Fishing Industry

Standing on the deck of his 91-foot trawler, veteran fisherman Tomoyuki Kondou winces over reports that radioactivity from Japan's damaged nuclear power plant in nearby Fukushima has contaminated the local food supply after this month's deadly earthquake and tsunami. The bespectacled third-generation angler has heard the warnings that milk, spinach and other vegetables grown around the plant have been found to contain traces of the radioactive isotopes iodine-131 and cesium-137. Now Kondou and others in Kesennuma worry that radiation from the seaside nuclear plant might also affect the region's long-bustling fishing industry, which provides tuna, oysters, shark, squid and seaweed to restaurants and supermarkets throughout Japan and around the world.

Talk to a fisherman on the West Coast and he'll give you a hard-luck story.  The once-glorious salmon runs of the Pacific Northwest are mostly shadows of what they once were, some threatened with outright extinction, and few rivers have had as many troubles as the Klamath, as it runs from southern Oregon into Northern California. Once the third-most productive salmon river system in the U.S., the Klamath last year saw only about 233,000 fall chinook - the big, meaty salmon prized by fishermen - headed back to spawn.  In 2008, the number was only 68,000.

More than a year after one of the worst salmon fishing seasons in decades, the state this week has begun disbursing $33 million in long-awaited federal disaster relief to the commercial fishing industry. The money, authorized in a bill by Rep. Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena), is meant to offset the dismal catch of 2006, which was barely one-tenth of normal.

Standing on the deck of his 91-foot trawler, veteran fisherman Tomoyuki Kondou winces over reports that radioactivity from Japan's damaged nuclear power plant in nearby Fukushima has contaminated the local food supply after this month's deadly earthquake and tsunami. The bespectacled third-generation angler has heard the warnings that milk, spinach and other vegetables grown around the plant have been found to contain traces of the radioactive isotopes iodine-131 and cesium-137. Now Kondou and others in Kesennuma worry that radiation from the seaside nuclear plant might also affect the region's long-bustling fishing industry, which provides tuna, oysters, shark, squid and seaweed to restaurants and supermarkets throughout Japan and around the world.

Iceland devalued its crown 10% Monday to help its fishing industry, which has been hit by falling prices abroad. The government also said it empowered the central bank to devalue the crown by 3% more against a trade-weighted basket of other currencies if and when it deemed this necessary. The crown traded Monday at 43.22 to the dollar, compared to Friday's official setting of 38.82.

Mass farming of the coveted Atlantic salmon and its swift transport to dining tables around the world is giving Norway's fishermen a new lease on life. "Salmon breeding is becoming big business, attracting more and more investors," Fisheries Minister Thor Listau said. Production of salmon and the smaller sea trout reached 30,000 tons last year, more than double the 1982 figure, and Europe, the United States and Japan are crying out for more of the Norwegian delicacies.

The seafood industry , despite a checkered food safety record, is now being called upon to police itself with minimal federal oversight under a controversial plan announced last week by the Clinton Administration. The current, patchwork program--sharply criticized as ineffective by critics--will be replaced with a system that relies more on detailed company record keeping than on state-of-the-art government inspections. The U. S.

California's commercial fishing industry, reeling from hard times, is attempting to resurrect a tax break worth at least $1.1 million a year. With fishing industry support, Assemblyman Gerald N. Felando (R-San Pedro) is seeking passage of legislation to exempt commercial deep-sea and charter fishing operations from the sales and use tax for diesel fuel. Twice in the past six years, the Legislature has approved temporary diesel fuel tax breaks for the state's commercial fishing vessels.

Jerry Mathers once pulled in 150,000 pounds of whitefish a year from Lake Erie. This year, all he got was one whitefish, some perch and a pat on the back from environmentalists. Mathers' boat, the Big Tony, is the only commercial vessel still in business around Erie, since state fishing restrictions in 1995 wiped out an already struggling industry.

The tuna are coming, but will Southland fishermen be around to catch them? And if so, how many will they be able to keep? Those questions are still being asked as summer approaches without the agreement so many were hoping for between Mexican officials and the San Diego sportfishing industry regarding recent restrictions on the take of tuna in Mexican waters. Under new regulations, fishermen are allowed only two tuna a day and no more than six on long-range trips.

President Obama served plates of barbecued gulf shrimp to guests at his 49th birthday party Aug. 9. But Kindra Arnesen, who runs a shrimp boat with her husband here in southern Louisiana, isn't nearly ready to eat what comes out of the tepid gray waters. When news first hit of the massive oil blowout 50 miles southeast of here, Arnesen filled her freezer with shrimp. She has no intention of eating fresh seafood until she stops hearing from her fellow fishermen about blobs of oil on the sea bottom and tiny droplets of dispersed hydrocarbons in the water.

A massive, quickly growing oil slick steered by unpredictable winds and rough seas lapped closer to land Saturday, bearing down on a stunned gulf coastline that had been just beginning to get its swagger back after Hurricane Katrina. From shrimpers in Mississippi delta fishing towns such as Venice, La., to urban settlers trying to rebuild lives in New Orleans' Lower 9th Ward, the approaching environmental disaster punctured the upbeat mood with a frightening and uncertain menace.

The sky was still black over the Gulf of Mexico as fisherman Jeff Howard steered his battered flat-bottom boat from one crab trap to another, frantic to snap up a few more crustaceans before the oil came. He had little time to waste. Stiff winds, rough waters and almost empty traps wouldn't keep him docked. Anything, he figured, was better than nothing. "Today might be the last day you can go," said Howard, 43. "You might not be able to go for another year. Who knows?" As the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico continued to spread Friday, Louisiana's $2.5-billion commercial fishing industry, which provides much of the country's domestic shrimp and oysters, is bracing for a virtual shutdown that could trigger shortages and price hikes for consumers nationwide.

More evidence emerged Tuesday to suggest that the voracious Asian carp is threatening to reach the Great Lakes, as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported for the first time finding DNA samples of the carp beyond the locks in the Chicago area. The news came hours after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to intervene and issue an emergency order closing off all the locks that connect Illinois' rivers with Lake Michigan. "We have one sample positive in the Calumet Harbor above the breakwater, so that is in Lake Michigan," Maj. Gen. John Peabody said in a conference call with reporters.

With the U.S. Supreme Court poised to act on a lawsuit seeking to prevent Asian carp from infiltrating Lake Michigan, defendants said Tuesday that hysteria over questionable DNA research is whipping Upper Midwest states into a frenzy that could devastate Illinois' shipping industry. Michigan took the lawsuit to the Supreme Court last month, asking for an injunction to force Illinois to close two Chicago-area navigational locks to prevent the carp's spread into the Great Lakes. Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio and New York have joined the suit.

The fight to keep invasive Asian carp out of the Great Lakes reached the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday, as Michigan's attorney general filed a lawsuit seeking closure of two shipping locks near Chicago. Claiming Illinois officials have been lax, Michigan Atty. Gen. Mike Cox asked justices for immediate action to seal off the most direct route for fish entering Lake Michigan, in hopes of protecting the region's $7-billion fishing industry. "We don't want to have to look back years later . . . and say, 'What was the matter with us?

Despite warmer-than-usual waters off the Ventura County coastline brought on by El Nino conditions, the local fishing industry is progressing uninterrupted and providing area markets with a variety of fresh catches. Currently, one of your best bets for locally caught fish is halibut. This species is actually the largest member of the flounder clan--any of more than 300 species of bottom-living flatfish.

First, the fish died. Just days after Israeli airstrikes destroyed a power plant near the fishing harbor and sent a huge plume of oil seeping into the sea, Yahia Hamadi began seeing the sheen of their scales on the surface of the water. The ones that weren't dead were contaminated, the fishermen knew, and their poisoned eggs would produce no offspring next year.

Re "Panel draws line in the sea," Nov. 11 The article on the Marine Life Protection Area panel recommendations could have been more useful if it offered more facts and didn't merely present this as a case of fishermen vs. eco-preservationists. Many readers will be surprised to hear that the sportfishing community has been doing a lot to save the fishing populations and work with the system. Fishermen do want this to work. We use the ocean and the waters this law controls.

Louisiana lawmakers Tuesday threatened the Food and Drug Administration with budget consequences if the agency followed through on a plan to ban Gulf Coast oysters harvested during warm weather that are not treated with antibacterial technology. Industry advocates said that the FDA's plan would imperil 3,500 Gulf Coast oystering jobs by imposing heavy technology costs, and that the 15 annual deaths attributed to eating untreated raw oysters were not excessive considering the volume consumed.