Shrimping starts slow in Prince William Sound

Last week's four-day season opener in the Prince William Sound shrimp pot fishery produced a modest catch of 8,761 pounds, with 21 vessels participating.

Another four-day period begins today, the state Department of Fish and Game says.

The quota for the year is 66,300 pounds, so plenty of shrimp left to catch if fishermen can find them.

Big shrimp ahead!

Again this year, the state intends to open a commercial fishery for those enormous, delectable spot shrimp in Prince William Sound.

The season will open April 15 with a 66,300-pound quota, says this announcement from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

Last year was a bit of a bust with 33 boats landing a total of 20,615 pounds, or only about 40 percent of the preseason quota.

The fishery, however, rotates around the Sound. The 2012 harvest was in Area 3, while this year's fishery will be in Area 1.

Fishermen use pot gear to capture the big shrimp, also known as spot prawns.

Jumbo argument coming on shrimp?

The Alaska Board of Fisheries will consider dozens of shellfish proposals during its meeting Tuesday through Saturday at the Hilton Anchorage.

Deckboss has reviewed the list and is particularly intrigued with four proposals on the commercial shrimp pot fishery in Prince William Sound.

The makers of proposals 358, 359, 360 and 361 all want to see the fishery shut down.

They contend commercial shrimpers actually lose money on the fishery, and that continuing the harvest will crash the stock to the detriment of sport and subsistence shrimpers.

All involved target spot shrimp, or prawns, a very large and tasty variety.

The commercial fishery was closed for 18 years due to low abundance.

It reopened in 2010, and again in 2011, producing catches of 45,349 pounds and 52,694 pounds respectively.

State figures show 75 vessels participated in the fishery in 2010, and 44 vessels in 2011.

As for noncommercial harvest, well in excess of 3,000 permits were issued in both 2010 and 2011, with an estimated take of 87,699 pounds and 59,182 pounds respectively.

The commercial harvest worries the proposal authors. They want the board to put a stop to it.

"Prince William has been a great place for friends and families to go do some shrimping and that is going to go away," writes Mike Crawford, in proposal 361. "The value of the resource is much higher for the noncommercial use than the $200,000 that the commercial fishery is worth."

Unless the commercial fishery is halted, adds Jeff Benkert, in proposal 359, the Sound will "become the desert" it was before.

The Department of Fish and Game, in a February management report, said "survey results for 2011 suggest that spot shrimp abundance remains high relative to recent years."

This year's commercial shrimp pot season is set to open April 15 with a 51,240-pound quota.

Fish and Game says it's neutral on what it terms the "allocative proposals."

Back with bits and pieces

Deckboss apologizes for his silence the past few days. Had some nonfish business to deal with.

To catch up, here are a few news nuggets I'm sure you'll find interesting.

• The Copper River District has produced a catch of 2 million sockeye so far this season, which is pretty awesome. Gillnetters managed only about 636,000 last year.

• The Prince William Sound shrimp pot fishery will close for the season at 10 p.m. Friday. Why? Because shrimpers by then are expected to max out the 52,760-pound quota. Last year's harvest came in at 45,349 pounds, well short of the 55,000-pound limit.

• The Norton Sound red king crab fishery also will close Friday, at noon. Crabbers are expected to hit the 331,150-pound quota by then.

• We know more now about the outcome of the big Togiak sac roe herring fishery back in May. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game puts the total value of the huge 22,699-ton harvest at about $2.3 million, based on an estimated grounds price of $100 per ton. Last year, Togiak herring paid $150 per ton, not counting any post-season adjustments.

• I haven't read it yet, but here's an independent review the states of Alaska and Washington commissioned on the recent federal biological opinion regarding commercial fishing effects on endangered Steller sea lions. The BiOp resulted in the closure of significant fishing grounds out the Aleutian chain — and provoked an ongoing lawsuit.

Princely prawns

The Prince William Sound commercial shrimp pot fishery wrapped up its first opener of the season on April 19, and the preliminary results are in: 33 boats caught about 10,000 pounds over five days.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game reopened the fishery at 8 a.m. yesterday, and boats can keep catching until 8 p.m. April 29. The quota for the season is 52,760 pounds.

This is the second consecutive year for a commercial shrimp pot harvest in the Prince William Sound. The fishery previously was closed for 18 years due to weak shrimp stocks.

In 2010 the fleet took 45,349 pounds of shrimp out of a quota of 55,000 pounds.

Shrimpers haul up predominantly spot shrimp, also known as spot prawns, in their pots.

These are big, luscious shrimp, the kind Forrest Gump and Bubba Blue could talk about all day long.

Spot shrimp are the largest variety of shrimp in the North Pacific. They take their name from the white, paired spots located just behind the head and just in front of the tail.

A third shot at Prince William Sound spot shrimp

Here's the latest announcement from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game in Cordova:

April 30, 2010

Prince William Sound commercial shrimp season, third period

The second fishing period of the Prince William Sound Area E commercial shrimp pot fishery closed at 8 p.m. April 29. Preliminary catch reports indicate a harvest of approximately 6,000 pounds by 18 vessels.

The cumulative harvest of approximately 19,000 pounds is 34 percent of the 55,000-pound guideline harvest level. Therefore, a third fishing period will open at 8 a.m. on May 1 and close at 8 p.m. May 7.

This fishing period may be extended depending upon effort levels and reported harvest.

More information here.

Spot shrimp, round two!

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game in Cordova today issued the following announcement:

April 22, 2010

Prince William Sound commercial shrimp season, second period

The first fishing period of the Prince William Sound Area E commercial shrimp pot fishery closed on April 18 and produced a harvest of approximately 13,000 pounds from 109 landings by 68 vessels.

Gale-force winds during the fishing period affected participation in the fishery as well as fishery performance. Therefore, a second commercial shrimp pot fishing period will open at 8 a.m. April 24 and close at 8 p.m. April 29.

The hours that fishing gear can be operated is also increased to 12 hours per day. Shrimp pot gear may only be deployed and retrieved from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. each day.

The maximum number of shrimp pots that may be operated from a vessel remains at 20.

More information here.

Wanna go shrimping?

Now here's something delicious.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is getting ready to open a commercial shrimp pot fishery in Prince William Sound for the first time in nearly 20 years.

The main quarry will be those big, wonderful spot shrimp, or spot prawns as some folks call them.

The state has set a modest guideline harvest level of 55,000 pounds.

To catch them, fishermen must register by 5 p.m. April 1.

The fishery will open at 8 a.m. April 15.

Click here to read the state news release and see a map of the area open for shrimping.

As I said at the top, it's been quite a while since we've seen a Prince William Sound commercial shrimp pot fishery.

In 1991, the last year the fishery was open, 15 participating vessels landed 17,302 pounds of spot shrimp and 278 pounds of coonstripe shrimp.

The peak year was 1986, when 80 vessels landed 286,105 pounds of spot shrimp and 3,715 pounds of coonstripes.

The state closed the fishery after the 1991 season due to weak shrimp stocks. Noncommercial harvests for subsistence, personal use and sport purposes were allowed to continue.

Since the commercial closure, spot shrimp have slowly but steadily increased in abundance, state biologists say. In December 2008, the Alaska Board of Fisheries approved a plan for resuming commercial shrimping.

And here we are.

I've have a chance to sample a few spot shrimp, y'all, and they're absolutely divine.

Spot shrimp are the largest type of shrimp in the North Pacific. They take their name from the white, paired spots located just behind the head and just in front of the tail.

A shout out to my good friend in Anchorage for alerting Deckboss to the Fish and Game news release.

Diving for dollars

Giant red sea cucumber. Photo by Eric Munk, NMFS Kodiak

Alaska's commercial fishing industry really doesn't have an off-season. Somebody is trying to catch something most all the time.

This month, for instance, a number of specialized commercial fisheries are opening.

Most of them involve divers going to the bottom to collect odd creatures that, frankly, aren't much in demand in the United States but command good money in Asia.

Here's a rundown of the action:

• The Southeast Alaska sea cucumber dive fishery opened Oct. 5 with a quota of almost 1.6 million pounds.

• The Southeast red sea urchin red sea urchin fishery opened Oct. 1 with a quota of almost 5.1 million pounds.

• The Southeast geoduck clam fishery opened Oct. 1 with a quota of 623,300 pounds.

• The Southeast pot shrimp fishery opened Oct. 1 with a quota of 692,400 pounds. Fishermen will be going after such species as spot and coonstripe shrimp.

• The Kodiak red sea cucumber fishery opened Oct. 1 with a quota of 140,000 pounds. Smaller quotas are available in the Chignik, Alaska Peninsula, Aleutian Islands and Bering Sea districts.

Deckboss would like to say he doesn't have much of a taste for sea cucumber or urchin, but he sure wouldn't turn down a box of those huge, luscious spot shrimp!