Tag Archives: Southwest Alaska.
Peter Pan’s King Cove plant will stay closed this winter as fishing industry turmoil spreads
In a major hit to Southwest Alaska’s fishing industry, Peter Pan Seafood Co. will keep its huge plant in the village of King Cove shuttered this winter, meaning that the company won’t be processing millions of dollars’ worth of cod, whitefish and crab. “It’s one of the most difficult days of my life,” Rodger May, one of the company’s owners and a longtime player in the seafood industry, said in a brief interview Thursday. “It’s just a devastating time for the industry.” The closure is the latest sign of the widening turmoil in Alaska seafood markets, which are contending with depressed global demand across many different species and intense competition from producers in Russia. more, >>click to read<< 13:39
Big ripples – The Pebble Mine saga continues
In a move sure to anger Lower 48 environmentalists and much of Alaska, Gov. Mike Dunleavy has decided to sue the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over its blocking of a proposed Pebble Mine in the Iliamna Lake drainage of Southwest Alaska. And though the lawsuit is sure to upset many Alaska, it might be the last, best chance the state will ever get to secure the rights to self-government that Alaskans thought were granted at statehood in 1959. A variety of Alaska legal experts, both left and right, this week agreed the state’s appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court is a crapshoot. One called it a classic “hail Mary.” Lots of links,>click to read< 13:01
Sanfilippo invited to Rose Garden for salmon fight
For more than a decade Angela Sanfilippo, president of the Gloucester Fishermen’s Wives Association, has helped advocate for the cause to protect Bristol Bay in Southwest Alaska and the world’s largest sockeye salmon fishery from a proposed open-pit gold and copper mining project near the bay’s headwaters. She did so even though Gloucester, the nation’s oldest seaport, and Bristol Bay are some 3,600 miles apart on opposite coasts of the United States. On Thursday at 4 p.m., Sanfilippo attended a celebration in the Rose Garden of the White House that marked the protection of Bristol Bay from the Pebble Mine project. Sanfilippo recalls being contacted by Katherine Carscallen of Dillingham, Alaska, who today is the director of the Commercial Fishermen for Bristol Bay and a salmon fisher as captain of the F/V Sea Hawk. >click to read< 07:33
After record haul, Bristol Bay sockeye harvest forecast to drop next year
Alaska’s Bristol Bay sockeye salmon harvest is forecast to tumble next year to some 36.6 million fish, according to Alaska state Department of Fish and Game biologists. The downturn comes on the heels of a record 2022 haul of more than 60 million sockeye. The Bristol Bay region in Southwest Alaska sustains the world’s biggest sockeye runs and draws fishermen from Alaska, Washington and other states. The record 2022 harvest was 104% higher than the 20-year average, and these fish, as well as smaller numbers of other salmon, were collectively worth more than $351 million. The 2023 harvest, if the forecast is accurate,,, >click to read< 12:45
Salmon season opens in SW Alaska
With the summer peak season just around the corner, early June saw a number of initial openings for commercial salmon fishing in Southwest Alaska. While the major influx of Western Alaska’s sockeye run is still to come, fishermen on the
southside have begun to get their nets wet. continued@thedutchharborfisherman
