Saving Seafood

Smaller pollock during Alaska’s season B expected to tighten supplies

July 23, 2021 — Alaska’s Bering Sea pollock B season, which runs from June 10 to October 31, is experiencing strong volumes, but smaller fish sizes are causing a shortage of supply for the pollock fillet market.

This season is an improvement over last year’s B season, when a disappointing slog ended with fishermen leaving part of the total allowable catch in the water. Brent Paine, the executive director of United Catcher Boats, told SeafoodSource that the fish are out there, but they are about half the ideal size.

“The fishing is okay, but the fish are small. The fleet would like to see 700- to 800-gram fish, but what they’re bumping into is a lot of 400-gram fish. They’re smaller than we would like to see,” Paine told SeafoodSource.

During a recent 3-Minute Market Insight, Tradex Foods, a Canadian seafood supplier, warned that the smaller pollock size would strain supply for once-frozen pollock fillets.

“Small-size pollock will ultimately minimize the amount of pollock fillets being produced, especially for anything larger than two to four ounces,” said Tradex’s Kyla Hayward.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

COVID-19 closes a third Aleutian plant, stranding Bering Sea fishermen at the dock

January 25, 2021 — A third seafood processing plant has shut down in the Aleutian Islands amid a COVID-19 outbreak, threatening to further derail lucrative winter fisheries in the region.

In the Aleutian port town of Unalaska, at least five local boats are stuck at the dock with nowhere to deliver their cod after the shutdown of the Alyeska Seafoods processing plant, according to a crew member on one of them, Tacho Camacho Castillo.

Alyeska closed its plant Friday “based on a cluster of positive cases” identified through “surveillance testing,” the City of Unalaska said in a prepared statement.

“There’s two days and this fish starts to spoil,” Camacho Castillo, a crew member on the 58-foot Lucky Island, said in an interview Friday. “Am I going to be throwing out fish into the ocean? It’s going break my heart, for real, if I throw all this fish away.”

The plant closures are setting off a scramble among fishermen, industry leaders and political officials involved in the Bering Sea cod, crab and pollock fisheries, which are worth more than $1 billion and support thousands of jobs.

Read the full story at KTOO

A Seattle fishing company has had more than 100 COVID-19 cases on its ships. They’re heading to Alaska this summer.

June 9, 2020 — As America’s meat producers contend with thousands of COVID-19 cases among processing workers, seafood companies have drafted rigorous plans to ward off similar spread of the disease as their summer season looms in Alaska.

But with that season still gearing up, the industry has already been shaken by its first major outbreak, aboard a huge vessel with an onboard fish processing factory. Last week, Seattle-based American Seafoods confirmed that 92 crew from its American Dynasty ship had tested positive for COVID-19 — nearly three-fourths of 124 people onboard.

Fishing executives had been working long hours to prevent just that type of disaster, and the news hit them hard.

“It was like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe this.’ We had done so much — each company had worked so hard to try to avoid this happening,” said Brent Paine, executive director of United Catcher Boats, a trade group whose members fish for pollock and cod off Alaska and another whitefish called hake off Washington and Oregon. “None of us have ever worked so hard in our lives than we have in the last two months, without a doubt.”

Read the full story at Alaska Public Media

COVID-19 Outbreak In Pacific Northwest Seafood Industry As Season Ramps Up

June 8, 2020 — As America’s meat producers confronted thousands of COVID-19 cases, Pacific Northwest seafood companies drafted rigorous plans to ward off similar spread of the disease in an industry where processors also work in close quarters.

But just a few weeks into the summer season, the industry has been shaken by its first major outbreak aboard a huge vessel with an onboard fish processing factory. This week, Seattle-based American Seafoods confirmed that 92 crew from its American Dynasty ship had tested positive for COVID-19, nearly three-fourths of the 126 people onboard.

“It was like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe this.’ We had done so much. Each company had worked so hard to try to avoid this happening,” says Brent Paine, executive director of United Catcher Boats.

The trade group’s members fish for pollock and cod off Alaska, and another whitefish called hake off Washington and Oregon. “None of us have ever worked so hard in our lives than we have in the last two months, without a doubt.”

Read the full story at Spokane Public Radio

Trawl fishing in the age of the coronavirus: First, you make it through quarantine

May 18, 2020 — The spring trawl harvest for whiting is underway off the Northwest coast in an unusual year when a crucial marker of success won’t just be nets stuffed with fish but crews that stay healthy and free from the COVID-19 disease.

To try to assure that outcome, hundreds of crew members went through two weeks of shore-side quarantine coupled with testing for the novel coronavirus that did identify a few who, if they had gone out to sea, risked sickness and spreading the virus.

“There’s no silver bullet. But this is a huge deal,” said Karl Bratvold, a managing partner of Aleutian Spray Fisheries, which operates the catcher-processor vessel Starbound now harvesting whiting in open waters off the Olympic Peninsula. “We have a steady crew. And I’m glad they came back. They work in tight quarters and it’s scary out there. We had to do what we had to do to keep these people safe.”

The testing unfolds as the food industry — considered essential since the pandemic spread widely earlier this spring — has struggled with operations that often involve long hours of labor for crews who work in proximity to one another.

Read the full story at The Seattle Times

ALASKA: North Pacific council to study catch-share proposal for cod trawlers

February 22, 2019 — As pressure continues to build on Pacific cod landings in the Bering Sea, the US’ North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) is taking a hard look at the number of trawl vessels and offshore processors there, Alaska Public Radio reports.

A year after federal regulators dramatically cut the quota in the Gulf of Alaska, trawlers say the congestion is causing a race for the fish.

“You got kind of a perfect storm going on here: You have more and more vessels entering a fishery, you’ve got less fish available to be caught, and now this year in 2019, we ended up with a 13-day season,” Brent Paine, executive director of United Catcher Boats, is quoted as saying. “Four years ago, it never even closed.”

The NPFMC has taken up a request from Paine and others to study a catch share plan for trawl catcher vessels, splitting up the sector’s landings between individual boats before the season begins. A scoping paper is due from its staff later this year.

Such a management structure, which is already used by halibut and pollock fisheries, would limit the number of vessels that can participate in the fishery and reduce competition, the article notes. A specific date range would determine historical participation and therefore who gets shares and how many.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

An act of cod: Alaska-based fleet gets a gift from Board of Fish

October 24, 2018 — Alaska’s inshore cod fishery got a significant upgrade at the state’s Board of Fisheries meeting on Friday, Oct. 19.

The board voted 6 to 1 to increase the fleet’s allocation from 6.4 percent of the total Bering Sea cod quota to 8 percent with an annual increase of 1 percent until it tops out at 15. The Under Sixty Cod Harvesters, a trade group that represents about half of the statewater fleet, had been lobbying to get up to 10 percent and were pleasantly surprised with the 15 percent allocation.

The fishery of pot-cod boats under 60 feet started in 2012 with 1.2 percent of the total Bering Sea cod share. Proponents of the increase argued that the Alaska Constitution mandates development of the state’s resources, prioritizing fisheries with low-impact gear.

“We applaud this board for recognizing how important these open-access statewater fishing opportunities are for our community-based fishermen, and for the young fishermen coming up in the industry,” says Todd Hoppe, president of the Under Sixty Cod Harvesters.

Opponents of the increase largely represent stakeholders in the federal fishery, from which the quota will be siphoned to expand the statewater quota. That includes the freezer-longliner fleet, which has about 50 percent of the quota, and the catcher vessels, which have 21.5 percent.

The move comes at an especially tough time for these historic stakeholders in Bering Sea cod.

“There’s very little recruitment showing up in the stock, and a big chunk of that stock is moving to the north,” says Brent Paine, executive director of the United Catcher Boats, a trade group that represents about 50 trawlers, ranging from about 80 to 130 feet.

Paine expects the North Pacific Fishery Management Council to cut the TAC by 20 percent this year, on top of about 16 percent last year.

“So you get that reduction combined with this statewater increase, and now it’s starting to hurt the federal participants,” Paine says. “It’s tough to get a fair shot [at a state meeting]for federal participants because we’re second-class citizens. The statewater fleet walks into the Board of Fish and says, ‘We’re Alaskans; this is an entry-level fishery… Give us the fish.’ And that’s what happens.”

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Alaska: Bering Sea Trawl Cod Fishery May Have Been Shortest Ever, as High Prices Attract Effort

February 20, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The Bering Sea federal trawl cod fishery closed in what may be record time on Feb. 11, just 22 days after the Jan. 20 opener, according to National Marine Fisheries Service Biologist Krista Milani in Unalaska/Dutch Harbor.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the shortest ever,” and certainly for as long as she’s had the job going back to 2009.

While the Bering Sea cod quota is down 20 percent from last year, Milani said other factors are at play. She pointed out that in a previous year, with an almost identical quota, the season remained open for about six weeks, ending the second week of March in 2010.

This year, the A season Bering Sea cod trawl quota is 24,768 metric tons, and in 2010 it was 24,640 mt.

“The bigger thing is the price is good, and there’s a lot of interest in it,” Milani said.

“I think there’s a lot of reasons,” including fishermen feeling a need to build catch histories to qualify for future Pacific cod fishing rights, if a rationalization program is adopted for cod in the Bering Sea, she said.

“I think there’s some fear it could go to limited access,” Milani said.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Program is now considering a plan to restrict the number of boats eligible to fish for cod in the Bering Sea.

The fish council floated ideas to limit catcher vessel participation in the Bering Sea cod fishery, including controversial catch shares or individual fishing quotas, during a December meeting in Anchorage.

IFQs are not among alternatives the council is considering. The purpose and need statement, approved unanimously, includes limiting trawling to vessels actually fishing cod in various years between 2010 and 2017.

This would create a limited entry program within a limited entry program. Bering Sea cod fishing is already limited to boats with licenses. Some of those boats don’t usually participate, but can when prices are high or stocks are low in their usual fisheries.

Brent Paine, the executive director of United Catcher Boats, said something needs to be done to regulate fishing in the congested “Cod Alley.” He accurately predicted a three-week season in 2018 in the area offshore of Unimak Island.

“This is the last unrationalized fishery in the eastern Bering Sea,” Paine said. “If you don’t do anything, we’re all going to be losers.”

While Paine said the NPFMC’s present majority is unsympathetic to rationalization, calling it the “R word,” he said that may change in the future.

Rationalization opponents see IFQs as privatization adding another barrier to entry into the fishing world, while supporters call it a reward for investment with benefits including substantial retirement income.

Milani said Tuesday it was still too early to say how many trawlers participated, as there were vessels still delivering cod to processing companies, and perhaps some trawlers delivering loaded nets to offshore motherships. The last count had 55 in the federal cod fishery, compared to 57 last year, she said, expecting this year’s final count will be higher.

The number of boats is hard to track in-season, as many go back and forth between cod, pollock and other fisheries, although there are some that only fish cod, Milani said.

The depressed cod stocks in the Gulf of Alaska probably also contributed to this year’s fast pace, she said. Gulf cod stocks are way down, far worse than the smaller decline in the Bering Sea, an 80 per percent decline from last year.

Earlier in the season, Milani said the number of Gulf boats coming into the federal Bering Sea cod fishery was smaller than expected.

The Gulf cod crash appears to be having a greater impact in the state cod fishery, with 32 small boats registered on Tuesday, up from 24 last year in the Dutch Harbor Subdistrict. The state waters fishery is limited to boats 58 feet or shorter fishing within three miles of shore and using only pot gear.

The Dutch Harbor Subdistrict total catch on Monday was 11.4 million pounds caught in pots from a total quota of 28.4 million pounds. The pot cod fishery is expected to continue for another 14 to 16 days, according to Alaska Department of Fish and Game Biologist Asia Beder in Unalaska.

In the Aleutian Islands Subdistrict state waters fishery, with a quota of 12.8 million pounds, Beder couldn’t release precise total catch numbers because of confidentiality rules when there’s fewer than three processors. She said the fleet has caught somewhere between 25 and 50 percent. There’s only one processor, in Adak, Golden Harvest — formerly Premier Harvest, she said. And she could also say there were eight small boats fishing cod in the Aleutian subdistrict, all in the Adak section.

In the Aleutians, cod boats are allowed up to 60 feet in with various gear types, although longliners are limited to 58 feet.

In Bering Sea crab fisheries, the 50 boats dropping pots for opilio snow crab had made 134 landings for 10.9 million pounds or 58 percent of the total quota. The cumulative catch per unit of effort for the season is an average of 161 crab per pot, according to shellfish biologist Ethan Nichols of ADF&G in Unalaska.

In the Western Bering Sea Tanner fishery, 28 vessels had made 66 landings for 2.1 million pounds, with the quota nearly wrapped up at 85 percent.

In the Eastern Aleutian District, two small boats harvesting bairdi Tanner had landed over 75 percent of the total quota of 35,000 pounds, Nichols said.

The EAD is open this year only in the Makushin and Skan Bay area, and that’s where the Tanners are from that sell for $10 each by local fisherman Roger Rowland at the Carl E. Moses Boat Harbor in Unalaska.

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