Saving Seafood

OREGON: So Far, 2021 Dungeness Crab Season A Mixed Pot

January 21, 2021 — The good news is, the market price for crab is up since a deal was reached nearly two weeks ago. Processors then agreed to $2.75 a pound. But Taunette Dixon of the Newport Fisherman’s Wives group – who owns a crabbing vessel herself – said that’s improved for some since.

“We delivered to a local plant here and received $2.75 on the 16th,” Dixon told KLCC.   “I called a friend who was a live crab buyer, and their price is $4 per pound right now.”

The downside, is that there are fewer Dungeness Crab this season.  They are in great health and full of meat, adds Dixon.  This has also caused larger crabbing vessels to look towards other seafood markets.

Read the full story at KLCC

Oregon Sea Grant’s Survey Results Prompted Positve Way to Address Seafood Industry’s COVID Dilemma

January 14, 2021 — When COVID-19 initially struck Asia, many fisheries in Oregon lost their export markets in late January 2020 because of canceled Chinese Lunar New Year celebrations. Prices for Dungeness crab stagnated at a time when they normally would be rising.

When the virus spread to the West Coast, Oregon’s seafood industry felt shock waves immediately. Most Americans eat seafood in restaurants, and Oregon’s “Stay at Home, Save Lives,” orders shuttered in-person dining in March. Some vessels cut their seasons short.

Read the full story at Seafood News

Oregon Dungeness crab vessels are finally headed to sea

January 12, 2021 — Three-and-a-half weeks into Oregon’s commercial Dungeness crab season, crab boats are finally heading out to sea.

Haggling over the opening price was the sticking point between processors and fishermen.  An agreement on $2.75 per pound was announced Friday night.

Taunette Dixon of the Newport Fishermen’s Wives group said she can’t recall the last time negotiations went on this long.  But she’s hopeful the season goes well.

“For the fisherman who are risking their lives, that are out there sacrificing their time, their energy, their health, their safety…to bring seafood to the world,” Dixon said.

Lori Steele, executive director of the West Coast Seafood Processors Association, said the COVID-19 pandemic really hit the industry starting in March 2020.

Read the full story at OPB

California commercial crab price strike ends

January 11, 2021 — The commercial crabbing fleet has ended its strike and will start soaking traps in the ocean on Monday, with fresh crab likely appearing in markets by Thursday afternoon, a local industry leader said Saturday.

Wholesale buyers and negotiators for crabbers in California and Oregon finally agreed Friday on an opening price for the coveted crustaceans after nearly three weeks of stalemate.

But the late agreement, following a 5½-week delay because of whales that were still feeding in the fishing grounds well after the traditional Nov. 15 season start, means the fleet already has missed the key Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s markets.

Fishers also had to settle for less than the $3 a pound they had hoped to secure for the initial landings, instead agreeing to $2.75 per pound, said Dick Ogg, vice president of the Bodega Bay Fishermen’s Marketing Association.

Read the full story at The Press Democrat

Pacific sea otter reintroduction gets nudge from Congress

January 8, 2021 — President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed this year’s federal budget, which includes a directive to study sea otter reintroduction in the Pacific Northwest.

Democratic U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley for Oregon added the paragraph to the federal budget bill that directs the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to study the feasibility and cost of reestablishing the marine mammals where they were once hunted to near-extinction along the Pacific coast in Oregon and Washington, the Northwest News Network reported.

“I’m very pleased. This is very timely,” said Bob Bailey, who leads the Elakha Alliance, a group that wants to bring wild sea otters back to Oregon. His organization, named after the Clatsop-Chinookan word for sea otter, prompted congressional action and already launched its own feasibility study based in Oregon.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Lewiston Tribune

No agreement yet on crab prices

January 4, 2021 — Two weeks after the season was set to open on Dec. 16, Oregon crabbers are still sitting at the dock waiting for a price before heading out to sea.

The California season is likewise delayed by price negotiations, while the Washington season has been delayed until at least Jan. 15 due to high domoic acid levels.

With no price agreement in sight, many would pin the price hang-up on the largest processor in the area, Pacific Seafood, but after a period of silence, the company has asserted it’s only one of many processors that contribute to determining the price, which is especially difficult this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

While not directly involved, Lori Steel, executive director of the West Coast Seafood Processors Association, said that as of Wednesday, negotiations were still ongoing behind closed doors, and a price could be decided at any time. Pacific Seafood is one of the companies that falls under the association’s umbrella.

“The companies I represent are working hard to get this going and find an agreement among the fishermen they buy from,” Steel said. “We’re all hopeful to see fishermen on the water as soon as possible.”

Steel said the pandemic has been a huge source of uncertainty this year and has disrupted every part of the supply chain for the crab industry. She estimates that the government closures have caused restaurant and food service demand for crab to fall 70 percent, and other restrictions on employment have led to a labor shortage.

“People who don’t work in the industry need to understand that we’re a struggling industry right now, and the pandemic is putting unprecedented pressure on us from the harvesters all the way up the supply chain,” Steel said. “We’re doing the best we can, and it’s just been a tough year. We want to see this resolved and have our guys packing crab in the plants as soon as possible.”

Read the full story at the Newport News Times

Record Marine Heatwaves Build Reservoir of Toxic Algae Off the U.S. West Coast, New Study Reveals

December 16, 2020 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

Repeated marine heatwaves off the U.S. West Coast starting about 2013 fueled record harmful algal blooms that seeded a region off Northern California and Southern Oregon with toxic algae, a new study has found. That reservoir of harmful algae has, in turn, spread across the West Coast and forced the closure of valuable Dungeness crab and other shellfish seasons every year since 2015.

This year, for example, toxic algae have closed Dungeness crab harvest and some clamming in Washington through December.

“We now can see that marine heatwaves have the ability to seed new offshore hotspots, like ocean ‘crock pots’ where blooms can develop in subsequent years,” said Vera Trainer, a research scientist at NOAA Fisheries’ Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Seattle and lead author of the new research.

Early Warnings

The good news, she said, is that offshore surveys and studies have unraveled the way toxic algae spreads through coastal waters. These data can help fisheries managers anticipate and mitigate the impacts. Scientists share that detailed information through regional bulletins that serve as an early warning system for harmful algal blooms.

That way, managers can focus closures in the most affected areas, for example, while others remain open. Or they can open fisheries earlier before the toxins build up in shellfish. The alert system has reduced the need for coastwide closures with widespread economic impacts.

“The most valuable tool we have is knowledge of how these events develop, so we know where to expect impacts, and which areas remain safe,” she said.

Read the full release here

PFMC: Southern Oregon/Northern California Coast Coho Workgroup to host online meeting January 5, 2021

December 7, 2020 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s Southern Oregon/Northern California Coast (SONCC) Coho Workgroup will host an online meeting that is open to the public.  The meeting will be held Tuesday, January 5, 2021 from 9 a.m., Pacific Standard Time, until 5 p.m., or until business for the day has been completed.

Please see the SONCC Workgroup online meeting notice on the Council’s website for purpose and participation details.

For further information:

  • Please contact Pacific Fishery Management Council staff Mike Burner at 503-820-2414; toll-free 1-866-806-7204.

Despite shutdowns, Oregon Dungeness crab fleet fares well

November 5, 2020 — Oregon crabbers had landed 20.07 million pounds of Dungeness as of August. Ex-vessel price negotiations and meat fill issues delayed the opening of the season until 31 December. And like other fisheries, the arrival of COVID-19 put the stops on product flow to preferred markets.

As for the resource, the good times continue to roll for the crabbers. Based on average ex-vessel prices of USD 3.64 (EUR 3.12) per pound this year’s revenues crunch out to USD 73.06 million (EUR 62.67 million). According to data from PacFIN, the Oregon fleet averaged USD 3.58 (EUR 3.02) per pound for revenues of USD 66.7 million (EUR 57.21 million) in the 2019 season.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Salmon study sheds light on why fall-run fish are bigger than their spring-run cousins

October 30, 2020 — For the Yurok people, who have lived at the mouth of the Klamath River for generations, the spring run of Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) is a welcome—and nutritious—relief from winter. But as the fish have dwindled to just a fraction of their original numbers, Indigenous groups there are pushing to have them protected by the Endangered Species Act. New research, which suggests genes play only a small role in distinguishing the spring salmon from their fall-run cousins, may call into question the need for such a designation.

The rivers of the Pacific Northwest used to teem with two waves of Chinook: those that arrived in March or April, and those that came 6 months later, swimming from the sea to their upriver breeding grounds. Although technically the same species, the spring-run and fall-run fish have some “iconic differences,” says Eric Anderson, a molecular geneticist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Southwest Fisheries Science Center. Spring salmon are smaller, fattier, and less sexually mature than fall fish. They also swim further upriver to breed.

To tease out the genetic basis of those differences, Anderson and colleagues teamed up with Yurok fishers living at the mouth of the Klamath River in northern California. Together, they examined 500 fish as they started their upstream journeys in all four seasons. The researchers measured the size of each fish, assessed its fattiness and reproductive status, and took samples of its DNA. The researchers gathered similar data from other rivers.

Past studies have shown that a small region of the salmon chromosome 28 contains two genes, GREB1L and ROCK1, that vary between spring and fall salmon. Anderson and his colleagues did further genomic studies, sequencing the whole genomes of 160 fish in the hopes of linking the two genes to the spring and fall traits. The data set is “impressive” and the work unique says Sheela Phansalkar Turbek, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Colorado, Boulder, who was not involved with the work.

Read the full story at Science Magazine