ROBERT WAKEFIELD BEGAN FISHING OUT OF CRESCENT CITY ON THE northern California coast in 1977 and soon decided he wanted a boat of his own. By 1979, he had become the owner of a small wooden boat, and has worked his way through several more over the last 40 years. His son Troy started fishing with him in 2007, and went full time in 2009. Since then, they’ve fished primarily for Dungeness crab and prawn and trolled for salmon on an older wooden trawler. Robert still appreciates the lines of a traditional design, but he has done his fair share…

Fisheries scientists from Russia, the United States, Canada, Japan and the Republic of Korea gathered virtually at Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk on Russia’s Sakhalin Island this past week to ponder the status and redistribution of Pacific salmon stocks.During the Feb. 19 gathering participants agreed to continue monitoring the migrations of these fish, and to intensify the study of their marine life to improve the accuracy of forecasts, the website Fish Information & Services reported. FIS, which produces daily reports, is widely considered to be the standard for global seafood industry information on the Internet.Ilya Shestakov, the head of Russia’s Federal Fisheries Agency, noted…

Trident Seafoods resumed operations at its Akutan processing facility on Feb. 19, in the wake of a COVID-19 outbreak that had put work there on hold since Jan. 21.Trident has taken additional steps to combat future COVID-19 risks there, including redesign of shift and break schedules to limit close contact and capacity limits to allow distancing in all areas outside of workstations.115 employees who were quarantined in Sand Point and Anchorage have returned to Akutan to participate in crab and Pacific cod processing at a crucial point in the season and to prepare for Pollock processing to resume this week.Trident…

NOAA Fisheries has taken under consideration four recommendations from the North Pacific Fishery Management Council for emergency or expedited changes to federal fishing regulations made in early February by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council.The first motion would allow for temporary transfer of catcher vessel halibut and sablefish individual fishing quota (IFQ) for all individual quota shareholders for the 2021 fishing season.The second would move the start date of the 2021 Central Gulf of Alaska Rockfish Program fishery from May 1 to April 1.The third motion would remove vessel use cap regulations for IFQ halibut harvested in the International Pacific…