What happened to those king salmon caught as bycatch? • Alaska Beacon

Journal du Nord last week published a story about how Kodiak-based pollock trawlers unintentionally caught 2,000 king salmon, forcing the closure of a major Gulf of Alaska fishery.

Subsequently, a number of readers responded with similar questions: What happened to those salmon? were they sold? Given ? Thrown into the water?

The short answer, according to a federal management official: the salmon were “discarded.”

A little extra context: It’s “prohibited from entering into the commerce” of salmon bycatch, Josh Keaton, a senior official with the National Marine Fisheries Service, said in a brief call Friday.

“No one gets paid,” he said. “The fishermen cannot take them home. »

The salmon caught by the trawlers were small, he said – four pounds on average, compared to the 10 pounds weighed by the smallest salmon caught recreationally.

When bycatch is of “marketable size” and suitable for food quality, Kodiak seafood companies often process the fish and donate it to an Alaska nonprofit group. Marine sharingKeaton added. But in this case, they were probably too small and also remained in containers for two days while independent fisheries observers took genetic samples from each, he explained.

Meanwhile, the fallout from the closure of the central Gulf of Alaska pollock fishery in response to salmon bycatch continues. The Kodiak Daily Mirror reportedOne of the city’s processing companies, OBI Seafoods, is laying off about 50 workers on Thursday, with an executive telling the newspaper that the remaining workers would also see “much fewer hours.”

The closure blocks an estimated $9 million worth of raw pollock in the Gulf of Alaska that would have been processed into $50 million or more worth of headless and gutted fish, fillets, meal and oil, according to a preliminary analysis of Garrett Evridge, an Alaska fisheries economist. .

The state and local government will also lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in fishing tax revenue, according to Evridge’s analysis.

Nathaniel Herz welcomes advice on (email protected) or (907) 793-0312. This article was originally published in Northern Journal, a Herz newsletter. Subscribe to this link.