Southeast regional planning teams are scheduled to meet April 8 in Juneau to review, among other things, some interesting hatchery proposals.
Hatcheries, of course, are very important in Alaska. The state's annual salmon harvest wouldn't be nearly so large or lucrative without them.
For some years now, processors have lobbied for increased hatchery production to satisfy market demand for Alaska salmon.
One proposal on the April 8 agenda comes from the Sitka-based Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association, which is seeking a capacity increase of 50 million chum salmon eggs.
Fry would be set to sea from a new remote release site in Crawfish Inlet. NSRAA projects an average return of 1.1 million chums worth about $6.5 million annually.
Another hatchery operator, Juneau-based Armstrong-Keta Inc., has submitted a plan to increase pink salmon production.
Not good. Negative price pressure. Very simple. At some point we will run into other problems from it too. Lets see what happens to markets for 2014 after 100+,million hatchery fish in 13. 500,000 lbs at .50 is the same as 1,000,000 at .25. Lets get real about this and look at the big picture. Lets strive for maximum economic yield.
ReplyDeleteNSRAA is a joke, why don't they just call themselves Baranof Aquaculture Association. Or Silver Bay Aquaculture.
ReplyDeleteEvidently, the theory here is to eliminate all naturally wild stocks and drive them to extinction. Hatcheries have done such a fine job at this in PWS to where 93% of commercial harvest is hatchery stocks.
ReplyDeleteIs this what you really want?
More the merrier-kudos to NSRAA & Armstrong Keta!
ReplyDeleteHatchery chums hit any freshwater stream they can find in areas around release sites. They aggressively wash out wild spawn and deplete wild stocks. That's all we have here in SE anymore is hatchery fish. Nice job!!
ReplyDelete7:17AM-hold the buss!
ReplyDeleteHatchery chums hit any freshwater stream they can find in areas around release sites----First off, ADF&G will NOT allow a remote release site in an area with wild stocks/streams at the same time.
They aggressively wash out wild spawn and deplete wild stocks---Let me get this straight, so a hatchery fish knows he's a hatchery fish and just found a new stream that he declares all his own and "kicks out" the wild fish? That seems a little far fetched, you would think a fish would just want to mate like the rest of us in the animal kingdom...those darn prejudice hatchery fish!
That's all we have here in SE anymore is hatchery fish---you may have been asleep this summer but there was the largest WILD pink salmon return in history here in SE.
ugh, this wasn't even worth my time.
7:17 Do you have any proof?
ReplyDeleteIf so please share it with us.
Proof of Hatchery impacts: In 2012 ADF&G commercial harvest forecast for non-hatchery chums (native wild chums) in PWS was a total 36,000 fish. Hatchery forecast for chums same year exceeded 3,000,000 in PWS.
ReplyDeleteRound weight average for a "wild" hatchery pink in 2013 was 2.6 lbs. also hatchery driven
Over 50% of the hatchery produced chum salmon in PWS has the meat color of a manila envelope with less than 1% oil content and are sent to China for a dye job and "value adding".
This is the reputation you are striving for in dumping more smolt into the North Pacific?
"Largest wild pink run in SE history." Ask a gillnetter in Sumner and Clarence how many sockeye, coho, kings & wild chums they caught. If you didn't fish a hatchery you didn't do that well!! As for the hatchery chums hitting fresh streams anywhere close to a hatchery, they do, as I see them in places a chum run has never been and yes they are aggressive. I'm not sayin that's the only factor that's declining wild stocks but I'm not a believer in so many millions of man made fish competeing in every aspect with the wild stock! I don't need a biologist to tell me that hatchery fish are not good for wild stocks. I've been fishing SE for 45 + years!! Thank God I'm about done!!! I hope you youngsters figure it out. GL
ReplyDeleteThe check and balance we had was MSC, now no more. They were putting the pressure on the Sound about the hatchery program. So the bottom line is nothing really holding back continued increases in hatchery production since we now certify our own salmon. The only recourse is public comment for what that is worth and a few low level biologist (who are aware of what is going on) who risk their jobs for fighting against increased production. One would think we should be talking about decreasing production. It really is hard to stomach. Hatchery fish are clearly not good for the wild stocks. And there is no such thing as a wild fish in the Sound, the DNA is polluted.
ReplyDeleteIn the long run you cannot improve so significantly on what nature has provided us. Sooner or later you will pay the piper for trying.
ReplyDeleteNo hatchery salmon can come close to matching the nutritional qualities of pure wild stocks. The more you pollute the genenic integrity of wild stocks, lower standards will have to be adopted or accepted. It gave us pinks that weigh 2 and half pounds, chums that have no consumer appeal or nutritional value.
ReplyDeleteWe are going to hatchery ourselves out of the market place.