GOA King Salmon Destruction Continues, Agency Juggles Numbers

Click on report to enlarge.

The October 16 PSC catch report on King Salmon destruction by trawlers shows another 4134 King salmon caught by GOA draggers. Interestingly they add the previously killed 56,636 to this week's 4134 mortality and get 58,194...hmm...NMFS reserves the right to adjust figures based upon...the sampling data. A form of juggling, eh? The actual number should be 60,870 king salmon destroyed.

Still, even these large numbers are probably on the low side, since much gaming goes on with the trawl fleet in order to hide the damage being done to achieve their short term profits.

The December NPFMC should be a good one. Plan to attend and testify to stop this madness, or at least to see how well the Alaska Groundup Fish Data Bank can dance and juggle at the same time. The dogs and ponies are already rehearsing, we're sure.

Keep yer flippers wet.

Dirtiest Draggers in the GOA to Date

By doing a sort of data provided on-line by NMFS http://www.fakr.noaa.gov/2010/pscinfo.htm we can see who the dirtiest draggers are in the GOA, our area of concern. While the majority of the NPFMC refused to recognize the gaming of bycatch figures of tanner crab bycatch, and refused to close down areas of concern for tanner crab protection, the figures provided by NMFS leave us with a very dirty picture of trawling in the GOA.

Crab: Week ending 27 March 2010, FV Golden Fleece, bottom dragging cod, caught 352 tanner crab per metric ton of bottom fish in four observed tows. Were these supposedly clean 'observer tows?' What happened once the observer left?

Halibut: Week ending 11 Sept 2010, FV Dusk, bottom dragging cod, caught 2526 pounds of halibut for every 2000 pounds of groundfish in two observed tows, so about 57% catch was PSC (prohibited species catch). This is just like the video we posted here last year http://www.tholepin.blogspot.com/2009/10/filthy-video-of-halibut-waste.html
Were these supposedly clean 'observer tows?' What happened once the observer left?

Chinook: Week ending 9 October 2010, FV Michelle Rene, pelagic trawling mid water pollock, caught 2606 Chinook in one observed tow. Only one tow observed. "Get that observer off, man, this is going to look bad!" But Michelle Rene had gotten 636 Chinook in one observed tow the week before. So much for avoiding hot spots. FV Pacific Star was there too, with 601 Chinook in two observed tows.

Week ending 9 October 2010, FV Sea Mac, pelagic bottom trawling pollock caught 864 Chinook in two observed tows, while the FV Half Moon Bay caught 674 in four observed tows. Again they were pelagic bottom trawling pollock. And you thought pelagic trawls couldn't bottom trawl? Well the FV Sea Storm apparently didn't know about that (or didn't care) and while pelagic bottom trawling hammered another 1002 Chinook in those same first two weeks of October.

Remember these are the observed tows, what happens when the observer leaves is the real story...but for the NPFMC, if it isn't observed it doesn't exist.

Total count so far this year in observed Chinook waste is nearly 57 thousand fish!

No telling what the real numbers are, but you can be sure this is a fragment of the real number and accounts in large part for diminishing Chinook salmon runs in the Cook Inlet, Kodiak Island, and Alaska Peninsula regions. Other drainages in western Alaska? Probably.

Get engaged, get active, save us from the destruction that dragging brings.

Keep yer flippers wet.

The Extinction of King Salmon? A Scandalous PSC Report

We are witnessing the wholesale destruction of the Alaska King Salmon. Unless the trawlers are held back the King Salmon will become extinct. Over 25,000 King Salmon in one week destroyed in the pelagic trawl fishery.

Click report to enlarge.

http://www.fakr.noaa.gov/2010/car120_goa.pdf

At the last NPFMC meeting, not one dragger would admit to the killing of Tanner crab. If asked, I suppose those same perjurous characters would say that with their pelagic gear on, they never kill King Salmon either. The US Coast Guard representative had so little knowledge of the gear type that when asked if the CG could tell pelagic gear from bottom gear, he stated that it was clear in the regs that more than 20 crab on a trawler deck would constitute bottom trawl gear. Where the hell is the gear specifications that the rest of us have to comply with? If pelagic is truly pelagic, it should be illegal for it to have chafing gear as part of the net. Afterall, if you are not on bottom, why need the protection from chafe? Trawling remains a shell (game) fishery.

Keep yer flippers wet.

Fair and Balanced Overview of NPFMC Meeting

http://www.alaskajournal.com/stories/101410/fis_cal.shtml

More later...

Keep yer flippers wet.

Fallacies of Trawler Arguments to Kodiak City/Borough

Fallacies in the Trawler Paper Written for the Kodiak City Council:

Central Gulf of Alaska Tanner Crab Bycatch

1) FALSE: Tanner crab bycatch in the GOA trawl fisheries is not a conservation concern. Because observed bycatch is poor, gamed, and generally unreliable, arguments about the low level of bycatch percentages of total abundance are specious and a poor defense of a dirty fishing gear type. Gross data gaps on trawler bycatch of tanner crab prevent serious consideration of such arguments. More convincing is: 1) the photographic evidence coming to light of excessive bycatch of mature tanner crab, 2) the reported abundance of tanner crab in non-trawled sanctuaries, 3) the commonly heard complaints by trawler crews of waste.

2) FALSE: Closures to protect tanner crab will have adverse economic impacts. Projection of economic impact is always a crap shoot. Tanner crab protection closures in the long run most likely will result in greater legal and deliverable tanner crab catches, as well as raising the productive rate of halibut and codfish. Short term trawler deliveries and economics have the long term consequences of damage to other fisheries that in the long run will destroy the economic viability of the community. A look at the east coast fisheries clearly shows the disadvantages of short sighted management.

3) FALSE: Too many trawl closures. Actually, there are too few. With trawl impacts well known on crab grounds, many formerly productive brooding and fishing areas remain without protection from hard-on-the-bottom trawling. This is widely believed to be responsible for, or contributory to, the reduction of king crab to the status of nearly extinct, the known destruction of 2000 MT of halibut every year, more than 20 thousand Chinook salmon annually, and the crimping of the comeback of tanner crab we are discussing here. And all this is based on poor observer data. If we really knew how bad it is, we might not be so complacent to limit this widespread destruction.

4) FALSE: Crab predation by commercial groundfish, trawling is actually good for crab. This argument is closely related to the same old arguments used to put bounties on bald eagles and seals in the bad old days, and the wholesale shooting of sea lions more recently. These days will be bad old days too, in the future, especially if you buy into these arguments. Natural predation in a natural system should not be used as an argument to absolve responsible parties from the damage wrought by trawling. Pacific cod and Pacific halibut can be caught by fixed gear sectors with far fewer impacts to the environment, and have a greater economic benefit to the fishing community. To argue that trawling benefits crab production is preposterously absurd.

5) FALSE: Wait for better observer data. There is no reason to believe that future changes in observer data will change the impacts of trawling on tanner crab. We have been waiting for these many years for the Council to take action to protect the species under its prevue and responsibility. To delay action until some further action elsewhere can be considered is a poor way to be responsible for a species under duress.

6) FALSE: New science lowers mortality rate of trawl crab bycatch. Until science is peer reviewed, it must remain suspect. Hastily designed studies, unexamined, and unreviewed that are used to defend potentially damaging practices is completely irresponsible. Placards don’t prevent overboard oily bilge discharges, and they don’t stop crab and other species from being crushed and killed in cod ends. Throwing a dismembered tanner crab or dead halibut or Chinook salmon down a newly designed discharge chute is not a conservation measure, it is a travesty.

7) FALSE: Trawlers offer flexibility and innovation. The proposed closures are reasonable and prudent to protect the rebuilding of tanner crab stocks. Permanent or seasonal closures are the only way that protection of rebuilding tanner crab stocks can be reasonably assured. If stocks move across lines, perhaps the lines need expansion. If trawlers were innovative, they would petition the council to convert at least some of their high impact gear to less damaging gear such as pots or longline. Modified sweeps using bobbins simply mean the damaged species are not retrieved to the surface for observation. Juvenile pollock excluders are not catching the juveniles, but damaging them and failing to count that damage. Like modified sweeps, these innovations simply hide the real damage wrought.
_______________________________________________________
We can't blame these inventive spinning spiders for their attempts to portray trawling as a a tolerable, even benefitial gear. They have, like other purveyors of dreams and distortions, come to believe their own deceptive thinking. They have become delusional. Profitably delusional, I might add.

"A delusion is a fixed belief that is either false, fanciful, or derived from deception. In psychiatry, it is defined to be a belief that is pathological (the result of an illness or illness process) and is held despite evidence to the contrary. As a pathology, it is distinct from a belief based on false or incomplete information, dogma, stupidity, apperception, illusion, or other effects of perception." Wikipedia.

Keep yer flippers wet.

Trawlers and Oligarchs Ramp Up PR Efforts Rant

The Gulf of Alaska trawlers and their friends, (the various, mostly foreign owned, processors) are working their spin machines, sending out passive/aggressive disinformation to bamboozle the public, while fooling no one but themselves. See their latest sophomoric YouTube productions at http://www.youtube.com/user/SeaAlliance#p/u/0/mdwsJDXtnFs where they attempt to show that 'fishermen are all in this together'...NOT.

Like the seafood sustainability rubber stampers, the Marine Stewardship Council, in the blog below, Sea Alliance and its bastard parent Marine Conservation Alliance would have us believe that we are all working for the sustainable fisheries future of Alaska. Sorry to throw cold water on your warm fuzzies, but MSC, MCA and SeaAlliance are a well financed public relations arm of the trawlers and their allies, the processors, the same people who consistently exceed PSC(prohibited species catch), work so hard to avoid observer coverage, operate as a secret guild, protect their catches from scrutiny by prohibiting cameras by their crews, jerk the NPFMC around by its nose ring, and tell the whole world via their videos that they are the true conservationists of the sea. Meanwhile crab, halibut and salmon stocks continue to take major hits. Over there...Southeast Alaska buries its collective head in the sand while sectors blame each other for the steeply declining halibut stocks all the while the Gulf of Alaska trawlers (SeaAlliance and MCA's not-so-secret Daddy Warbucks) just keep killing off the future. Meanwhile the war drums are beating around the docks as the trawlers put on their face paint, girdle up their loins and prepare to do foot to mouth combat at the NPFMC meeting in Anchorage in October. Up for a vote of protection are some of the most productive crab grounds in the Gulf of Alaska, hammered repeatedly by the trawlers for flat fish. Also included are the banks on either side that are productive halibut grounds. The trawlers are counting on their allies to attend in force to get their way as usual with the NPFMC. But the problem statement this time is a real problem statement, thanks largely to Alaska leadership, Denby Lloyd. To quote the NPFMC:

"The purpose of this action is to provide additional protection to Gulf of Alaska (GOA) Tanner crab from the potential adverse effects of groundfish fisheries, in order to facilitate rebuilding of Tanner crab stocks. This would be achieved by closing areas around Kodiak Island that are important to the Tanner crab stocks. Areas would be closed to some or all groundfish fishing, depending on the vessel’s gear type or gear configuration. An alternative in the analysis would allow a vessel to be exempt from the closures if the vessel carries 100% observer coverage. This would provide the Council with a high level of confidence in the assessment of any bycatch caught in the closed area, as a basis for future management action as necessary.

"The Council formulated a problem statement in October 2009, to initiate this analysis, and revised it slightly in April 2010:
Tanner crab are a prohibited species bycatch in the Gulf of Alaska (GOA) groundfish fisheries. Directed fisheries for Tanner crab in the GOA are fully allocated under the current limited entry system. No specific conservation measures exist in the GOA to address adverse interactions with Tanner crab by trawl and fixed gear sectors targeting groundfish and low observer coverage in GOA groundfish fisheries limits confidence in the assessment of Tanner crab bycatch in those fisheries, and a greater level of observer coverage in the appropriate areas may provide the Council with a higher level of confidence in the assessment of any bycatch occurring in the designated areas as a basis for future management actions as necessary. Tanner crab stocks have been rebuilding since peak fisheries occurred in the late 1970s. Specific protection measures should be advanced to facilitate stock rebuilding."

So there you have it. The crux of the problem. But MCA and SeaAlliance would have you believe it's all warm and fuzzy out here in the Gulf of Alaska. We are taking good care of the resources, using the best science (their money can buy), and are really deeply concerned about the environment, ecology, and other popular shit. But really, what they care about is their wallets, that new house they are building on the hill, and how they can game the public and the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council for another day...pay day that is...and the hell with the future. "We got to get it now, while there is still something left to get."

Trawlers killed off the shrimp and the king crab. Now they are keeping the Tanner crab down, pushing back the halibut, crimping the king salmon; fishing down the food chain to the self digesting arrow tooth flounder. Got to get it now. There is no tomorrow. Pretty soon Alaska will be just like the East Coast.

In this scenario, the trawler mouthpiece seems to say, "Spin on. Let deception and obfuscation rule, and the Devil take the hindmost."

Keep yer flippers wet.

MSC hurts the populations that are not sustainably taken.

Seafood stewardship questionable: experts

September 1, 2010 The world's most established fisheries certifier is failing on its promises as rapidly as it gains prominence, according the world's leading fisheries experts from the University of British Columbia (UBC), Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California at San Diego and elsewhere.

Established in 1997 by the World Wildlife Fund and Unilever, one of the world's largest fish retailers, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) has been helping consumers eat fish "guilt-free" by certifying fisheries. Major North American grocery chains such as Wal-Mart, Whole Foods and Europe's Waitrose carry seafood bearing the blue-mark label as part of their sustainability strategy.

But in an opinion piece published in the current issue of Nature, six researchers from Canada, Italy and the U.S. object to the many of the MSC's procedures and certification of certain species.

"The MSC is supposed to be a solution, but a lot of what they do has turned against biology in favour of bureaucracy," says Jennifer Jacquet, lead author and post-doctoral fellow with UBC's Sea Around Us Project.

The largest MSC-certified fishery, with an annual catch of one million tonnes, is the U.S. trawl fishery for pollock in the eastern Bering Sea. It was certified in 2005 and recommended for recertification this summer.

"Pollock has been certified despite a 64 per cent decline of the population's spawning biomass between 2004 and 2009, with no solid evidence for recovery. This has worrisome implications for possible harmful impacts on other species and fisheries besides the viability of the pollock fishery itself," says Jeremy Jackson from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego. "How is that sustainable?"

Paul Dayton, also of Scripps Oceanography, and David Ainley, a biologist who works in the Antarctic, remain concerned about the recent certification of krill and the proposed certification of toothfish.

"The certification of the Ross Sea is an embarrassment as it flies in the face of existing data and denies any sense of precautionary management," says Dayton.

"We're especially concerned about the recent certification of Antarctic krill despite estimates of long-term decline and a link between krill population depletion and declining sea ice in areas sensitive to climate change," says Daniel Pauly, head of UBC's Sea Around Us Project. "The rationale for this certification is on further thin ice because the catch is destined to feed farmed fish, pigs and chicken."

Fisheries that are being heavily depleted, reliant on high-impact methods such as bottom trawling and that aren't destined for human consumption should be excluded from certification, conclude the authors, which include Sidney Holt, a founding father of fisheries science.

"The MSC should not certify fisheries that are not demonstrably sustainable, fisheries that use high-impact methods such as bottom trawling and/or fisheries that aren't destined for human consumption," says Pauly.

"The MSC needs to strengthen its commitment to its own principles in order to fulfill its promise to be 'the best environmental choice,'" says Jackson.

The authors also note that the current certification system, which relies on for-profit consultants and could cost as much as $150,000, presents a potential conflict of interest and discriminates against small-scale fisheries and fisheries from developing countries - most of which use highly-selective and sustainable techniques.

Dayton points out that "the failure of the MSC hurts the populations that are not sustainably taken and their ecosystems; it deprives the public of an opportunity to make a meaningful choice and it damages those fisheries that are well managed - this is especially important for those sustainable small-scale fisheries competing with the giants that buy certifications they have not earned."

"Unless MSC goes under major reform, there are better, more effective ways to spend the certifier's $13-million annual budget to help the oceans, such as lobbying for the elimination of harmful fisheries subsidies or establishing marine protected areas," says Jacquet.

Provided by University of British Columbia

Borrowed from http://www.physorg.com/

Thanks!

Keep yer flippers wet.

Are Sea Lions the Big Canary of Our Coal Mine?

Like a fox, digging beneath the snow for mice or voles, let's dig around a bit beneath the snow job regarding sea lions in Western Alaska. I guarantee we will find more there than the smooth white surface that appears to be there and how that relates ot the Gulf of Alaska.

• NOAA/NMFS is being proactive on the sea lion issue. Now let's get real, NOAA/NMFS never have been big greenies in the past. They are like the Minerals Management Service and the oil industry. They have let one helluva lot of bad things go down and have supported the big fishing industry like nobody's business (but their own). So that should be a tip off that something VERY bad is going down and we need to shake off the fog and try to see what that really is...er, too much fish is being taken from Area 543. Period. NOAA/NMFS recommends shutting it down, so the damage must be very bad indeed.
• Where was NOAA/NMFS when Cod Alley was being trawled to the elimination of king crab in the southern Bering Sea? Why did they let the Kodiak NMFS boss (BO) suppress studies that clearly showed the area was crucial to king crab production. That research, as shocking as it was, is vaild; the best available science. But NOAA/NMFS turned out that research and that researcher in favor of the trawlers. So when NOAA/NMFS calls for a closure, people, the damage is already unconscionable, probably irretrievable, and irreparable.
• First Lesson: Bottom trawls work best on smooth bottom. Anything else causes damage to these expensive pieces of webwork. Smooth bottom is crab bottom. If you can't trawl on smooth bottom, you can't trawl. Simple math applies. 1 + 1 = 2. Get rid of the crab that supported so many, in order for a few trawlers to support a few: 1.)a few owners who make big bucks, 2.)a few crew who make big bucks, 3.)a few processor corporations who make big bucks, 4.)and a lot of little people who make minimum wage, are supported by the general public through welfare, subsidised housing, and social support networks and by their own back breaking tenacity and labor. Don't blame these people, they are pawns like the rest of us. The City of Kodiak fell for the PR line and built a huge haulout facility for the trawlers which now rides upon the city residents and their wallets. The City of Kodiak Trawler Support Center. Bottom line? Crab had to go. And it went. You are next.
• Chant jobs, jobs, jobs. Whenever the destruction of our renewable resources becomes an issue, you will invariably hear the chant, "Jobs, jobs, jobs." And if you look carefully it is always peasant jobs. Low paid, minimum wage, public dole supported jobs. Not a job that most of us would look to do. With trawling, you have a very few skilled workers and a lot of bottom of the barrel jobs. With other forms of fishing, the crews are generally more skilled, there are more crew jobs because of efficiency factors that benefit the larger community; such as crabbing, longlining, seining, gillnetting, and jigging. When you have to handle the fish individually, you require more hands and therefore hire more people. Mass caught trawler mush can be machine handled because it is intrinsically of lower quality. The trawlers require their crews primarily to sort out the halibut, king salmon and crab. When the managers of our fisheries opt for trawler caught, they opt for the lowest value for our resources, at the highest resource price.
• Halibut is next. Gulf of Alaska trawlers claim they are being limited by the halibut cap of 2000 metric tons of halibut wasted bycatch per year which is constraining the wholesale destruction of the cod resource, et al. 4.4 million pounds of halibut is just not enough for the trawlers in the GOA. That's $22,000,000 exvessel value wasted as PSC. Insiders will tell you that the real trawler waste is far higher, since coverage at best is 30% of trawl time and at least some of that is incompetent observers, or lazy observers, or seasick observers who by regulation can only put in a 12 hour day. 100% observer coverage and 100 % retention of all catch is the only answer right now. Data gaps are used by the trawlers to argue for less stringent scrutiny (You can't prove we are criminals!), but that 'nobody is here to see this' is cause for concern about the wastage by those same trawlers. Where the hell is video surveilance?
• On the horizon? Replacements at the NPFMC threaten to reverse progress made there in the past few meetings regarding tanner crab protection, king salmon bycatch and halibut waste reduction. Mouth pieces for the trawlers and processors have been busy whispering in the Governor's ears, twisting arms, threatening exposures. Let's face it, Sean Parnell has not yet shown the courage to stand up for the State of Alaska's best interests. DL was not in attendance at this sea lion meeting. He was replaced by CC, who is tied directly to Petersburg fishing/processor interests, and has not heretofore shown herself to have our best interests at heart. Generally speaking, SE Alaska doesn't realize the trickle down effect of trawlers destroying the Gulf, so, by and large they don't care about the rest of the state. SE long ago outlawed trawlers. Can't they see we need the same?

So all this without addressing the details of the proposed sea lion closures in area 543? Well, just because the fox hears scratching beneath the snow doesn't mean it is a mouse or vole, it could just be a weasel. The weasels are in the fine print, and between the lines of print, and in the back rooms, and behind closed doors. When NOAA/NMFS calls for closures and industry cries "jobs" you know that something is on the move; that resources are going to suffer, that history will be repeating itself, and that we are about to witness another great compromise.

Read Margaret Bauman reports, http://www.thedutchharborfisherman.com/article/1033noaa_issues_draft_groundfish_biological

Keep yer flippers damp.

Bits and Pieces: Once They're Gone, It Won't Be An Issue

Coming back from a longline trip, Capt. X spotted a trawler with his gear down in a IPHC listed hotspot for juvenile halibut. Capt. X knew the operator of the trawler, so he called him on the VHF. Asked what he was doing dragging in such a place, he replied, "The sooner we clean these f'ing halibut up, the sooner this place won't be off limits."

Capt. Z sets his trawl down hard, real hard, on his way in from unobserved trips regularly. His crew says he has a taste for scallops.

A midwater (pelagic) trawler was in Kiliuda Bay. Capt. Y called him on the VHF to ask why he was leaving. He relied, "I just tore the hell out of my trawl on a crab pot." Midwater crab pots should be illegal?

Why shouldn't regulations make chafing gear illegal on midwater (pelagic) trawls?

Why are the pelagic doors on the F/V Golden Fleece wear polished and why did they go through the expense of having them hardfaced if they aren't digging into the bottom on a regular basis?

(ii) Amendment 80 vessels in the GOA processors. Except for the F/V GOLDEN FLEECE (USCG Documentation Number 609951), all Amendment 80 vessels, except when directed fishing for scallops using dredge gear, in the GOA must have onboard at least one NMFS-certified observer for each day that the vessel is used to harvest, receive, or process groundfish in the GOA management areas or adjacent waters open by the State of Alaska for which it adopts a Federal fishing season. Why? Who arranged that exception, and for how much cash?

Why shouldn't "accidentally" "kissing the bottom" with "pelagic" trawl gear be just as illegal as "accidentally" setting a seine or gillnet over the line?

Why did the USCG have such an issue with using a tape measure to figure Simplified Gross Tonnage? Don't tell me that didn't come from on high. Why?

Why are simple measures to ensure our fishing future so "impossible" for our regulators?

Keep yer flippers wet.

Guest Predicts "Halibut Stock Collapse in the Near Future"

"I am (name withheld). This is my history. After graduating in 1976, I worked on the Miller Freeman as a trawl gear specialist in the Bering and Chukchi Seas. In 1977, I worked as a fisheries biologist with ADF&G. I was one of the first domestic observers on Kodiak shore based trawlers, and I worked on one of the first draggers delivering food fish to shore plants. I was a deckhand on a Kodiak trawler for three years. There were very few draggers then and they were relatively small and towed modified shrimp nets. Even so I was appalled at the amount of halibut and crab we dragged up. One day as an observer we caught three thousand pounds of egged king crab females in a tow. I told my boss, Phil Rigby, about it and he said “Do not let this get out. We would not want to discourage the bottom fishing industry.” Ironically, the shrimp fleet dragged in the summer and sold pollock in the winter as bait to the crab boats. Well, soon the draggers were putting on public relations through the local newspaper reporter, Chris Blackburn. At the time I thought it was funny. But they ended up making Chris their chief lobbyist, their minister of information. Joint ventures brought more boats and more areas got dragged. There were more gear conflicts. Today those drag boats are much larger and cover more ground.

"Currently I am a commercial halibut fisherman. I bought into the IFQ program. I can hardly believe what I have seen in the last four years or so. First, the fall cod trawl disaster where millions of pounds of halibut were dragged up in the Marmot Gully. The fishing vessel Dusk had 70,000 pounds of halibut and the fishing vessel Peggy Jo had over 100,000 pounds of halibut bycatch. Then there’s the arrowtooth flounder fishery, where millions of tiny halibut are killed and spawning areas are dredged. This year, everywhere I go, I find draggers on the black cod edge. Draggers close by my gear; draggers in high concentrations of halibut with no observers. The price of black cod is so high it gives a powerful incentive to fish dirty. A friend has a picture of the dragger Walter N with deck load of black cod. They only could keep a small amount, after picking out the big black cod, they shoveled the rest over. And now in the past few years we have the super 58 foot autobaiter longline boats (no observers) trashing out the juvenile halibut.

"We have no real effective observer coverage. 30 percent? And that’s not 24 hours. The system is further manipulated by timing the tow before midnight and by the “observer tow” that’s recorded and later the dirty tow that’s not recorded. A lot of damage can be done in one day of unobserved trawling.

"What I see now is a serious decline in area 3A halibut and even more so in 3B. I would say stock collapse in the near future. Fifty years ago it was the foreign trawlers who were responsible for a huge decline in halibut, but now it is the domestic trawlers threatening our crab, salmon and halibut resources. Thousands of sport charter and commercial fishermen depend on halibut for a living. A fishery worth over $300 million in ex-vessel value this year soon to be trashed out as fodder for cheap flatfish. The IFQ program will surely collapse under the weight of loans not repaid.

"As one dragger crewman told my deckhand 'Why doesn’t anyone do anything about it?'"

Keep yer flippers wet.