Monday, June 29, 2009

You can look, but don't catch

OK, we're not through June yet and already I'm hearing angry reports from Bristol Bay that some processors are struggling with the volume of fish and have placed gillnetters on delivery limits.

Catches exceeded 1 million sockeye on Friday and reached nearly 1.5 million on Saturday. The Department of Fish and Game hasn't posted the tally from Sunday.

Processors imposing limits year after year at Bristol Bay has been a sore point for fishermen, including Gov. Sarah Palin, whose family fishes commercially at Dillingham.

Despite the grumbling, however, we haven't seen appreciably more processors come into the bay.

Spokesmen for the industry contend existing processors have increased capacity over the years.

Yet here we are again on limits as valuable sockeye swim upriver, fishermen are saying.

More on this as I can get it.

No comments: