Fall fisheries bring urchins, cukes and geoducks

By Laine Welch
After the summer salmon season wraps up, Alaska’s fishing industry begins a big line-up of fall fisheries that can last through the winter.
Starting Oct. 1, the fall Dungeness crab season opens in Southeast Alaska for roughly 200 crabbers, along with several shrimp fisheries. Nearly 200 divers also begin heading down to the icy depths to handpick pricey sea cucumbers, urchins and giant geoduck clams (pronounced “gooey-ducks”). Geoducks average three pounds, but can weigh up to 10 pounds. Their name is derived from a Nisqually Indian term meaning “dig deep.”
Southeast divers will compete for 600,000 pounds of geoducks, 1.5 million pounds of sea cukes and 5 million pounds of red sea urchins in the coming months. A small sea cucumber fishery (140,000 pounds) also occurs around Kodiak Island.  Dive fisheries of 5,000 pounds of cukes also occur at Chignik and along the Alaska Peninsula.
Sea cucumbers fetch about $2.50 a pound for divers, geoduck clams get $3.50-$3.90 per pound live, ($1 per pound processed); red urchins average about 35 cents a pound. Nearly all go to Asian markets.

Also in October: 
Southeast trollers will be back out on the water on Oct. 11 targeting winter kings. Alaska’s biggest crab fisheries get underway in the Bering Sea on Oct. 15. At the same time, sablefish and halibut fisheries are ongoing until mid-November. Fishing for cod, pollock, flounder and many other species also continues throughout the year.  
 
Crab cuts
Holding true to a precautionary course in fishery oversight, managers have reduced the 2009/2010 catches for Alaska’s largest crab fisheries in the Bering Sea. 
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced last week that the quota for snow crab will be cut to 48 million pounds; an 18-percent decrease from recent years. Still, stakeholders breathed a sigh of relief, as they had feared a far lower snow crab catch to help speed up a stock rebuilding plan.
A bigger surprise is the sizable cut to red king crab at Bristol Bay. Discussions for months had largely suggested the catch could remain status quo at 20 million pounds. Instead, the red king crab catch was reduced to just 16 million pounds; a decrease of 21.4 percent. The Tanner crab take also was reduced to 1.3 million pounds, taken from the eastern region only. Fishery managers said the lower catch quotas also account for the estimated numbers of crab taken as bycatch and accidental mortality rates.
For the first time in a decade, a blue king crab fishery will open way out west at St. Matthew Island, with a catch guideline of just over one million pounds. The Bering Sea crab fisheries get underway Oct. 15. 
Crabbers in Southeast were disappointed again by the cancellation of the November red king crab fishery. That fishery has been closed since 1991, and managers claim the number of male crabs is at its lowest level in 16 years. Crabbers, on the other hand, question the validity of the surveys, and believe they are not a complete indication of the health of the crab stocks. 
Looking at crab markets, less king crab all around could boost prices across the board. The Dungeness market is reportedly clamoring for crab, and Alaska will be competing for shelf space with bigger west coast fisheries. For snow crab, the market is said to be well-stocked, with lots of crab still available from Canada.
 
Fish for the hungry
American Seafoods Group was recognized last week for reaching the milestone of donating 10 million seafood meals to hungry Americans.  The donations go to SeaShare, which – since 1994 – has worked with the seafood industry to provide more than 130 million seafood meals to food banks, shelters and soup kitchens across the United States. The nonprofit SeaShare is now one of the largest sources of protein for hunger relief in the nation. For more information about SeaShare, visit their Web site at www.seashare.org. 
 

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