Tag Archives: crab season

Press Democrat Editorial: North Coast fishers need help

The bad news keeps piling up for the North Coast’s beleaguered fishing industry. Crab season was delayed yet again this winter, and now salmon season may be canceled entirely for the second consecutive year. Even a hopeful development — the ongoing removal of four obsolete hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River — turned sour when as many as 830,000 hatchery fish died within days after being released in the Klamath, apparently because of high water pressure inside a bypass tunnel at Iron Gate Dam. Commercial and sport fishing have supported families in Bodega Bay, Fort Bragg and other North Coast towns for generations. “The identity of Bodega Bay is fishing,” Dick Ogg, a local skipper and president of the Bodega Bay Fisherman’s Marketing Association, told the editorial board. “The town itself, that is what we are, fishermen.” more, >>click to read<< 07:01

Dungies beyond crabbers’ grasp

The delay in starting the crab season, now stretching into its first month,,, “People have no idea how much money Dungeness crab bring into Newport,” said Casey Cooper, a third-generation fisherman who was rigging the steel-hulled Leslie Lee with crab pots at Newport’s International Terminal. “From car dealers to grocery stores, everybody’s waiting for this huge annual infusion of cash.” Businessman Dean Fleck of England Marine supplies the crab fleet with rope, buoys, crab pots and other fishing gear. He said the delay is being felt up and down the waterfront, where hundreds of workers from deckhands to processors are idled. He claimed each dollar generated by crab fishing is “brand new” to the local economy, with the potential to rebound seven times. >click to read< 15:41

Hurricane Ian Ravages Family Fishing Business Just Before Crab Season

Off the Hook Fishing Fleet has been in Michael McPhillips’ family for three generations, but Hurricane Ian has left the Fort Myers business in shambles. “Words can’t describe what happened here, McPhillips said. Though stone crab fishing runs in his blood, McPhillips says family-owned commercial fishing businesses are hard to come by. It’s why he tied down and braced for impact as Hurricane Ian barreled into Fort Myers. His mom Denise says she begged her son to stay home.  “This is our livelihood,” Michael McPhillips said. “This is all we got. Without this, you don’t have anything. That’s why I was trying to save the boats.” Denise McPhillips says they don’t have insurance. Video, >click to read< 14:00

Price Negotiation Delayed! Will there be Oregon Dungeness crab for Christmas? Fleet still in port

Commercial Dungeness crab season, Oregon’s most valuable fishery, opened Wednesday. But crab boats remain tied up on docks in Coos Bay. “We’re kind of sitting here with our hands tied behind our back. We’ve got really no options,” Rex Leach, owner of the fishing vessel, Ms. Julie, said this week. While weather can be a hold-up, that’s not the case right now. Fishermen are stalled because of price negotiations with processing plants. video, >click to read< 18:15

Crescent City Harbor: Crabbing as a family

After the state of California announced crab season would not open until Dec. 23, most of the owners and crews headed home to wait another week. The only boat with activity was the F/V Resolution, where boat owner Richard Nehmer and his crew made some final preparations. Nehmer also took the extra time to work with greenhorn Blake Mihelich, who is going crabbing for the first time. Nehmer was joined on the boat by his wife, Annie, and their children, Alana and Connor. “My grandfather was a fisherman, my father was a fisherman,” Richard said. “Connor will be a fourth-generation fisherman. Connor literally fishes with us. It’s his business, he just has to wait a few years.” photos >click to read< 09:18

Economic storm brews over Newfoundland and Labrador

Crab season in this part of Newfoundland and Labrador normally starts at the end of April and has always marked the beginning of the fishing calendar in a place where work is still tied to the bounty of the sea. But now that their crab pots are in the water, the crews aren’t sure if they can collect them. The pandemic has cut the price of crab in half, and fishermen are worried about confrontations at the wharf with larger boat operators who can’t afford to go to sea with such deflated prices. “It looks like when someone has died and you’re just waiting around to see what’s going to happen. As oil prices have collapsed, so have revenues from key industries such as tourism, forestry, mining and the fishery because of the continuing COVID-19 fallout. Personal income and sales tax streams have shriveled. The pandemic also shut down megaprojects such as the Voisey’s Bay mine and the Muskrat Falls hydroelectric dam, and closed the province’s only oil refinery. Future offshore projects, including the $6.8-billion deep-water Bay du Nord oil field, have been put on hold. >click to read< 14:58

FFAW, processors remain at odds on opening Newfoundland and Labrador crab season

It remains to be seen whether harvesters in the province will eventually start fishing for crab and offloading it at plants for processing. According to the Fish, Food and Allied Workers (FFAW-Unifor), two vessels from outside the province were turned away in Port Aux Basques and denied the opportunity to offload crab as of Monday morning, and three transport trucks carrying crab harvested outside the province were being blocked from making deliveries to fish plants, two in South Brook and one at Goobies. “The fishery was postponed three times on health and safety issues,” Pretty said. “During that time, the bargaining for the price of crab should have progressed, but instead of progressing,,, >click to read< 19:46

Coronavirus brings financial and physical worry for fish harvesters

“Whatever way this goes, it’s going to be a very hard year in the fishery, I think, overall,” said Jason Sullivan, a fisherman on the Avalon Peninsula. “There’s no way to sugarcoat that.” He said DFO’s release of the snow crab management plan — which saw an average quota increase of about 10 per cent — has lifted the spirits of some fish harvesters. Still, he figures others are going to have a tough decision to make this year. “If they do open the fishery, and I says ‘well, jeez I’m not going fishing, I don’t feel safe,’ the bank is going to call me and say ‘Jason, why didn’t you make your payments,'” he said. “Do you think they’re really going to care?” >click to read< 16:34

Crab fishermen hope new season won’t have same roadblocks. Next big hurdle is to negotiate commercial prices

Crabbers anticipate being able to set up their gear on Dec. 28 with an official start date just days later. But the fishermen still need to finish negotiating this year’s market prices — a process that could indefinitely delay the season’s start if it doesn’t move quickly. It’s illegal in California to sell crabs commercially without a set market price. “We’re definitely worried,” said fisherman Scott Creps. “We’re hoping to get everything worked out and get a full season this year.” >click to read< 07:22

Commercial crab season opening delayed until at least Dec. 31

With Dungeness crab in some management areas including Long Beach and Astoria still lacking enough meat, fishery managers on Dec. 6 decided to delay opening the commercial season until at least Dec. 31 from Point Arena, California to the U.S.-Canada border. > click to read<, Commercial Crab Season Delayed Again>click to read<Commercial Dungeness crab season delayed again along Oregon coast>click to read< 18:49

New Brunswick fishermen alarmed at 2nd closure over whale sighting

Fishermen are alarmed over the closure of another fishing area in order to protect North Atlantic right whales, a move some say will have a drastic effect on the industry. Fisheries and Oceans Canada announced Sunday that a second area off the coast of northern New Brunswick was being closed to fishing for at least two weeks. “We’re behind on our annual catches right now,” said Steven Hughes, a deckhand on a snow crab fishing boat based out of Shippagan. “This brought back the stress on the fishing industry.” >click to read< 15:15

Crab season: ‘Fishermen just needed to go fishing’ while skinny crab adds stress

The opening of the commercial crab season is traditionally December 1, but this year it was delayed to ensure quality and to work out negotiations between fishermen and processors over price.
While crabbers in Newport agreed to a $2.75 starting price, we were told Friday the offer was not accepted by the majority of west coast fishermen. >click here to read< 16:54

Skinny crabs add stress on local business owners – Scattered crabbing vessels dotted the horizon from Klipsan Beach and along the southwestern Washington coast last Monday. It was the start of the new commercial crabbing season — and possibly, sellers hope, the rebounding of the local market. Pacific Northwest crabbers have already lost over one and a half months’ worth of the crab season. >click here to read<

Bright outlook for Dungeness crab season and holiday feasts

ar-161119904-jpgmaxh400maxw667After enduring the most dismal Dungeness crab season in memory, one that ravaged fishermen and left consumers with the holiday blues, Bay Area crab lovers can put on their party hats. The 2016-17 commercial crab season will begin Tuesday on schedule, state regulators declared this week. The harmful algae blooms that tainted last year’s catch with a neurotoxin known as domoic acid have receded to normal levels along most of the California coast. That means Bay Area consumers will in all likelihood have crab for the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays, and fishermen will begin to recover from a brutal 18-month period in which a delayed and abbreviated crab season was sandwiched between two poor Chinook salmon seasons. “We’re just excited to get back out there,” said Devin Bunch,  Read the story here 13:43

Looking ahead to next years California crab season

dungenesscrabShould California’s four-year drought break, causing rivers to run, next year’s crab season could be worse than the 2015-2016 season. The industry has, so far, lost at least $48 million in revenue for crab fishermen statewide, according to information presented at the Joint Committee on Fisheries and Aquaculture hearing last Thursday, April 28 in Sacramento. Dr. Raphael Kudela and his colleague, Dr. William Sydeman, senior scientist with the Farallones Institute Team, fear if this season is followed by enough rain to end the drought, the rivers will run, bringing rich nutrients to the ocean. The algal bloom will then feed off the nutrients and, according to Kudela, be 400 percent more toxic than it was this year. There is a chance, however, that a La Nina weather pattern could be cool enough to make the algal bloom dissipate. As Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker drags her feet on disaster relief. Read the rest here 13:52

Fishermen ready for crab season

crab%20boatFishermen admit the delay is inconvenient, and came at an inopportune time, but are realistic about the delay, and know it’s just part of the industry. “It’s nothing new to us,” said Brett Webb, a Port Orford port commissioner and fisherman. “Anyone who doesn’t expect a delay should probably reconsider their expectations.” Bernie Lindley, a Brookings-Harbor fisherman, said the season may still prove to be a difficult one for fishermen on the south coast, as much of the crab is expected to be up in the Coos Bay area. Read the article here 22:23

Don’t under-estimate the importance of crab season

crab pots idleThe North Coast is undeniably crab country. Our traditionally cold coastal waters have been perfect for producing some of our nation’s healthiest crab harvests. This harvest, a time-honored tradition since the mid 1800s here in Northern California, represents a change of season.,, So, when North Coast crab tested with high levels of a naturally occurring toxin, fishermen, industry leaders and public officials all came together, as partners, to call for a delayed opening to the crab season to ensure the public’s safety. Read the article here 17:10

Prospects unclear in ‘crab country’; state committee to discuss delay’s impacts

The fishing boat ImperialBeing the sole proprietor of his commercial fishing operation for the last three years, Eureka resident Bob Borck said one of the important skills of the job is being able to live with uncertainty. While he’s seen delays in the Dungeness crab season caused by price disputes or meat quantity requirements, Borck said the indefinite delay caused by the presence of a potent neurotoxin along the entire West Coast is making the prospects of this season unclear. “We’ve never been here before,” he said. “There is no real way to tell.” What Borck does know is that he still needs to pay the bills — not only for moorage and insurance for his fishing vessel,.. Read the article here 08:34

Crab season: West Coast Fishermen scrambling to pay bills

This was supposed to be the winter Braeden Breton finally realized his dream of running his own crab fishing boat. After putting down $7,500 in April toward a commercial permit, he was counting on earning enough money as a deckhand this fall to pay off the rest and begin setting his own traps after the new year. Now the indefinite postponement of the commercial Dungeness crab season has thrown that plan into disarray. Like hundreds of other fishermen in the Bay Area, Breton finds himself scrambling to pay the bills. Read the rest here 10:36

California delays opening of crab season amid toxic scare

dungenesscrabThe California Fish and Game Commission voted Thursday to delay opening of the crab-fishing season as officials scramble to deal with a coastal algae bloom that’s left Dungeness crabs with a potentially fatal toxin called domoic acid. Meeting by conference call, the commission voted 3-0 to delay the recreational crabbing season, which was supposed to begin Saturday. The opening of the commercial crab fishing, which is supposed to open Nov. 15, is up to the director of the Department of Fish and Wildlife. Read the rest here 12:41

Cold water blamed for slow crab season in Cape Breton

First it was the ice, and now frigid water temperatures are causing more problems for Cape Breton crab fishermen. Main-a-Dieu fisherman Joe Forgeron isn’t worried about meeting his 285,000-pound quota by season’s end on Sept. 1, but he figures it may take longer than last year.Forgeron, who fishes out of Louisbourg, said the colder-than-average water temperatures translate into slower-moving crab, which means smaller-than-average catches. “This season’s been all right, but,  Read the rest here  15:00

Virginia Crabbers feel the pinch of slim pickings

Newport News, Va., Daily Press – Michael Diggs of Poquoson has been a waterman for more than 40 years, and says the blue crab harvest as the 2013 season kicks in is slim pickings. “Oh, Lord, things are tight,” Diggs, 62, said Monday. “One good week — since then, it’s been downhill.” During the first week of the crab season in mid-March, he said he was catching 25 to 30 bushels a day around Buckroe and Grandview. His haul dropped rapidly to seven or eight bushels. continued

 

Crab prices unfair, fishermen say – Boats remain tied up to protest crab prices. Their pissed!

This crab season opened up to a rocky start this week with fishermen upset over the price of crab. Harvesters are angry that the price-setting panel sided with processors in establishing the price at $1.83 per pound. continued Listen to the call in discussion about this issue here with John Furlong and Union Chief  Earl McCurty. audio here