Daily Archives: August 16, 2018
Small processors carve out a market in Bristol Bay
Standing in a shipping container that’s been converted into essentially a salmon butchery. Sandy Alvarez is filleting a sockeye. People regularly admire her technique but she said the secret behind it is practice. “Well you know people who comment they wish they could do that I usually laughingly tell them. ‘Try doing 1,500 fish for 10 years you probably can!’” Almost a decade ago Alvarez and her husband, a commercial fisherman, set up a little processing plant near their summer home in Naknek. Alvarez’s husband fishes for sockeye and drops off a bit of his catch to his wife who then processes it. Then he sells the rest of his salmon to a larger seafood company. That is pretty typical for small seafood processors in the region. >click to read<22:20
Iceland’s Fishing Minister: No Plans For “All-Seeing Eye” Within Government
A proposed drone surveillance plan for Iceland’s fishing fleet has provoked a strong response from the Confederation of Iceland Enterprise (SA), prompting Minister of Fisheries Kristján Þór Júlíusson to give some perspective on the idea. A draft of a government bill would deploy a series of drones to oversee Iceland’s fishing vessels, RÚV reports, for the purpose of reducing dumping and cheating on fishing weights. In response, SA managing director Halldór Benjamín Þorbergsson said in a radio interview yesterday that this drone system would mean that “Icelanders will have to prepare for a surveillance that has only been seen in novels and movies.” >click to read<
Dixon McGlohon, 27- ‘Wicked Tuna’ Fish buyer city’s 11th overdose of year
Lucas Pina, general manager at the Lynn-based North Atlantic Traders, sent a text message to company buyer and driver Dixon McGlohon of Gloucester on Tuesday afternoon, thanking him for putting so much extra effort into the job. “I just told him, ‘Thanks for stepping up,'” Pina said Thursday, “and he responded, ‘Just doing my job.’ Now that’s class, and that’s the kind of guy he was.” Just a few hours later, McGlohon, known for his appearances on the National Geographic reality TV show “Wicked Tuna,” was pronounced dead at the age of 27, thought by police and Fire Department responders to be Gloucester’s latest victim in the ongoing opioid crisis. Police and the Essex District Attorney’s office are still awaiting a confirmed cause of death from the office of the state medical examiner. >click to read<19:06
Due to abundance of capelin this summer, harvester and union director hope for improved science
With capelin flooding the beaches and nets of harvesters in numbers not seen in years, the abundance and quality of the species is turning heads across the province. Fixed gear harvester Dennis Chaulk had three days fishing capelin in Bonavista Bay from July 23-25. Like the capelin fishers in the Notre Dame Bay region of central Newfoundland, Chaulk witnessed a successful and plentiful fishery. ,, But now that harvesters and buyers across the province are saying it’s the best quality and population of capelin seen in over two decades, Broderick says this summer’s capelin fishery has shown that the science available on capelin is far from accurate and needs to be seriously scrutinized. >click to read<17:58
Salmon decline reveals worrisome trend
The sad story of an orca carrying her dead calf for 17 days off the Washington coast this month has garnered global attention to the plight of killer whales in the region. It has also highlighted the steep decline in the region’s salmon stocks, the resident orcas’ sole food source. ,, That is because the availability of Pacific Ocean salmon has been trending low for the past decade. The total pounds of chinook salmon caught off the Oregon coast in 2017 fell 40% compared with the year before, according to Oregon Department Fish & Wildlife (ODFW) data. Between 2014 and 2017, total pounds caught dropped 80% and the value of the catch dropped 72% to $5 million. Drought in California and nutrient-starved ocean conditions are blamed for the decline. >click to read<16:15
Maine Lobstermen’s Association seeks members
The Maine Lobstermen’s Association, founded in1954, is conducting its annual membership drive and invites all lobstermen and the public to become members For more than 60 years, the MLA has tackled numerous issues with the potential to harm Maines lobster industry. .,,, During the annual membership drive, lobstermen and the public are urged to become members and help the MLA to continue the fight. >click to read<13:46
Old Willapa boats get new lives – May West to serve as concert stage; Tokeland will be historical exhibit
With the Jazz and Oysters music festival moving to the Port of Peninsula (PoP) in Nahcotta this weekend, it seems right that the musicians would be performing on a stage befitting the event. The deck of the former oyster dredge May West will be making its official debut as a stage at the annual event, after the Northern Oyster Company donated the retired vessel to the port earlier this summer.,, The barge is one of two retired oyster boats that have been donated to PoP recently, with the Herrold family also having contributed their historic boat, Tokeland. >click to read<11:56
Video: RNLI’s New Class of Waterjet-Propelled, Self-Righting, All-Weather Lifeboats
When the UK’s Royal National Lifeboat Institution was given the chance to design their dream lifeboat, they came up with the Shannon: a waterjet-propelled, highly-maneuverable, stop-on-a dime, beach-launched and recovered, self-righting, shock-absorbing, 13-meter all-weather lifeboat capable of reaching speeds up to 25 knots. The Shannon is actually the first class of all-weather lifeboats to be powered by waterjets, which are capable of pumping 1.5 tonnes of water per second at full-power and allow for beach launch and recovery. Video, >click here<10:53
Scientists and fishermen team up to help save North Atlantic right whale
Whale researchers and fishermen are out at sea together on a two-week mission, combining efforts to help save the endangered north Atlantic right whale. These two worlds have usually stayed far apart, but for the first time scientists are onboard a crab boat to do their field work. Crab fisherman Martin Noel, captain of the Jean-Denis Noel boat in Shippagan, agreed to take scientists out in the gulf to help them carry out their research this year. “We don’t want to be called whale killers,” Noel said. “We want to be called fishermen that are implicated in the solution.” All season, fishermen begged Ottawa to involve them in fisheries management. They felt the federal government was imposing overly strict measures without consultation with industry. >click to read<09:28
Former skipper gets deferred-prosecution deal in fisheries case
Thomas Kokell, a former commercial trawler-boat captain, was indicted in 2016 on four counts of mail fraud, conspiracy and filing false fishing reports in connection with an alleged scheme to illegally harvest nearly 200,000 pounds of fluke in 2011 and 2012. The fish were valued at nearly $400,000. Kokell was released Tuesday on his own recognizance after a court appearance in which the deal was approved by a federal judge, according to federal court documents and Kokell’s attorney. He will not enter a plea and the charges will be dismissed, avoiding prison time and fines, if he “avoids future misconduct” over the next year, according to his attorney Peter Smith and court documents. >click to read<07:56
