Monday, June 14, 2010
Chilean hake up for MSC accreditation
Sociedad Nacional de Pesca has entered its Chilean hake (Merluccius gayi gayi) trawl fishery into the independent, third-party assessment under the Marine Stewardship Council’s (MSC) certification program.
– MSC press release
More:www.msc.org
One step to SE seine buyout OK’d
Gov. Sean Parnell signed House Bill 365 into law. The law gives the National Marine Fisheries Service access to confidential state records on the value of fish harvests.
– Pacific Fishing columnist Wesley Loy, reporting in his blog: Deckboss
Gulf spill workers look to Alaska experience
With their futures dark and confused, desperate residents of the Gulf of Mexico are turning to veterans of Alaska's Exxon Valdez oil spill for clues about what they are facing.
– Anchorage Daily News
More:www.adn.com
Oregonians may have to thank Alaska
The National Marine Fisheries Service this summer is interviewing Oregon commercial fishermen who began their fishing careers in Alaska.
– Pacific Fishing columnist Wesley Loy, reporting in his blog: Deckboss
Fisherman dead in Auke Bay
A Washington state man was killed attempting to secure a commercial fishing vessel to a dock in Juneau.
– Seattle P-I
More:www.seattlepi.com
BP wants to see fishermen’s tax returns
BP's request for tax records poses a problem for some residents of fishing communities in southeastern Louisiana — the nonconformists who haven't kept records or reported their cash income.
– LA Times
More:www.latimes.com
Habeas corpus for sea lions?
It is not uncommon for a law professor to have a client on death row. Mine is a sea lion. He goes by C657.
– Washington Post
You may see some strange aircraft
The Continental U.S. North American Aerospace Defense Command Region, along with its Alaskan and Canadian counterparts, will participate in Exercise Amalgam Dart Tuesday through Thursday off the coasts of northwestern U.S., western Canada and Alaska. U.S. Air Force C-21 jets will take on the role as tracks of interest. They will fly during daylight hours at altitudes above 15,000 feet off the Alaskan, British Columbian, Washington and Oregon Coasts.
– Military press release
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Thank hatcheries after Exxon Valdez
Before the tanker Exxon Valdez hit Bligh Reef in 1989 and smeared Prince William Sound with 11 million gallons of crude oil, salmon catches in the sheltered waters in the curve of Alaska's underbelly had been averaging less than 10 million fish per year all the way back to statehood.
– Alaska Dispatch
Beam him home, Scottie
The news that William Shatner of Capt. Kirk fame is boosting the NDP-backed battle to torpedo our fish-farm industry is weird, but not entirely from another universe.
– Vancouver Province
Read more: www.theprovince.com
Crescent City to remodel seafood plant
Preliminary steps to refurbish the seafood processing plant currently leased by Albers Seafood are in the works after the City Council approved a measure Monday allowing city staff to apply for a grant.
– Crescent City Triplicate
More:www.triplicate.com
Thanks for … not much
Approximately 350 commercial fishermen were given checks in the amount of either $2,500 or $5,000 from BP as compensation for lost wages in the month of June.
– KPLC, Lake Charles, La.
More:www.kplctv.com
NOAA brings much to Newport
NOAA vessels are all about marine science, research, and education, and jobs, economic development, and growth. But more:
– Newport News Times
Problems foreseen in Fraser probe
A federal judicial inquiry appointed by Prime Minister Stephen Harper to investigate the staggering decline of sockeye salmon in the Fraser River hasn’t yet started its hearings, but already it is under attack.
– Globe and Mail, Canada
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Salmon: Highest prices in two decades
As commercial salmon fishermen in Kuskokwim Bay made the season's first deliveries, Coastal Villages Seafoods announced it will pay prices that haven't been seen in two decades.
– Tundra Drums
More:www.thetundradrums.com
A bit late, kings arriving in Yukon River
With the first of the summer kings beginning to show up in the test nets operated by the Alaska Department of Fish & Game (ADF&G) just outside Emmonak, native subsistence fishermen are finally able to begin their traditional harvest of the prized kings, reports Jack Schultheis, General Manager of Kwik’pak Fisheries, the only salmon buyer on the Lower Yukon.
– Kwik’pak press release
More:www.kwikpakfisheries.com
Harbor Crown sale postponed
Deckboss told you last month about how the defunct Harbor Crown Seafoods processing plant out at Unalaska was being offered in a foreclosure sale.
– Pacific Fishing columnist Wesley Loy, writing in his blog: Deckboss
More:www.deckboss.blogspot.com
New current, tide charts for Aleutians
This weekend, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration completed the first part of its effort to redo tidal current maps for the Aleutian chain. It's been over fifty years since the maps have been updated.
—KUCB, Unalaska
More:www.publicbroadcasting.net
Kodiak sends people to oil spill
Kodiak is sending more than its sympathy to the people of coastal Louisiana, Mississippi Alabama and Florida in response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
As oil continues to come ashore, Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge and Coast Guard personnel have been sent to help with the recovery.
– Kodiak Daily Mirror
More:www.kodiakdailymirror.com
Columbia River salmon must be priority
Columbia River dams have been around long enough to engender thoughts that they are as immutable as the landscape in which they were built, but in fact some noteworthy and laudable changes are under way.
– Daily Astorian
More:www.dailyastorian.com
Ocean Beauty ends eagle episode
You remember this slimy story. One day in January 2008, a flock of ravenous bald eagles took a deadly dive into a truckload of fish waste at the company's Kodiak processing plant.
– Pacific Fishing columnist Wesley Loy, writing in his blog: Deckboss
More:www.deckboss.blogspot.com
Columbia River fishery underway
Tribal and non-Indian commercial fishermen, and anglers as well, get to test the Columbia River mainstem waters for adult salmon for the first time since early this spring with the opening of fisheries targeting what is expected to be the largest summer Chinook run since 2002.
– Chinook (Wash.) Observer
More:www.chinookobserver.com
Whale poop: a weapon in climate change
Southern Ocean sperm whales are an unexpected ally in the fight against global warming, removing the equivalent carbon emissions from 40,000 cars each year thanks to their faeces, a study found on Wednesday.
– AFP
More:www.google.com
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Observers on halibut boats
The North Pacific Fishery Management Council wrapped up its June meeting in Sitka on Tuesday. During the meeting, the council advanced a measure to restructure a program that puts human observers on fishing vessels.
– KCAW, Sitka
More:www.kcaw.org
New leadership at UFA
United Fishermen of Alaska (UFA) has elected Arni Thomson, executive director of the
Alaska Crab Coalition (ACC), to lead the statewide fishing trade association as president for 2010 - 2011.
– UFA press release
More:www.ufa-fish.org
Disappointment on Kuskokwim
Commercial salmon fishing in the Kuskokwim Bay fishery is closed for the remainder of the week, following a disappointing opener in Quinhagak on Tuesday and reports of slow subsistence fishing.
– Tundra Drums
More:www.thetundradrums.com
Kenai River fight: 2010 edition
What was expected to be the contentious time for Alaskans to fight over Kenai River salmon has yet to arrive, and already a salmon war has erupted south of Anchorage.
– Alaska Dispatch
More:www.alaskadispatch.com
Troopers say legislator was poaching
The Alaska State Troopers confirm the person cited in the following case is state Rep. Wes Keller, R-Wasilla. Keller is vice chairman of the House Special Committee on Fisheries.
– Pacific Fishing columnist Wesley Loy, writing in his blog – Deckboss
More:www.deckboss-thebrig.blogspot.com
Counting sea otters
A project that gets underway next month aims to count sea otters throughout Southeast Alaska, where the animals pose a growing threat to several important fisheries.
– Pacific Fishing columnist Laine Welch, writing in the Homer Tribune
More:www.homertribune.com
Tribes now selling Columbia salmon
The four Columbia River treaty tribes have opened their summer fishery with commercial sales of fresh summer Chinook nicknamed "June Hogs" because of their size.
– Seattle P-I
More:www.seattlepi.com
B.C.’s Nass sockeye fishery opens
The Sockeye Salmon fishery officially opened on the Nass river yesterday. Back in March the Department of Fisheries and Oceans projected a return of over 600,000 sockeye, a number slightly below last year's average, however enough for a fishery to exist.
– CFTK, Terrace, B.C.
More:www.cftktv.com
Bristol Bay group announces grants
Research studies, increased ice capacity, marketing efforts and more are the beneficiaries of $671,000 in grants awarded in early June by the Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association, at its annual meeting in Dillingham.
– Bristol Bay Times
More:www.thebristolbaytimes.com
Friday, June 18, 2010
Boat on the rocks
Following the rescue of three crewmen from the Seward-based 58-foot fishing vessel Copasetic Thursday Coast Guard Marine Safety Unit Valdez dispatched personnel to assess the damage done to both the vessel and the environment.
– Coast Guard press release
More:www.piersystem.com
Editorial: NOAA observers are dangerous
For all the now-admittedly bad government science that's wreaked havoc on the fishing industry, all the documented criminal law enforcement tactics carried out by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries agents — and even all the signs of special-interest influence on the Obama administration's government fishery policy — NOAA may have hit a new low this week.
– Gloucester Times
More:www.gloucestertimes.com
Fight over Kenai setnets
The Department of Fish and Game's decision approving set net fishing near the mouth of the Kenai does not sit well with some fishermen.
– KTUU, Anchorage
More:www.ktuu.com
Seiners return to Columbia River
In what might seem like a time warp, purse seines, beach seines and fish traps will reappear up and down the Columbia River this summer.
– Longview Daily News
More:tdn.com
California tribes oppose water bond
The Water Commission of the Inter-Tribal Council of California (ITCC), in a powerfully worded statement, is urging people to vote "No" on the $11.14 water bond on the November ballot.
– Indymedia, San Francisco Bay
More:www.indybay.org
Finally, Fraser probe begins
A $14 million official investigation into the precipitous decline of sockeye salmon stocks in British Columbia's Fraser River has begun in Vancouver.
– FIS
More:www.fis.com
B.C. trollers want treaty money
The West Coast Trollers Area G Association are in the process of taking the federal government to court for a fair share of the Pacific Salmon Treaty's (PST) $30 million U.S., which Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) has decided to invest mostly in a permanent licence retirement program.
– Westerly, Tofino, B.C.
More:www2.canada.com
Some good news about oil removal
For more than 50 years lurking below the surface of the frigid Alaska waters lies the Canadian Pacific Railway ship Princess Kathleen, resting at an angle on its port side, reminding Alaskans of its presence by releasing fuel periodically tainting the surface with its sheen.
– Coast Guard press release
More:www.piersystem.com
