Daily Archives: May 1, 2017
Pulling the traps: Captain Shelley Deagle says the season looks positive
Lobster fishermen on Prince Edward Island’s north shore are hopeful today’s catch will give them an indication of what the two-month spring season may bring. Captain Shelley Deagle is one of the fishermen who headed out before sunrise from Naufrage, P.E.I., on the Miss Shawna Lee to start pulling traps with her cork, Dougie MacKinnon. The captain said there were lobsters in the traps, adding that’s a good sign of the season to come. “They’re talking a good price again this year,” said Deagle referring to a meeting held Friday with the fish buyer. click here to view the images, and read the story 19:49
Fisherman backs shark-cull tourism
A third-generation Albany commercial fisherman has weighed into the ongoing shark cull debate, suggesting that the State Government explore the prospect of giving charter operators the licence to catch great white sharks as a tourism venture. Tony Westerberg, who has fished off the waters of the south coast for more than 40 years, says the ramifications of the reduction of shark fishing licences were evident, with surfers and divers continually being attacked. Teenager Laeticia Brouwer was the 15th person to be killed by a shark in WA since 2000 when she was attacked while surfing with her father in Esperance last month, prompting the debate’s reignition. click here to read the story 18:34
Blessing of the Fleet takes place May 6 at 10 a.m. at the Alaska Commercial Fishermen’s Memorial
The annual Blessing of the Fleet and Reading of the Names ceremony is set for Saturday, May 6. Organizers of the local event encourage the public to attend to honor commercial fishermen, past and present, and the industry as a whole at the start of the fishing season. It’s taking place at 10 a.m. at the Alaska Commercial Fishermen’s Memorial next to Taku Smokeries. The blessing takes about an hour. The guest speaker this year is Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott. This year marks the 27th year that the fleet has been blessed. Attendees are advised to dress warmly. For those who can’t attend or those on the water, the event will be broadcast over VHF Channel 10. click here to read the story 16:33
A new oyster war – Rich homeowners vs. working-class watermen
Oystermen, pirates and police clashed violently more than a century ago over who could collect the Chesapeake Bay’s tasty and lucrative oysters. As the shellfish makes a comeback, a modern-day oyster war is brewing, this time between wealthy waterfront property owners and working-class fishermen. Over the past five years, oyster production has doubled on the East Coast, driven by new farming methods, cleaner water and Americans’ growing taste for orders on the half shell. The resurgence has led to unprecedented resistance from coastal Virginians who want to maintain picturesque views from their waterfront homes and has fueled a debate over access to public waterways. “These people can’t have it all,” said Chris Ludford, an oysterman in Virginia Beach who sells to nearby farm-to-table restaurants. Ludford said he faces fierce pushback along a Chesapeake Bay tributary from people with “a $2,000 painting in their house of some old bearded oysterman tonging oysters. “But they don’t want to look out their window and see the real thing,” he said. click here to read the story 14:15
Billings fishing company offers sustainability and affordable wild salmon
Every June, Joe Echo-Hawk makes the long trek to Bristol Bay, Alaska to catch thousands of pounds of sockeye salmon. The area around the Kvichak River has hosted generations of commercial fishermen. But a growing number of operations like Echo-Hawk’s have adopted a new business model that’s beneficial to the people fishing and consumers who enjoy their catch. Echo-Hawk operates Kwee-Jack Fish Co. with his wife, Angela Echo-Hawk. The Billings-based company does more than just catch the fish. It also distributes directly to consumers as a community supported fishery, or CSF. Customers can place orders for flash-frozen salmon fillets in 10-pound increments until May 26. Joe and a crew of two or three other fishermen travel to Bristol Bay in June and fish through July to catch the salmon to fill orders in Montana, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. The fish is shipped on a barge to Seattle and trucked to Billings. Kwee-Jack guarantees delivery of the fish by early September. click here to view the photo gallery and read the story 12:16
Two dead after fishing boat goes down off Vancouver Island near Tofino
Two people are dead and three others were treated and released from hospital Sunday after a fishing boat went down off the west coast of Vancouver Island near the remote tourist community of Tofino. All five people on board the vessel were taken to shore Sunday afternoon, but health officials later confirmed that two of them had died, Coast Guard spokesman Dan Bate said in a statement. The 8.5-metre-long catamaran was fishing for halibut near Bartlett Island, north of Tofino, B.C., on Sunday afternoon, he said. Someone on the boat made a distress call around 1:20 p.m., said Sub-Lt. Melissa Kia with the Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Victoria. Details are sketchy. click here to read the story 11:04
The RCMP says two Alberta men died when a sport-fishing vessel overturned and sank off the west coast of Vancouver Island on Sunday. The Mounties say the men are 32 and 42 years old, but their names and hometowns haven’t yet be released. click here to read the story 15:46
When Alaska shellfish turns deadly – Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning
In the Alaska wilderness, at least you can see the things that’ll kill you. That’s what I say when I get tired of questions about bears. But it’s not true. The smallest things that can kill you here are single-celled creatures you need a microscope to see. They can find their way into the food chain, into your clam bucket, your chowder, and then into your nerve cells. Minutes or hours later, you tingle or go numb. Nerve cells shut down in a rapid cascade until you lose control over limbs and lungs. This is paralytic shellfish poisoning, or PSP. It comes from a tiny species of plankton called Alexandrium, which produces an even tinier chemical called saxitoxin, which is a thousand times more toxic than sarin gas, and was once studied as part of our biological weapons program in the 1950s and 1960s. click here to read the story 09:00
P.E.I. Fishermen hope for the best – first lobsters of the 2017 season will be hauled in on Monday
P.E.I. Lobster fishermen will be crossing their fingers as they head out onto the waters this morning for the first landing day of the 2017 fishery. Long-time fisherman, Norman Peters, also known as the Bearded Skipper, went out from North Rustico Saturday on his boat Silver Wave with his brother Keith and son Corey. Peters, who has been fishing for longer than 55 years, said the day went well, although it was impossible to tell what the landings will be like. Like many others, Peters was remaining cautiously optimistic. “We’ll have to wait and see,” said the 75-year-old Peters. “No doubt there’s going to be lobster, a pound or two to a trap would be nice, but whatever we get, we get.” click here to read the story 08:11
