbia River). The area south of Cape Blanco will remain closed to both recreational and commercial crabbing due to persisting domoic acid in the region. Continued testing will determine when this closed area can reopen.

Read the full story at The World Link

 

Most of West Coast Dungeness Season Delayed Until Dec 16th to Allow for Better Meat Fill

November 21, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Washington and northern California also will delay their commercial crab seasons until at least Dec. 16 and let the Dungeness crab populations fill out with meat a bit more.

Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife officials decided last week [link] to delay the state season until Dec. 16 at the earliest and, after a Tri-State conference call, all three states agreed to delay the season until the same date.

In California, the delay applies only to the area from Point Arena to the Oregon/California border. The central California fishery has been open since Nov. 15.

“This decision was based on crab condition tests conducted by WDFW, [Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife] and [California Department of Fish and Wildlife] which shows that all test areas do not currently meet the minimum meat recovery criteria,” the WDFW notice to industry said.

The Tri-State Dungeness Crab Pre-Season Testing Protocols specify that after the first round of testing, if any area does not meet the minimum meat recovery criteria (23 percent north of Cascade Head and 25 percent south of Cascade Head) a delay is required and additional testing is required before a season opening date can be confirmed, WDFW said.

Some news media have reported the delay also is due to concerns of domoic acid. However, tests from Washington show results below the action level of 30 ppm for crab viscera. Portions of the Oregon coast have had crab with levels higher than 30 ppm and ODFW has closed part of the coast to recreational crabbing.

A second round of both meat recovery and domoic acid testing is scheduled to be conducted after Thanksgiving, the WDFW said in the statement. Oregon and California also are continuing testing.

The latest round of domoic acid results in California show areas near Point St. George Reef, near Crescent City, having one of six crab with a level of 65 ppm and also one crab from the Usal area near Fort Bragg with a level of 150 ppm.

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

 

Fish Habitat Enhancement Talk in Portland, Oregon September 7

August 28, 2017 — The following was released by the West Coast Seafood Processors Association:

For those of you who will be in Portland, OR the evening of Thursday, September 7, please consider the following event hosted by the OR Wildlife Foundation.

You are invited to the OR Wildlife Foundation’s Thursday, 9/7 presentation at Columbia Sportswear’s downtown Portland store (6:30 PM). More information and RSVP (through the OWF Facebook page) here: http://www.myowf.org/events

The presenter is Dave Stewart, Stream Restoration Biologist for ODFW. OWF has worked closely with Dave on a succession of projects including tributaries to the Clatskanie, Clackamas, and Siletz rivers. OWF has an upcoming project on the Little Clatskanie River and two more slated for summer 2018 on tribs to the Yaquina and Siletz respectively.

How Using Light Could Help Reduce Bycatch

July 20, 2017 — British startup SafetyNet Technologies is using light to develop a potential new solution to one of the fishing industry’s biggest problems: bycatch. Bycatch—the fish, turtles, seabirds, dolphins, and other types of marine life that end up caught in fishing nets and then discarded—has both environmental and economic consequences. It damages marine ecosystems and adds cost to the fishing industry. According to Oceana, around 20 percent of the catch in United States fisheries is thought to be of unintended species. Worldwide, it could be as much as 40 percent.

SafetyNet recently developed PISCES, a light-emitting device that fits existing nets and helps fishermen target certain species. It is based on the theory that fish vary in their reactions to light, with different types of light attracting some species and repulsing others. It is designed to be flexible and comes in different shapes and sizes to accommodate a variety of equipment. PISCES is also programmable, allowing the user to choose specifications such as the type of light, its intensity, and the flash rate.

Other solutions for bycatch, such as turtle excluder devices or the Nordmore grate, tend to involve gear adapted to particular fishing environments. These devices either physically prevent certain non-target species from entering nets or allow them to easily escape. Unlike these solutions, PISCES does not focus on a specific species. Light has been shown to affect a range of fish and crustaceans, as well as turtles and birds, and the planned trials for PISCES are spread across diverse fishing environments.

SafetyNet conducted an initial trial of PISCES in 2016 in partnership with Young’s Seafood and Cefas. The tests were based in the North Sea and showed that light could reduce bycatch by up to 60 percent. Recent trials in shrimp by scientists with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife have shown that light can reduce bycatch by as much as 90 percent.

Read the full story at Foodtank

OREGON: Fund to aid commercial gillnetters never tapped

June 20, 2017 — A fund that was supposed to provide commercial fishermen $1.5 million to adjust to new regulations curtailing gillnetting in the Columbia River has never been tapped.

The Columbia River Fisheries Transition Fund, a 2013 creation of the Legislature, was supposed to set aside $500,000 every two years to provide financial assistance to commercial gillnetters through 2019.

The money was intended to help fishermen buy replacement gear and offset economic harms due to the expected phasing out of non-tribal gillnetting in the lower main stem of the Columbia.

The money’s not been used yet, and after some of it was reverted back to the general fund due to an accounting error at the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Legislature is now poised to do away with the last $500,000 installment.

That leaves $500,000, a third of the amount initially intended, and it’s not immediately apparent whether commercial gillnetters will end up applying for or receiving the money.

Gillnets are hung vertically and catch fish by the gills. Their use is a source of a longstanding dispute between commercial fishermen and sports anglers.

But the issue has come to a head in recent years. These days, sportsmen have rights to most — 70 to 80 percent — of the catches in the main stem of the Columbia, depending on the season. That’s a fact most commercial gillnetters resent.

Gillnets were, back in 2013, likely to be phased out of legal usage on the lower main stem of the Columbia by entities other than tribes. The bill followed an agreement with Washington brokered by former Gov. John Kitzhaber.

Read the full story at the Portland Tribune

Chuck Tracy Named New Executive Director of the Pacific Fishery Management Council

June 29, 2016 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

TACOMA, Wash. — The Pacific Fishery Management Council today named Mr. Charles “Chuck” Tracy as the new Executive Director for the Pacific Fishery Management Council. Dr. Don McIsaac, the former Executive Director, retired in April.

“We believe Chuck’s experience serving as both Deputy and Acting Executive Director and his in-depth knowledge of the issues facing the Council will allow for a seamless transition as the Council deals with important ongoing issues,” said Council Chair Dorothy Lowman. “We are convinced he will be able to motivate the Council staff to continue their high level of performance and enable the Council to successfully take on future challenges.”

Mr. Tracy’s appointment is effective immediately. He has been serving as the Acting Executive Director since Dr. McIsaac’s retirement; before that he served as Deputy Director for four years.

Mr. Tracy has a degree in biological oceanography from Humboldt State University with additional graduate level work in estuarine ecology. He has been with the Council since 2001, following several years of service with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife focusing on interjurisdictional fisheries issues, including Columbia River sturgeon research and salmon management. Before becoming the Deputy Director, Mr. Tracy was the Staff Officer responsible for coordinating Council activity on salmon fishery management matters.