The Sitka Sound seine fleet saw a fourth and final herring opener Saturday, taking an estimated 3,935 tons.
That brings the total to 17,231 tons. The "guideline" harvest limit going into the season was 16,333 tons.
The season is now closed, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced today.
As for prices paid to fishermen, Deckboss has no definitive numbers at this point.
The full value of the catch generally isn't established until after processors market the product.
The size of the Sitka catch isn't the only price factor. It also matters what other Pacific herring fisheries produce. These fisheries stretch from California to remote Western Alaska, with some occurring before Sitka and some after.
Sitka herring are valued primarily for their eggs, or roe. The pack goes almost entirely to Asia.
The notoriously combative Sitka fishery apparently proceeded without incident this season. Either that, or news of any trouble simply hasn't reached us yet.
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16 comments:
There were all sorts of nets that got cut up by propellers.one spectra webbed t was so wrapped that the offender had to be hauled at a local shipyard.
Hard to believe that the ADF&G would allow a harvest of over 17,000 Tons of herring knowing that the price to be paid will likely be only $150 per ton. Doesn't anybody care about this rape of a resource that is far better left alone and which will benefit so many more uses including as a forage fish for Chinook and Halibut. Hopefully the BOF will finally be able to do something to protect against this terrible waste. It truly is almost criminal for the Dept to continue this carnage. When will the people of this state stand up and say enough!
The Sitka Tribe of Alaska, and testimony from hundreds of citizens against these harvests at the board of fish meetings have come up empty. Defying logic, the BOF, fishermen and processors have successfully beaten all attempts to address this tragic one sided loss of a public resource with no assistance from the local fish and game. It simply relays the message that money is in the interests of a few that control the decisions here. How else can you explain it?
@7:05PM There were all sorts of nets that got cut up by propellers.one spectra webbed t was so wrapped that the offender had to be hauled at a local shipyard.
I'm just curious, what qualifies him as an offender?
Oh the horror, fishing gear wrapped in the propeller of the fishing boat!
yawn
Offender??try having your net destroyed with 250 tons of fish in it.have you ever studied the rules of the road or are you simply ignorant?when you get 100%on the rules of the road in that section of Coast Guard testing for aMasters license as I did then you will know how and why the courts rule against those offenders.
That's why you live in Arizona.
6:36, what cg license do you have? a 100 or 200 ton master? worthless, absolutely worthless unless you have the toar endorsement to go with it for towing, you might be hired to run a 60-79 foot tub. readers might want to know the test is easy, 50 questions. all memorization, and rules have nothing in it about running over someones' net.
SBSS board members had a closed door meeting with the governor urging him to influence the BiG members that are appointed by the governor. We need Parnell gone.
Most people do get a 100% on Rules of the Road. You need a 90% just to pass. What Cracker Jack box did you get your license from anyway? You can't even form a proper sentence.
This is the only fishery in the state where the management (ADF&G) are literally in bed with the deep pocketed herring seiners. ADF&G bends over backwards to facilitate the 48 permit holders as evidence by finding the herring schools for them t fish on, postponing an opening because a boat fouled their net, catering to every whining need, and the fact that this fishery even exists for mere pennies. Shameful.
4:06 the f&g managers in sitka and nsraa have fallen like politicians in washington, to the only thing that makes business decisions, money.
6:13PM What does NSRAA have to do with Herring?
If NSRAA is raising herring now too, maybe we can get them to only raise sac roe with fins and only harvest the sac roe and not the whole fish.
We could all harvest swimming egg skeins instead of swimming fish...perfect solution!
7:53 NSRAA's past cost recovery process in awarding bids led the way for Sitka F$G to realize where the money really is. They both managed with input from the processing industry, that's what the point is, not raising fish but selling them.
LOCAL NEWS
Archaeologist: Herring once far more abundant, widespread
by Rachel Waldholz, KCAW
April 4, 2014 12:40 pm
Read this herring boys, and then say the herring stocks are healthy.
this years total spawn was 7 miles by the 3rd of four openings for the commercial seine openings,by the last and final opening the total spawn was 28 miles by this time last year the total spawn was 68 miles.it will be interesting to see what the total spawn for the 2014 season turns out to be.the 17000 tons they took this year will only futher glut the markets ,and then you have togiak at 29000 tons at 50 dollars per ton!fish till you have nothing left then move on to the summer humpys where that market is glutted too!
I just want to point out that just a few years ago we were fishing humpies for $100 a ton. No one was screaming to let them spawn.This is what we do. Did you sit out the bad years or did you get up and go to work? By the way, it was around the same time the biomass for Sitka herring was in the tank. If I recall they didn't even have enough to fish in 92.
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