Monthly Archives: July 2014
Louisiana Inshore shrimp season closes Mon., few exceptions
Louisiana wildlife and fisheries regulators say the 2014 spring inshore shrimp season will close at 6 a.m. on Monday in state inside waters except for the open waters of Breton and Chandeleur Sounds and a portion of Mississippi Sound. Read more here 07:49
Tacoma’s Martinac shipyard sold at auction
A limited liability corporation calling itself Washington Landmark Holdings LLC purchased the Tacoma’s J.M. Martinac Shipbuilding Co. on Friday for a little more than $6 million in a foreclosure auction on the County-City Building plaza. The amount the corporation paid, $6,001,992.64, was the exact amount including fees and penalties owed to the fishing company that had loaned the shipyard funds to finish a 184-foot fishing boat in December 2012. Read more here 07:40
Coast Guard assists F/V Vernon taking on water near Ketchikan
JUNEAU, Alaska — Coast Guard Station Ketchikan crewmembers assisted the six-person crew of F/V Vernon taking on water near Ketchikan Friday morning. A Station Ketchikan 47-foot Motor Life Boat crew and 25-foot Response Boat – Small crew rendezvoused with the vessel taking on water, deployed a team with dewatering pumps and escorted the 65-foot purse seiner back into port. Read more here 17:14
A Fresh Look at Iron, Plankton, Carbon, Salmon and Ocean Engineering
Two years ago this month, an edge-pushing environmental entrepreneur and a company formed by a Native Canadian village set off a wave of international protest by dispersing a pink slurry of 100 tons of iron-rich dust over one of the 60-mile-wide ocean eddies that routinely drift across the salmon feeding grounds of the Gulf of Alaska. Lots of links, Read more here 14:52
Obama opens East Coast to oil search
Opening the Eastern Seaboard to offshore oil exploration for the first time in decades, the Obama administration on Friday approved,,,”No one has been allowed to test anything like this on right whales,” Kraus said of the seismic cannons. “(The Obama administration) has authorized a giant experiment on right whales that this country would never allow researchers to do.” Read more here 11:36
Pressure mounting for US tuna fleet to secure tuna rights after ‘no deal’
A shareholder in the largest U.S. tuna fleet this week decrying the ‘no deal’ conclusion of American treaty negotiations with Pacific Island nations that leaves the United States tuna fleet without fishing access to the Pacific Ocean in 2015. Read more here 10:06
New boat design in works for Acadian Peninsula crab fleet
A shipbuilding company on the Acadian Peninsula is unveiling plans for what it’s calling “the next generation of fishing boat.” “This boat has been designed in order to improve the seakeeping,” said naval architect Didier Marchard, whose company Pantocarène Architecte Naval of France is a partner in the project. Read more here 09:34
Chatham fishermen not impressed with federal aid package – No Buy Back, “Please take care of fishermen first.”
Chatham fishermen at the Thursday meeting were highly critical of the first phase of the aid package, which will soon issue a $32,000 check to each of the 191 qualifying permit holders,,. Diodati said that sentiment was universal at the four meetings he hosted. One state proposal for direct assistance to crewmen stipulated that they needed to show they earned 50 percent of their gross income from fishing. Read more here 08:49
Mississippi’s shrimp season off to a great start – so far about 2.1 million pounds and the price is up!
Mississippi shrimpers have good reason to smile this summer. This season’s catch is impressive. The latest numbers from the DMR show the shrimp harvest is nearly double what it was last year. It appears a large number of shrimpers have been able to enjoy the success of this season. Video, Read more here 07:38
Canada and the United States have ratified an agreement on updates updates to the Pacific Salmon Treaty
The Honourable Gail Shea, Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, announced today that Canada and the United States have ratified an agreement on updates to the Pacific Salmon Treaty (PST). These changes will help ensure the long-term sustainability of Fraser River sockeye and pink salmon stocks while supporting an economically viable fishing industry on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border. Read more here 22:20
Tacoma’s oldest shipyard, the 90-year-old J.M. Martinac Shipbuilding Co. to be sold on courthouse steps Friday morning
Joe Martinac Jr., the shipyard’s president, and the last of a long line of family shipyard managers, said eleventh hour efforts to find new business for the shipyard failed to produce new contracts that would stave off the shipyard’s auction. “There were boats to be built out there, but we just couldn’t put those deals together with this hammer over our heads,” he said. Read more here 21:28
New England Set Gear Fishermen – Final Rule – Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan. Are you Affected?
NMFS issues this final rule to amend the regulations implementing the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction. This rule revises the management measures for reducing the incidental mortality and serious injury to the North Atlantic right whale, humpback whale, and fin whale in commercial trap/pot and gillnet fisheries to further the goals of the MMPA, and the ESA. . Read final rule in the Federal Register 18:49
The Hookpod – New UK invention to save the albatross
Designed by brothers’ Ben and Pete Kibel, based in Devon, UK, and trialed extensively by the RSPB Albatross Task Force on behalf of BirdLife International, it is small in size and it said to have huge implications for saving the albatross from extinction. Read more here 17:57
King concerns drive Cook Inlet fisheries
Strong sockeye returns and low king numbers continue to drive the interplay of several Cook Inlet fisheries. Sport, commercial and personal-use fishermen all target Cook Inlet sockeyes. They also catch king salmon. Lots of info here, but we can expect that from Alaska fish reporter,Molly Dischner , Read more here 17:20
This is Fish Radio. I’m Laine Welch – Do it yourself energy audits for fishing boats.
Just as with a home audit to try and understand where your energy is going, how your vessel is consuming energy and finds places where it might be wasted or not used as efficiently as possible, and frankly, most fishing vessels are not very energy efficient. Listen to the audio, and Read more here 16:33
From the Far Reach’s of Alaska- IDrive restaurant imports fresh (frozen) scallops
Long past her untimely demise, These scallops come to sunny Orlando from the Bering Sea. It is on the Arctic Hunter ?, Oceanaire noted, that the fishermen “catch, shuck, clean, size-sort, box and rapid-deep-freeze the Alaska Weathervane within four short hours of capture. Read more here 13:25
Jones Inlet Seafood Co., Executives plead guilty to committing fraud, falsifying records and violating the Lacey Act.
Jones Inlet Seafood Co., the company’s president, Michael G. Mihale and company vice president Bruce Larson Jr. admitted they underreported the amount of summer flounder they caught between June 2009 and December 2011 by 56,000 pounds, the Department of Justice announced. Read more here 10:33 From US Justice
Maine’s lobster industry feeling pain of slow start – Some say the crustaceans are ‘back on the old time clock’
David Cousins, president of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association and a South Thomaston lobsterman, said lobstermen expect shedding to pick up and catches to escalate at the end of this month, if not the end of the week. He said the slow season indicates that Maine lobster are “back on the old time clock” of shedding later in the summer. Read more here 09:13
The Scots Bay Wharf takes a whacking
The Scots Bay wharf took a serious pummelling during post-tropical storm Arthur. Waves generated by gale-force winds ripped out the midsection of the wharf near Cape Split on the Bay of Fundy, leaving fishermen to scramble to find other ports for their boats. About 15 metres of the wharf was flattened, leaving a large gap between the two end sections. Read more here 08:50
For all the Hard Merch Fans of Wicked Tuna, some haul out shots from GMG
Dave Marciano’s hard Merchandise Hauled Out At The East Gloucester Marine Railways See the rest at Good Morning Gloucester, the funky, hip blog from Cape Ann! 08:07
Fishery disaster relief a difficult effort – A Story of the Have’s, and the Have Not’s
Former Mayor Scott Lang, who criticized NOAA for setting up a slow process, said the aid plan is becoming “a Christmas tree, trying to do too much with too little for too many people.” “Only 100 or so permit holders of the approximately 700 federal groundfish permit holders in Massachusetts would receive direct federal assistance,” Keating wrote. “The plan also neglects the crew members and supporting shoreside industries who continue to struggle to stay financially solvent as a result of the groundfish disaster.” What a mess! Read more here 07:42
GDT Letter: Fishing disaster: Where are the ‘responders?’
There is a letter about the NE fishing disaster a GDT that I can’t access, but post the notice for those that can access the site. The perversion of Community Newspaper Holdings Inc. free article venue that allows five page views, while they now require up to four or five page views per article, removes non subscribers from these important to the fishing industry issues. Here is the link to the GDT. 07:16
Prince Charles and his Privatization/Consolidation EDF Intoxication Situation.
The world’s oceans could be saved if they were turned into attractive investment opportunities, according to a new report by the Prince of Wales’ International Sustainability Unit (ISU) and the US Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). 19:20:56
This is Fish Radio. I’m Laine Welch – Sockeye price posted at Bristol Bay; Lots of red salmon rivals
An advance sockeye price of $1.20 a pound has been posted at Bristol Bay by Alaska General Seafoods, with an extra 15 cents for chilled fish. Other processors are likely to match, according to reports from the Alaska Independent Fishermen’s Marketing Association. That compares to a base price of $1.50 a pound for Bristol Bay reds last year. The Bay catch yesterday was approaching 28 million sockeyes, 11 million more than forecasted and the fish are still coming. Read more here 18:29
Coast Guard medically evacuates injured fisherman from F/V Tara Dawn
ALAMEDA, Calif. — Coast Guard and local agency personnel medically evacuated an injured person from a fishing vessel approximately one mile west of Coast Guard Station Bodega Bay, Calif., Wednesday. At approximately 9:26 a.m., Station Bodega Bay watchstanders received a call from a person aboard the Tara Dawn, a 65-foot fishing vessel, requesting assistance for the captain who had sustained an injury to his arm. Read more here 17:48
Eastern Passage fish processor, H&H Fisheries Ltd. fined $400,000 for buying and possessing illegal halibut
The company has five years to pay the fine. 
Several area ground fishermen were also charged as a result of the probe. The fine for H&H Fisheries Ltd. was handed down Wednesday in Dartmouth provincial court. Read more here 15:30
