Saving Seafood

HEATHER HANSON: Fish-friendly development is cost effective for taxpayers

October 24, 2018 — As Alaskans are faced with the question of whether or not to support Proposition 1 in the upcoming election, I want to share my experience working as a civil engineer in the salmon habitat restoration field. I started my career working on projects in the 1990s to retrofit the dams on the Columbia River in Washington state. We poured hundreds of millions of dollars into floating fish passage structures, drilling tunnels and trucking fish around the dams with very little result. It is now widely accepted that dams have a pretty negative impact on salmon runs.

I now live in Alaska and work on stream restoration and fish passage here. The undersized culverts on many of our existing road stream crossings act like small dams that make it difficult for adult salmon to get upstream to spawn. They are an even bigger problem for juvenile salmon that spend up to four years in fresh water before heading out to the ocean. Juvenile salmon need to move between their summer and winter homes in the small streams and lakes that make up their habitat in order to find food in the summer and avoid ice packed streams in the winter. Culverts are such a problem that the Department of Fish and Game has been assessing culverts around the state since 2001 for their ability to pass fish. On the Fish and Game website, you can see if there are undersized culverts in your neighborhood that are blocking fish passage.

Another problem for salmon in Alaska has been the destruction of vegetation in the riparian areas, or the areas along the banks of rivers and streams. This vegetation provides shade, hiding places and food for fish and helps protect against bank erosion. Many landowners who live along Alaska’s rivers have also discovered that removing vegetation leads to accelerated bank erosion and are now investing in replanting these banks to protect their land with the help of state and federal tax dollars.

Habitat restoration is a slow, expensive process that is largely funded by federal and local taxpayer dollars. We have learned a lot about how to build fish friendly infrastructure during the past 30 years, and this infrastructure has also greatly reduced maintenance and flood damage costs. For these reasons, the municipality of Anchorage, the Mat-Su Borough and the Kenai Borough have passed ordinances to protect salmon habitat. In areas of the state without adequate protections, there are still undersized culverts being installed that prevent salmon from getting to their habitat and changes to riparian areas that reduce habitat quality. A recently published article in the Alaska Business Magazine has some good information on the long-term cost benefits of doing it right the first time when it comes to building roads over streams.

Read the full opinion piece at Anchorage Daily News

NFI Future Leaders seek donations for SeaShare

October 23, 2018 — The National Fisheries Institute’s Future Leaders program is seeking donations for SeaShare, a non-profit organized to enable the U.S. seafood industry to donate food and resources to hunger-relief efforts nationwide.

The Future Leaders program, founded and run by the seafood industry’s trade group, is designed to craft and promote young leaders in the industry through a year-long training program.

SeaShare Director of Development Kate Tomkins said the Future Leaders have conducted a SeaShare giving campaign since 2011.

“Like Future Leaders, SeaShare really represents the seafood industry, is aligned with seafood industry, and we both see ourselves as extensions of the industry giving back for hunger-relief,” Tomkins said.

Founded in 1994 and based in Bainbridge Island, Washington, U.S.A., near Seattle, SeaShare annually organizes the donation of more than two million pounds of seafood to food banks in as many as 30 states across the United States. Tomkins said in addition to seafood, the organization also accepts in-kind donations of cold storage and transportation, and has nearly 200 partners throughout the supply chain helping to get seafood to food banks.

“We want to continue to bring more seafood to more people throughout the country,” Tomkins said. “There are 42 million Americans who struggle with hunger. That number has not significantly changed since the end of the last financial crisis. People are still really struggling to meet their own basic needs, and we believe everyone should have access to highest-quality protein that’s out there.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

RAMONA DENIES: Should Oregon Kill Sea Lions to Save the Salmon?

October 18, 2018 — Used to be, they’d show up at Willamette Falls around late November—beefy males here to bulk up and loll on the docks. Call it sea lion winter break; time off from California’s Channel Islands rookeries, beaucoup steelhead to eat, zero problems. (No pups, no ladies, no predators.) When it was time to head back south, a 400-pound sea lion might have doubled in size, having chowed down on, at minimum, three 15-pound Pacific Northwest salmonids a day.

Nowadays, these party boys are arriving earlier and staying later. And they’re not just loitering in Oregon City. They also mob the Columbia River, particularly around January, for chinook on their way to spawning grounds—eating, by one report, as much as 45 percent of some salmon runs, a feast season that now draws out through June.

“They’ve learned that in April and May there’s a pretty good buffet,” says Robert Anderson, a fishery biologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “Particularly over the past four to five years, there’s been a good uptick in the California sea lions that go to Willamette Falls.”

The result, warned Oregon’s Department of Fish & Wildlife in a 2017 study, is a 90 percent chance some of the Columbia River’s already struggling salmon populations will soon go extinct. And that’s causing some Northwest legislators to take aim at sea lions.

The irony here? Both species are protected by federal law—salmon (steelhead, chinook) by the 1973 Endangered Species Act and sea lions (California and Steller’s) by the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act. That means state, federal, and tribal agencies’ hands are tied when it comes to lethally removing hungry sea lions from river systems—like the mid-Columbia—where historically they’ve never been. According to Charles Hudson of the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, that’s the choice we have to make: do we kill one species to save another?

Read the full opinion piece at Portland Monthly

Netflix’s ‘Battlefish’ follows the adventures of tuna fishing boats off the Washington-Oregon borde

October 5, 2018 — Tuna is the new gold. Well, it’s worth its weight in gold anyway; pole-caught albacore tuna is one of the world’s most sustainable wild fisheries, with premium fish on demand for sashimi and high-end canned tuna. And the men and women who catch it are the subject of a new, bingeable Netflix docuseries called, adorably, “Battlefish.” 

“Battlefish,” a coproduction of Netflix and the reality powerhouse Pilgrim Media Group (“Dirty Jobs,” “Ghost Hunters,” “American Chopper”), follows five tuna fishing boats — the Judy S, the TNT, the Intrepid, the Oppor-tuna-ty and the Ashley Nicole — as they sail in and out of Ilwaco, Washington, on the Washington-Oregon border at the mouth of the Columbia River with their catches. And while the fisheries of Alaska and New England have had their day on the screen, “Battlefish” is the first show to highlight the fisheries of the Pacific Northwest.

“Battlefish” executive producer Mike Nichols is a fishing-show veteran; he also produces the reality show “Wicked Tuna” about bluefin tuna fishermen off the coast of New England.

“On the East Coast, it’s a very generational thing. It’s handed down in the family, and they catch the bug,” Nichols. “It’s not that way out west.” In the Pacific Northwest, Nichols posits, people come tuna fishing from all walks of life, maybe drawn by the primeval lure of the ocean, but certainly because there’s money to be made — like a gold rush, where one’s ability to pull money out of mother nature depends partially on luck and partially on preparedness and method.

Read the full story at The Seattle Times

U.S. Secretary of Commerce Declares Commercial Fishery Disasters for West Coast Salmon and Sardines

September 28, 2018 — The following was released by NOAA:

Today, Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross announced that commercial fishery failures occurred between 2015 and 2017 for salmon fisheries in Washington, Oregon, and California, in addition to the sardine fishery in California.

“The Department of Commerce and NOAA stand ready to assist fishing towns and cities along the West Coast as they recover,” said Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross. “After years of hardship, the Department looks forward to providing economic relief that will allow the fisheries and the communities they help support to rebound.”

Between July 2016 and March 2018, multiple tribes and governors from Washington, Oregon, and California requested fishery disaster determinations. The Secretary, working with NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), evaluated each request based on the available data, and found that all but one (the California red sea urchin fishery) met the requirements for a fishery disaster determination.

The determinations for West Coast salmon and sardines now make these fisheries eligible for NOAA Fisheries fishery disaster assistance.  The 2018 Consolidated Appropriations Act provided $20 million in NOAA Fisheries fishery disaster assistance. The Department of Commerce is determining the appropriate allocations of these funds to eligible fisheries.

Read the full release here

Commerce Department Makes Several Fishery Failure Determinations for West Coast Fisheries

September 27, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Salmon and sardine fisheries off the West Coast have been closed or severely curtailed in the years since The Blob — an unusual mass of warm water — stuck around for most of 2014 and 2015. While not the only odd ocean change, it was blamed for many fisheries problems.

Now, Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross has determined those salmon and sardine fisheries are indeed fishery failures due to natural resource conditions, the department said in a press release and letters released Tuesday. Those fisheries will now be eligible for $20 million in fishery disaster aid in the 2018 Consolidated Appropriations Act.

““The Department of Commerce and NOAA stand ready to assist fishing towns and cities along the West Coast as they recover,” Ross said in a statement. “After years of hardship, the department looks forward to providing economic relief that will allow the fisheries and the communities they help support to rebound.”

About a dozen fisheries are included in the determinations, a mix of several tribes and state fisheries from all three West Coast states. Only one, the California red sea urchin fishery, was not included.

“The recent five-year average revenue (2011-2015) from the California red sea urchin fishery was $8,538,815,” Ross’ letter to California Gov. Edmund G. Brown said. “In 2016, California red sea urchin fishery revenues were $7,255,593, which is a 15 percent revenue loss as compared with the previous five-year average. Compared to the previous five-year average, this percentage loss in revenue is substantially lower than the 35 percent revenue loss minimum called for in the NMFS Policy Guidance to justify a determination of a commercial fishery failure, serious disruption, or harm.”

However, the 2015 and 2016 Pacific sardine fishery did meet the requirements for a fishery failure. A large biomass decline in sardines, resulting from unfavorable ocean conditions, was beyond the control of fishery managers, the letter to Gov. Brown stated.

“We are deeply grateful to Secretary Ross and Assistant Administrator for Fisheries Chris Oliver, as well as to West Coast NMFS officials and Governor Brown, for acknowledging that our sardine fishery closure met the legal requirements for designation as a fishery resource disaster,” California Wetfish Producers Association Executive Director Diane Pleschner said in an email. “This determination now makes our sardine fishery eligible for NMFS fishery disaster assistance. We look forward to learning the level of disaster assistance that the Department of Commerce will determine. The fact that relief is coming is very good news.”

NMFS has not determined the allocations for the $20 million in disaster assistance yet, but the final divisions will be pretty small for each entity compared to similar disasters in years past.

For example, the 2016 and 2017 California and Oregon ocean troll Klamath River fall Chinook salmon fisheries were included in the determinations. A similar scenario in 2005 and 2006, in which commercial troll seasons were partially or fully closed due to poor returns of Klamath River fall Chinook, $60.4 million in disaster aid was made available to fishermen, processors and related businesses. Now, those fisheries will have to share part of the $20 million — barring additional funding appropriated by Congress.

Other determinations include the 2017 Yurok and 2016-2017 Hoopa Valley tribes’ Klamath River fall Chinook fisheries; the 2016 Makah ocean coho and Chinook salmon troll fishery in Washington; the 2015 Hoh, Suquamish, Nooksack and Stillaguamish tribes’ coho fisheries in Washington; the 2015 Muckleshoot and Upper Skagit tribes’ coho and pink salmon fisheries in Washington; and the 2015 and 2016 Quileute Tribe coho salmon fisheries in Washington.

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

Disasters declared for salmon fisheries along West Coast

September 26, 2018 – SEATTLE — Federal officials have determined that commercial fishery failures occurred for salmon in Washington, Oregon and California, making those fisheries eligible for federal disaster assistance.

U.S. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross on Tuesday also announced a commercial fishery failure for the sardine fishery in California but not for the state’s red sea urchin fishery.

The governors from Washington, Oregon and California and multiple Native American tribes had requested the determinations between July 2016 and March 2018. Their requests noted unusually warm and poor ocean conditions that affected fish.

Read the full story from at the Associated Press

 

Washington Governor’s task force releases draft plan to save local orcas

September 26, 2018 — A state organization dedicated to protecting the area’s endangered orcas is one step closer to fulfilling its mission.

Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee’s Southern Resident Killer Whale Task Force released a draft plan on Sept. 24. The public can comment on the report until midnight, Oct. 7 at governor.wa.gov/orcareport. Members will review comments at their Oct. 17-18 meetings and their final plan is due by Nov. 16.

The draft plan states that the organization’s “goal is to ensure the ecosystem is healthy and resilient enough to support a thriving Southern resident orca population.” Members are coordinating with an orca recovery plan created by the National Marine Fisheries Service in 2008, which strives to create an average population growth rate of 2.3 percent per year for 28 years.

Read the full story at The San Juan Journal

 

Tariffs could harm NW fishing industry in markets on both sides of the Pacific

September 24, 2018 — First, it was Washington wheat farmers and apple growers. Then it was regional wineries. And now, Pacific Northwest seafood companies are getting sucked into the escalating trade war between the Trump administration and China.

The fleet that fishes in the North Pacific, much of it based in Puget Sound, was first caught up in the fight in July, when China imposed sweeping sanctions on many U.S. imports, including virtually all seafood. The immediate risk was clear: China’s tariffs threatened to block access to what many believe will become the world’s largest consumer market for seafood products.

But now there’s a new risk: a Trump administration trade policy that was meant to punish the Chinese, but which could end up making American seafood more expensive for American consumers — a bizarre outcome that could expose the Northwest’s seafood industry to trade-war damage both at home and abroad.

That risk became clear on Monday, when Robert Lighthizer, the United States Trade Representative, released a list of some 5,700 imported Chinese food products that will be hit by heavy new tariffs. Among them, roughly $2.7 billion in imported Chinese seafood items—everything from salmon and flounder to sole and snow crab.

Read the full story at The Seattle Times

Tentative deal reached on renewal of Pacific Salmon Treaty

September 21, 2018 — American and Canadian negotiators have successfully brokered a deal to renew the Pacific Salmon Treaty. The compromise agreement has now been sent to Ottawa and Washington, D.C., to be approved and ratified by their respective national governments.

The Pacific Salmon Treaty is renegotiated every decade between the two countries to govern salmon catch, research, and enhancement in Alaska, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia. The treaty expires on its own terms on Dec. 31, 2018. The current negotiations have taken place over the course of two years by two teams seeking to renew the treaty for the next decade, from Jan. 1, 2019, through Dec. 31, 2028.

Aspects of the expiring plan will carry over. Among them, the use of an abundance-based management regime for king salmon, as opposed to hard caps. This should result in harvest rate indices and quotas that will rise and fall depending on abundance of the fish.

Pacific Salmon Commission Executive Secretary John Field praised the negotiators for working out amendments to the treaty, including harvest rate reductions of king salmon when it comes to mixed-stock ocean fisheries.

Read the full story at National Fisherman