Daily Archives: April 11, 2020

West Coast salmon season taking shape – Feds Look at Protections for Oregon Spring-Run Chinook Salmon

The Pacific Fishery Management Council has adopted ocean salmon season recommendations that provide recreational and commercial opportunities for most of the Pacific coast and achieve conservation goals for the numerous individual salmon stocks on the West Coast. >click to read< 17:25

Feds Look at Protections for Oregon Spring-Run Chinook Salmon -A petition seeking to extend federal wildlife protections to spring-run Chinook salmon found along Oregon’s coast has merit and could warrant listing the fish under the Endangered Species Act, Conservation groups Native Fish Society, the Center for Biological Diversity, and Umpqua Watersheds submitted a new petition in September 2019 specifically for spring-run salmon. >click you< 17:33

Harry Graham Goes Fishing

Harry Graham was a local surfer and fisherman. I only briefly got to know him near the end of his life. We did a page together about surfing and his friend Tom Linker, but he also gave me a bunch of photos of his commercial fishing days. Unfortunately, he passed away before I got much info on these. So I asked a few friends, a got a little info, and found some info in my notes. I think these are mostly from the early 80s. So here are some historic photos of some legendary characters doing their thing in an earlier time. By Tom Modugno >click to read< 16:02

What it’s really like to join the ‘Deadliest Catch’ crew at sea for a day

“Bait!” Capt. Sig Hansen’s voice booms at me from the wheelhouse of his crab fishing boat, the Northwestern,,I’ve joined his five-person crew for a day as the ship’s newbie, or “greenhorn,” to help set gear. It feels just like I’m on the unscripted Discovery hit Deadliest Catch…except I’m not on camera. My assignment: hooking bait bags inside the 875-pound steel-framed crab pots that are dropped one at a time into the churning sea. I climb awkwardly into the 8-foot-tall, 7-foot-wide pot that sits perched on the boat railing, secured by a cable. As I try to attach the bag, my two layers of gloves cause me to fumble, although another reason might be hearing Sig shout, “Turn and burn!” and “Time is money! by Kate Hahn >click to read< 13:51

Northern N.S. lobster fishermen fear impact of Coronavirus on communities

Leonard LeBlanc says his phone has been ringing off the hook. The retired fisherman now the president of the Gulf Nova Scotia Fishermen’s Coalition, “Last night I had a call from a fisherman’s wife who was crying on the phone,” LeBlanc said. “She said ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do this spring. My husband is going to have to be separated from me for the entire fishing season. We have two young kids and he doesn’t want to take the chance to infect the kids with the virus.’” Fish harvesters and processors have been deemed an essential service by the federal government, but some are concerned going ahead with the season would be a recipe for disaster for their families and communities. >click to read< 11:43

New Orkney state-of-the-art whitefish trawler arrives home

Orkney’s brand new state-of-the-art whitefish trawler, Aalskere, arrived in Kirkwall for the first time this morning.  The partners in the new Aalskere are Iain Harcus, his wife Elizabeth, John Harcus (Iain’s father) and the Don Fishing Company Peterhead. The new Aalskere was designed by Ove Kristensen from Vestvaerftet in Denmark, who oversaw the hull-building at the Stal-Rem S.A. yard in Poland. >click to read< 10:42

Mickey Sisk Jr. paints the outriggers on the F/V Swell Rider

Coronavirus undercuts Port of Astoria’s progress

Will Isom, the Port’s executive director, has focused on low-cost projects that benefit the agency and keep staff busy during a massive drop-off in business caused by the coronavirus.,, Bornstein and Da Yang seafood companies, which employ hundreds of people processing, freezing and shipping catch on Pier 2, have so far kept operating while checking workers’ temperatures, increasing sanitation and enacting more social distancing. “It is a constant concern and effort,” said Andrew Bornstein, co-owner of Bornstein Seafoods with his family. “We have installed partitions, spaced out lines, broken up lunch and dinner breaks to have less people in the lunchroom at a time.” Commercial Dungeness crab prices were already hurt by China’s travel restrictions and ban of live-animal imports during the coronavirus outbreak. >click to read< 09:31

Nfld. & Labrador: Can you fish safely in a pandemic? Seafood industry facing hard Coronavirus questions

All commercial inshore fisheries are delayed until at least May 1,, as the department (DFO) and industry players work out protocols for safer operation of vessels and processing plants. According to Keith Sullivan, the president of the Fish, Food and Allied Workers union, plant workers and fish harvesters have many questions about how they are supposed to keep themselves and their families safe. “The vast majority of the input and the feedback and everything we’re hearing from members is that right now, with all of the advice that we have, they certainly don’t feel safe,”,,, Brenda Greenslade, physical distancing, “A harvester told me the other day, their accommodations when they sleep, their heads are so close together, they share the same dream,” she said. She’s hearing some suggestions that harvesters should be told to bring less crew out to sea, where possible. >click to read< 08:43

Herring spawn setting new records near Craig

Herring are spawning in a big way near Craig on Prince of Wales Island in southern Southeast Alaska. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game reported 30 nautical miles of active spawn observed near Craig on Friday, April 10. That’s the largest single-day active spawning event on record for the area. And it beats the record set the day before, Thursday, a day that saw over 25 nautical miles. The area has a spawn on kelp commercial fishery underway. Fisherman catch herring and release them in floating net pens, called pounds. Those fish then lay eggs on kelp suspended in those pounds. The herring eggs and kelp are harvested together and sold. >click to read< 07:23