Today's Catch - Put a Salmon in your Tank

A deadly fish virus has forced a Bainbridge Island, Washington (USA) salmon farm to destroy its entire stock and has put state wildlife experts on alert for additional outbreaks.

The Kitsap Sun reported last month that more than a million pounds worth of Atlantic salmon had been cleared from infected net pens in Rich Passage to the south of the island.

The Infectious Hematopoietic Necrosis virus, or IHN virus, can be carried by other fish, including herring, which sometimes pass through the farm’s net pens. The same virus recently appeared in two British Columbia fish farms, requiring the destruction and disposal of 560,000 fish. The virus had never been recorded in Washington waters until it was found at the Bainbridge Island farm last month.

The Bainbridge farm is owned by American Gold Seafoods, affiliated with Icicle Seafoods of Seattle. The company is also concerned about another batch of net pens about a half-mile away. The nets from two acres worth of pens will be removed and disinfected, and in four months the farm will be back in operation.

The dead and dying fish will be composted, although the living fish will still be processed and sold for food, in spite of most not having grown to the preferred market size.

South of the border, Chile knows a thing or two about salmon farm diseases. In 2010 the country’s salmon aquaculture industry saw production cut in half by outbreaks of the Infectious Salmon Anemia virus (I.S.A.) that spread through the fish farms in the southern part of the country. The Chilean farmed salmon industry suffered more than $2 billion in losses, saw its production of Atlantic salmon fall by half and the farms are still battling the disease.

But a novel new technology is revealing a silver lining to the cloud of massive farmed fish die-offs:

Biogas.

Equipment manufacturers Global Fluid S.A. and Landia have developed a line of pumps, seals and choppers to process the infected fish into fish silage, preventing further contamination, but also producing valuable, protein-rich fats and oils for use in biogas plants and paint manufacturing. The salmon are macerated in custom-engineered silage processing units, which comprise a stainless steel tank, chopper pump, control panel, recirculation pipe and valves.

When they enter the Silage Processing Unit, dead salmon weighing as much as 18 lbs. are successfully macerated into slurry by an aggressive chopper pump. Propeller mixers are used to agitate the silage during storage, which can be held in tanks for several months or even up to a few years when correctly produced and handled.

Biogas can be compressed, much like natural gas, and used to power motor vehicles, and as a renewable fuel, Biogas qualifies for renewable energy subsidies in some parts of the world. While not the ideal solution to the world’s energy problems, at least the diseased Chilean fish aren’t making it to the dinner table.

Chris Philipseditor@fishermensnews.com

Economists Still Uncertain How Farmed Fish Will Affect Wild Salmon Prices

Going into the wild salmon season in Alaska, there is some concern over how farmed salmon prices will affect those of wild salmon, and fisheries economists are still waiting for more data to make a determination.

While it is entirely plausible that farmed salmon prices could cause wild salmon prices to fall, nobody will really know until a significant amount of salmon is sold, says Gunnar Knapp, an economics professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage Institute of Social and Economic Research.  Right now it’s the time of year when very high stakes negotiations are taking place between processors and buyers, with processors trying to sell as high as they can and buyers trying to buy as low as they can.  It’s all very complicated.  Knapp said some processors, concerned about a soft market for frozen headed and gutted fish, were saying they planned to put fewer fish into H&G and more into frozen fillets and canned salmon.

Other factors to consider are the size of salmon runs, the amount of Russian salmon available and exchange rates, he said.

Keith Criddle, director of the fisheries division at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, speaking from Juneau, noted that research done by his students shows clear linkages between exvessel prices for king and coho salmon from Alaska and US wholesale prices of Chilean, Canadian and Norwegian reared Atlantic salmon.

In addition, there are clear linkages between exvessel prices for sockeye salmon from Alaska and the supply of Chilean pen-reared coho and steelhead shipped into Japanese markets, he said.

Increases in Chilean or Norwegian production of Atlantic salmon primarily affect our domestic markets for king and coho, while increases in Chilean production of coho and steelhead primarily affect demand for Alaskan sockeye in the Japanese market, he said.

Now that Chilean exports have increased, they are entering a market that includes substantially larger volumes of Norwegian Atlantic salmon and in order to clear inventory the Chileans have had to reduce their asking prices.  The resulting decline in exvessel, wholesale and retail prices of Alaskan salmon in domestic markets could as reasonably be attributed to the resumption of Norwegian exports to the US as it can be attributed to expansion of Chilean exports to the US, he said.

Alaska Wild Salmon Harvest Nears 59 Million Fish

The statewide harvest of wild Alaska salmon rose to nearly 59 million fish in late July, up 9 million fish from a week earlier, with the big increase in catch coming from Cook Inlet, Southeast Alaska and Kodiak.

The harvest in Upper Cook Inlet alone was at 3.5 million salmon, including 2,981,000 sockeyes,  compared with 1.1 million reds the previous week. The fish were being caught by drift gillnetters, while Cook Inlet set netters were shut down by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to protect the escapement of king salmon moving north on the Kenai River.

In Southeast Alaska the salmon harvest rose from 5.6 million fish to 7.8 million salmon of all species.  The cumulative harvest in Southeast Alaska stood at 5.7 millon chum, 1.2 million pink, 405,000 sockeyes, 380,000 silver and 135,000 Chinook salmon.

At Kodiak, the cumulative harvest jumped from  2.2 million salmon of all species to 3.8 million fish, including 1.6 million sockeye, 1.6 million pink, 545,000 chum, 14,000 coho and 10,000 king salmon.

Meanwhile on the Yukon River, the cumulative harvest of chum salmon was up to 385,000 fish, compared with 309,000 chum the previous week.

Pirate Fishing Bill Moves to Senate Floor

Legislation to end the multi-billion dollar practice of pirate fishing is headed for the Senate floor, while another measure dealing with genetically engineered salmon has been dropped for now, in hope of stronger support in the future.

The Pirate Fishing Elimination Act, which passed the Senate Commerce Committee on July 31, is sponsored by Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii.

“Pirate fishing is a multi-billion dollar industry that mocks law for fisheries conservation and seafood safety, hurts legitimate fishermen in the marketplace, and at its worst, even holds its workers as slaves,” Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska, a co-sponsor of the pirate fishing bill. “This legislation is a serious way to fight back.”

S. 1980 enacts measures included in a 2009 international agreement on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing to deny known pirate boats access to ports to offload their catch. It also makes it illegal to knowingly import, export or buy or sell fish caught in violation of marine laws and treaties, or to interfere with or bribe inspectors, and gives the Secretary of Commerce power to enforce those measures through arrests, citations and civil and criminal penalties.

Begich said legislation on genetically engineered salmon – the Frankenfish measure – was pulled when it appeared to be one vote shy of passage, but a third bill supporting the NOAA Corps also was headed for the Senate floor.

S. 1717, an act for the Prevention of Escapement of Genetically Altered Salmon in the United States, would have prohibited sale of such fish unless the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration finds that production of those fish would have no significant impact or were found to be consistent with the National Environmental Protection Act.

The federal Food and Drug Amendments Act of 2006 called for a report on any environmental risks associated with genetically engineered seafood production, including impact on wild stocks, but to date the FDA has not provided such a report. The Senate committee also passed S. 2388, the NOAA Corps Amendments Act of 2012, sponsored by Begich, to give the corps tools to streamline personnel practices, improve its diversity and retain senior female officers. The bill also creates new incentive programs, to be paid for by savings in other sections of the bill.

ERMA Will Increase Readiness for Handling Ship Traffic, Arctic Energy Development

New steps are underway to use a federal interactive online mapping tool to deal with the challenges of increasing ship traffic and proposed energy development in the Arctic.

It’s ERMA – the Environmental Response Management Application – announced July 31 by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Interior Department’s Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement.

Fran Ulmer, who chairs the US Arctic Research Commission, says ERMA is a work in progress that will connect many different data sets.

The Alaska Ocean Observing System, the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the University of New Hampshire, along with borough governments in Alaska’s Arctic, are working with NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration on the effort. The data will include near real-time oceanographic observations and weather data from NOAA, and critical environmental, commercial and industrial data from the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, plus other federal and state agencies.

It will include observations of the extent and concentration of sea ice, location of ports and pipelines, vulnerable environmental resources and traditional and local knowledge of cultural and subsistence resources.

Emergency responders for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico used the same type of mapping tool.

The Gulf of Mexico version of ERMA is online at http://gomex.erma.noaa.gov/erma.html.

Kwik’Pak Looks to its Youth to Fill Workforce

By Margaret Bauman

On the Lower Yukon River, where wild salmon have for centuries been key to subsistence survival, teen-agers are learning how this nutritious fish can lead them into myriad employment opportunities and help grow the regional economy.

The youth employment program, in which 141 students earned wages totaling $233,000 during the 2011 salmon run, is the brainchild of Kwik-Pak Fisheries, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Yukon Delta Fisheries Development Association.

YDFDA is one of six community development quota associations formed 20 years ago to boost the economy and quality of life in 65 communities on the Bering Sea Coast, by involving them in the lucrative Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands groundfish, halibut and crab fisheries.

“It has worked fabulously for us,” said Jack Schultheis, Kwik’Pak’s fisheries manager, with one eye to the greying of the fleet, and the other to providing skilled employment to the next generation. “We’re trying to get the younger people more involved in the fishing business, bringing young kids into the business so they can learn what it is all about from the ground up.

“We want to demonstrate to them how important this industry is to the Lower Yukon.”

“We think, we hope this will do it,” he said.

“The whole structure of the fishery is family-oriented,” he said. “They fish with their families and then they come off of the boat and work for us. It’s getting young people involved in the main business that’s out there. It’s the only non-government economy.”

“The benefit for us is that these kids are really good, very reliable workers,” he said. “They take their jobs very seriously. The money means a lot to them, so they are really reliable workers. They are not trouble-makers.”

The students, who start at $10 an hour, comprise about one-third of the workforce at Kwik-Pak’s fish processing plant at Emmonak. During the fishing season, they rotate through jobs every two weeks, to find out where their career interests lie.

Students aged 14-15 years old learn the skills of being administrative assistants, receptionists, custodians, break room store workers, and public relations, sales and marketing skills. The 16 and 17 year olds work as packing room, boxing room and roe house workers.

The program ends each year two weeks before school starts, but quite a few of them come back and work after school. “We really miss them when school starts, Schultheis said. “It gives you a warm feeling that you have a bunch of young people with ambition, who want to work. We’re hoping these kids get more involved in the economics, the business side of it.”

Other students are employed in collecting scientific data about the salmon at the plant for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and at buying stations at Mountain Village, Kotlik and Nunam Iqua.

The whole idea behind the youth training/employment program is to have skilled employees to come back and work for the villages, said Judy Murdock, operations assistant manager for Kwik’Pak. “We had a lot of eager people. We wanted to get them on the job, to get them trained,” she said.

“And we’re not just an employer said Marilyn Charles, employment and training services coordinator. “I work with the school counselor (at Emmonak) to keep tabs on the students. We make sure they are going well in school.

“For people who don’t have consistency in their lives, this gives them a path, a guideline of some sort,” she said. “They see Kwik’Pak coming (during the fishing season) every year and they see they are building a relationship with Kwik’Pak.”

Kwik’Pak actually began employing regional youth in commercial fisheries back in 2001.

By 2010, 105 youths were putting in a total of more than 14,500 hours combined.

Last year the program employed 141 students and this coming summer, Kwik’Pak hopes to employ even more.
Over the years these youth have also participated in other projects led by Kwik’Pak Fisheries, from painting churches and the women’s shelter in Emmonak and Alakanuk to building the fishermen’s store at Kwik’Pak.

They have also become involved in support of suicide prevention efforts, attending conferences led by regional elders and several community entities.

The youth employment program, says Kwik’Pak management, gives the communities a great sense of excitement of what the future holds for the region.

Kwik’Pak also is looking constantly to broaden the perspective of these teen-agers into the vast worldwide competition and potential of commercial fisheries.

In March, the CDQ group took two of its 18-year-old students to the International Boston Seafood Show to work at Kwik’Pak’s booth.

“They were just overwhelmed with the city of Boston itself, and they got a good impression of the competition, how huge in general the seafood industry is,” Schultheis said. “They met customers and talked to them. We had them work in the booth, talked to customers. One wants to go to college and go into marine biology. The other wants to go into fisheries operations. We think it is a really good program.”

In the future, Kwik’Pak is also looking at possibilities of bringing some of the students into Anchorage during winter months, for technical training, college courses and office training. “We are trying to do this so those kids go back to the villages and have jobs there,” he said.

A state Labor Department grant for $150,000 has helped fund wages, training, supplies and administrative services for the youth employment program, and a large career fair is planned for June.

Still, more funds are needed to help the program grow, Schultheis said.

Margaret Bauman can be reached at margieb42@mtaonline.net.

Alaska’s Wild Salmon Harvest Climbs to 50 Million Fish

Alaska’s wild salmon harvest rose by more than 10 million fish from July 13 through July 20, to reach the 50 million fish mark, including nearly 31 million sockeye salmon. The bulk of the red salmon catch was harvested in the Bristol Bay watershed, including a cumulative total of more than 10 million reds in the Naknek-Kvichak district, now quiet as harvesters depart for other fisheries.

The Copper River harvest now stands at 1.8 million salmon, a small increase over the previous week, and includes some 1,783,000 reds, plus some 29,000 chum and 12,000 kings. While the fresh Copper River reds are now long gone, Copper River Seafoods, one of several processors of those reds, has joined other marketers of Alaska’s wild salmon online, with gift packages of smoked sockeye salmon fillets on www.Amazon.com, in addition to its own website, www.copperriverseafoods.com

Cook Inlet’s wild salmon harvest rose from 460,000 fish to 1.4 million over the same week ended July 20, with the sockeye salmon harvest alone jumping from 433,000 to 1.3 million reds, but the commercial East Side setnet fleet was basically shut down by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game in an effort to protect king salmon swimming up that side of Cook Inlet.

Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell has already asked for a federal disaster declaration related to Yukon and Kuskokwim Chinook salmon stocks, and noted in that request there is a similar trend on Cook Inlet stocks. Parnell said in the fall, when the season’s fishery return data is in, he intends to send a follow-up letter to federal authorities to support the disaster declaration request.

Parnell said he has also called for a state Department of Fish and Game comprehensive fisheries research plan. Parnell said he has already requested millions of federal dollars for Chinook salmon research but this was above and beyond that earlier request.

On the Lower Yukon River, a strong run of fall Yukon chums boosted the cumulative harvest from 176,000 to 285,000 fish, but that didn’t make up for the lost harvest during the summer run, when commercial fishermen had to wait to begin fishing until the required number of kings had escaped upstream, heading toward the Canadian border.

In Southeast Alaska, the cumulative catch doubled to 5.6 million salmon, including 4.3 million chum, 595,000 pink, 318,000 red, 232,000 silvers and 132,000 kings.

On the Alaska Peninsula the harvest edged up slightly to 3.3 million fish, including 2.5 million sockeyes, while at Kodiak the cumulative harvest rose from 1.6 million to 2.2 million salmon, including 1.4 million sockeyes.