Copper River Salmon Season 2014 Kicks Off!

It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here!  Copper River Reds are here!  I don't know about you but I have been lucky enough to eat fresh salmon for the past few days now.  But, look at me, getting ahead of myself already.

The Copper River gillnet fishery opened up for a 12 hour period last Thursday, May 15th.  The weather was pretty nice as we all charged out the harbor floating on the excitement of the first opener of the season.

Anchored out the night before the 1st opener

The weather started off pretty decent for us, no wind, sunny and warm.  As the opener progressed, a westerly kicked up, making running west to home at the end of the opener a bit of a kidney buster.  All in all, though, not too bad of a day on the Flats.

The price started a little low then crept up through out the day as it became clear there weren't too many fish around.  I think we ended up somewheres just north of four bucks a pound for reds. We managed to scrape up a few fish and with the good price we get at the beginning of the season, even a few fish add up just fine.

We had a second opener on Monday, another 12 hour shot at the fish.  There were a few more fish around but not so, so much.  But again, the price held and so did the weather. 

There is usually a slough of media coverage around the beginning of the season and this year was no different.  Articles about fish and the price of fish have been popping up left and right.  Here is a great little video capturing a few of our local characters of the fishing fleet along with an article about the price of fish.  Simply click the links below.

Meet the Fleet


The story behind the $50/lb hype of Copper River salmon.

Copper River Salmon in Seattle & Anchorage


Too bad we fisherman don't get paid that kind of money!  But, we don't.Which is why we have to go out and do it again.  Speaking of, I'm about to do just that!  Fishing opens again tomorrow for a 36 hour period.  The fish counter has just gone crazy so we are getting lots of fishing time.  Wish us luck!

Scenes from the 2013 season

watchin' corks

steering station

Fishermen's bible aka tidebood

the fleet heading to the Copper River Flats, Cordova

Fog. This is actually a color photo!

Who me? Otter in the Harbor

Sunset Copper River Flats

Sitting on anchor

An ass kickin’ silver season

Which has really been more of just an ass kicker,  than ass kickin.  This past week especially, when not one but two storm systems swept through Alaska.  They gave the seas out west of the Aleutian chain 70-knot winds and 17’ seas.  They ripped through the Anchorage bowl earlier this week with 100+ MPH winds tearing out trees, flipping small planes and left 30,000 people without electricity.   Three days later, some 4000 homes are still without power (http://www.adn.com/2012/09/06/2613732/thousands-still-without-power.html).

NOAA's weather graph for 9/4/12

By the time these storms got to us on the Central Gulf Coast, Prince William Sound and the Copper River Flats, it was merely blowing a steady but relentless 40 knots or so.  Of course, this was Monday and there was a silver opener so guys and gals were out fishing.  Most fishing boats faired without too much harm, just tales of close calls of sailing down the channel while picking up the net, catching trees, snagging down and ripping up.  Most guys stayed inside the protection of the barrier islands instead of fishing out in the open ocean where seas were probably over 10 or 15 feet, at least.

The tenders, on the other hand, don’t have the luxury of staying inside.  Their deep drafts prevent them from running all the way to the east end of the fishing grounds inside so they are forced out into the open ocean.  Also, once they have fish on board, they are pretty much committed to getting those fish back to town.  So, come hell or high water, or both at the same time, they usually go. 

Tender Alaskan Pacific

 

One tender, the Alaskan Pacific can attest to that. Coming out of the Bering River, the east end of the fishing grounds, they took a “30 year wave” one that ages you 30 years in an instant.  That wave that broke out both front windows and knocked both guys out of their helm seats.  Their windows must be about 12 feet or so above the water line and they said two-thirds of this wave completely washed over them.  It probably would have flipped a bowpicker like a toy in the tub.  I don’t know what electronics it knocked out, but I know they were lucky enough that it didn’t drown the mains so they were able to come in under their own power.  A 65 nautical mile run in big seas and 40 knot winds with no front windows.  No thank you!  They made it to town all right patched themselves up with plywood and Plexiglas and went back out, in still shitty weather, to buy more fish for Thursday’s opener.  

Usually, it’s the little bowpickers that get their asses kicked, this week it was the bigger boats. 

bowpicker

The Sound Pacer, an 80 foot tender with a green skipper was following fellow tender Tamar into Soft Tuk on the east end of the Flats this last opener, a place where this skipper had never been, with this boat anyhow.   The boat hadn’t been there either this year so the GPS didn’t have any current track lines.  These channels change on an annual basis, so there are no current nautical charts and track lines need to be changed every season.

tender Sound Pacer (picture by Chris Salmon)

After a snotty crossing on the Flats they finally duck into Soft Tuk, missed the channel and promptly ran aground.   They dented in their keel coolers and over heated an engine while getting pummeled by breakers.  Breakers that ripped off their rudder and caused them to start taking on water.  Hopefully, this all happened to the same engine so at least they would still have one engine and could limp off the sand bar when the tide came in. 

View from Sound Pacer (picture by Chris Salmon)

Last I heard, which was last night, everyone was OK and the pumps were able to keep up with the incoming water. They were able to limp in under one engine and were up on the grid last night! 

But fishing boats weren’t the only ones getting their asses handed to them this week.  The Chenega, our 220’ ferry on the Alaska Marine Highway took a pounding last Sunday crossing Prince William Sound from Whittier to Cordova, with 50 Girl Scouts on board.  Evidently, everyone was seasick and they didn’t slow down while getting hit with wave after wave.  They took such a pounding that structural damage was caused!  As of yesterday, September 6^th, inspections reveals that further welding to the framing will be required to meet regulatory standards.  The vessel has been out of commission all week and the soonest estimated date of service is Monday, September 10^th.  We rely on the ferry for transportation of not only people, but also cargo (such as salmon) in and out of town, produce and groceries. 

You can keep posted on that at https://www.facebook.com/cordovabuzz?ref=ts

Lets just hope next week will bring better luck.  And weather. 

Reluctant fisherman or just reluctant to write

Until today, I have been a reluctant fisherman, or at least a reluctant writer.  As you may or may not have noticed, my blog has been nothing but photos the past few weeks.  This started out innocently enough, lack of sleep or time to write due to copious amounts of fishing time, cool photos seemed the perfect solution.  But, now that I am back on land and the storm of the season is over, I am still tempted to just post photos, again.  Then I decided to roll my sleeves up and try to figure out why.

I can’t deny there have been some rogue waves the past few months.  As some of you may know, my mom past away back in April after a yearlong battle with cancer.  Two days after the funeral, I hauled my ass cross country from Ohio to Alaska, some 4000 miles, driving 14 hours a day for 7 days straight to make the 1^st fishing opener in Cordova.

Fishing took off like gangbusters and it was full fart from the get-go with 48-hour openers and shitty weather to boot, kicking all of our asses the whole time.  (There were some fish caught, though.) This was about the time my now ex but then current boyfriend check out of my life so fast he left skid marks.  After getting our asses kicked on the Flats for a month, we heading to the Sound where we proceeded to put in 20-hour days, fishing over 500 hours in 32 days.  It takes you normal folks about 4 months to put in 500 hours of work; we did it in a month!  Again, we caught some fish and made some money but I won’t say it weren’t hard earned cake.   That last week I tweaked my low back the day before our biggest. Set. Of. The. Season!   Honestly, our net was sinking.  I took near fatal doses of Vitamin I (Ibuprofen) and moved around like Mr. Roboto to get through the pain.  I had to dose myself at each change of time to get through.  High tide, take two.  Low tide, take two more. 

But, now I’m back in town, my back is on the mend, and I’m back to mending gear.  Having weathered those storms, the forecast is looking good.  V10.  After 2 days of sunshine and 4 trips up the ski-hill, the tide has finally turned! I met self discipline (SD meet Jen, "nice to meet you" Jen meet SD, "grumble, grumble")  but I lost 5 pounds, I’m going to a Poetry Workshop in a few weeks held in my most favorite place in the whole wide world, McCarthy Alaska.  (Gearing up for Fisher Poets early this year!) I’m having fun flirting with a hot man from Anchorage, I’m applying for Writer’s Residencies and looking into going to Bali then hiking in Nepal and inquiring to be on some T.V. program I know nothing about (wish me luck!)  So, finally, I have something to write to all you about.  I couldn’t quite make myself do it until the tide had turned.

But hey, when a fisherman gets a water haul, she just turns around and sets the net out again. 

Catch as catch can

Some weeks are more crazy than others during the fishing season and this week is no.....shit, how does that phrase go?  Exception.  This week is no exception.  The grind of fishing has begun, along with that comes sleep deprivation and that 1000 yard stare.  I got both, I'm sure of it and, like I said, the grind has only started.  The worse is yet to come.  I stared at the computer screen for a good 2 minutes before I could remember what I was doing here.  Then I deleted the first 3 or 4 attempts at this week's blog.  Think I better just post some pix and shut up!  So, here goes.

Morning set at Egg Island

The tender anchorage at Egg

my view when we are running

The whistler, marking can at Egg Island.  Doe that can have a permit?

Das net, you can see a fish!

Sunset

Boat running south

Thea running east.  Go get 'em Thea!

crowded fishing grounds

Hey, its me.   Is it red right return or green right return?

Tenders at Whitsed buying fish

Fishin' the color change

The Cost of Fish

I started thinking of what to write about a few days ago when we were getting tossed around the Copper River Flats as it was blowing westerly, which makes for a lumpy ride.  I kicked around a few ideas in my head, jotted down some notes, as I frequently do.   And, as often the case, I started with one idea, then it took a life of its own and turned into something that I didn’t see coming.

What spurred this post was hearing buddy recall his weekend on the VHF radio.  He had gone out to eat at the Reluctant Fisherman, a restaurant here in Cordova, just to enjoy a nice meal.  But half way through his halibut he started getting pissed.

There were a couple of gentlemen at the table next to him lamenting that over the high price of fish, practically insulting fisherman. Typically a bad thing to do in a fishing town, but lucky for them my buddy isn’t the head-butting kind of fisherman.  He just quietly stewed as they went on and on about how expensive fish is, especially, compared to beef. 

I laid in my bunk that evening wondering if you could compare fish to beef.  Yeah, sure, farming is somewhat similar to fishing in that it is seasonal, dependent upon the weather and markets, guys are independently employed and the like.  Farmers, like fishermen, rely on their equipment to make their harvest, but, one difference I thought of at this point is while their ground remains mostly still, ours, the ocean, is ever in constant motion, bucking and surging.

Farming can be dangerous, growing up on one, I know this.  I knew a guy who lost his arm to an auger, another one got smashed when his tractor tipped over on him, my own Dad once kicked a pig and broke his toe (long story).   So yes, there are some similarities with farming and fishing, but still,  I’m not really sure you can compare the cost of beef to salmon. 

In a fisherman’s defense, let me just say a little about our costs.  For starters, if you wanted to buy into the gillnet fishery here on the Copper River, a permit would cost you about $180,000.  A boat would run you, oh, depends what you get, but anywhere from I’d say $75,000 to $150,000 to get a decent starter boat.  $300K + to have one built.  Then you need a net, $5,000 for that.  Hope you don’t need to replace it. Or an engine.  Or a jet or outdrive.  Fuel is around $5.00 a gallon, you need that.  Plus boat insurance, raingear, something to eat, to name a few.

Then there are other costs too, unforeseen costs, like, for example my buddy Dennis, who put a gaff hook through his foot by accidentally stepping on it.  Went right through.  Woke up in the morning, out on the fishing grounds, with that dreaded red line running up your leg, tell tale sign of blood poisoning.  Better get to hospital before that hits your heart. He was out a few fishing periods but is better now.  Though Dennis had another scare last opener when he broke down near the breakers.  The tender Saturn, a beautiful old 80’ wooden boat came to the rescue to tow him out. But somehow, as the towline went out from the Saturn to the Hang Fire, Dennis’ boat, the deckhand on the Saturn got caught in the bight of the line.  She went over with the towrope.  Into the 48 degrees ocean near the breakers.  Lucky for her, it wasn’t still blowing 40 knots at the time.  The wind was clocking around and was blowing about 10 out of the west, with 2-4 foot seas.

Dennis threw her a life ring, but missed.  She was able to reach the towline and walk her self up it, hand over hand.  Ralph, the skipper of the Saturn, ran to the stern to grab her and help her aboard.  He got there, clutched her jacket and yelled at the crew to take the boat out of gear. 

By this point, we heard something was going on and tuned into the VHF channel everyone listens to on the grounds, channel 6.  Just then we heard Dennis scream over the radio “Goddammit, she can’t hang on much longer!”  There was sheer panic in his voice.

Just then, the gal fell back into the water.  Turns out, the crew inadvertently hit the wrong lever and instead of pulling the boat out of gear, push the throttle forward to wide open.  Neither Ralph nor the gal could hold on and she fell back into the water.  She went under a few minutes this time and no one could see her.  She ended up travelling under water under the Hang Fire and popped up about 150 feet away.  Luckily, Dave on the Rocky Point had heard the commotion and started to run over there.   When she came up, he as able to scoop her up out of the water and bring her aboard his boat.  Though I’m sure a little banged up and shaken up, I heard the gal is OK.

So I got to thinking, how do you figure that into the price of fish?

A few weeks ago the tender St. Joseph with a crew of 5 was crossing the Gulf of Alaska coming up from the Seattle area to Cordova to work the season.  In 20-foot seas the boat lost it’s steering and the crew had to abandon ship.   They had made the MAYDAY call with enough time for the Coast Guard chopper to come get them and bring them safely to town.  The boat though, washed up on shore some 80 miles southeast of here and is breaking apart with each wave.  The weather has been too severe to make a safe rescue of the ship.

How do you figure that into the cost of fish?

A few months ago, fellow fisherman and blogger Tele Aadsen who write Hooked (www.nerkasalmon.wordpress.com) posted an old article from the Portland Oregonian in one of her blog posts entitled the “the Price of Fish”.  I copied it here for you. 

The Price of Fish

“The deep sea fishing boat ‘Republic’ will never sail out for the tuna again, nor for the salmon – out of Astoria into the green swells from westward. Part of her bow has drifted ashore near Long Beach, and some of the forward deck – and where the hulk of her is, only the sea can tell. Her last port of call was the storm. And the fishermen who sailed her, and looked to her fishing gear, and harvested the sea? Where are they? Perhaps the gulls know, or the cormorants. Only this seems certain – that they and their boat will fish no more.

You walk through the market and glance at the fish stalls heaped with limp silver. Only a day or so ago these fish, most of them, were out where ‘the low sky mates with the sea.’ Now they bear price tags. Even fish, so we say, is high priced. That is true. Fish are high priced – and the least of the price is reckoned in coin.

Men who would rather fish at sea than work ashore sail out on the fishing boats to seek and follow the fish. It is a glad, hard life, and they love it well – but they stake their lives on the catch. It isn’t often that the boats don’t come back to port, for their oil-skinned skippers and crews to shout to their friends on the dock with word of their luck – but sometimes they don’t. The ‘Republic’ was one that didn’t. And how are you going to figure that into the price of a pound of fish?”


Good question, how do you factor men’s lives into the price of fish?

When we were out on this last one, we heard about the tragedy on the Northern Mariner, a boat that was making a long-line trip for halibut out of Cordova.  Among the crew was a young man of 34, Sean Johnson, on board.  I don’t know the whole story,  but sometime during the trip Sean had hit his head.  He complained of a headache and went below to sleep it off in his bunk.  When the crew tried to wake him a few hours later for his wheel watch, he was dead. 

Again, how do you figure that into the price of fish?  


My heart goes out to the friends, family, and loved ones of Sean Johnson and to all of those he left on shore.   The season's over, its time to go home.

All fisherman are liars

East coast fisherman Linda Greenlaw had it right when she stated, “All fisherman are liars.“  I tell you, fishermen are physically incapable of telling the truth, the whole truth and nothin’ but the truth, so help us cod. It’s in our DNA. Fisherman does two things.   We lie about the amount of fish we catch, the amount of fish we don’t catch.  We lie about where we caught them and when and how we caught them. We lie about how big it was…or wasn’t. We catch fish and we lie. 

So when asked if this blog is true, true to form, I answered, “as true as any fisherman can tell a tale.”  I stick to that.  Having said that, some names that I use in my blogs have been changed in order to protect the innocent, or the guilty, whichever the case may be.   Being that I’m talking about fisherman, the latter is probably more often the case.  Having said that, I want to revisit my disclaimer, which I wrote when I started this blog a few years ago, which is, as follows.  Here goes: NOT ALL THIS IS TRUE!  In fact, none of it may be true at all.  Or, a little may be true or true-ish. Or, it may have actually happened, but years ago.  You decide.  So, when I poke fun at the skipper or tell a story about a trip, or whatever, I may not be talking about the current trip, or even the current season.  You pickin’ up what I’m puttin’ down?  This blog is for entertainment purposes only and the scuttlebutt is all in good fun.  OK, just needed to clarify since I live in a small town and rumors fly and someone just gave me a pillow that said, “Be nice to me or you’ll end up in my novel”. 

Having said that, I do really fish.  Honest.

In fact, fishing has been pretty good this year on the Copper River so far.  Near record runs have the counter going like crazy.   The count to date is 306,816 fish up the river verses and anticipated 129,500. The next opener is for 48 hours on Thursday, May 31.

The last opener, which was Monday, though a bit slower than the rest, was still pretty good, even if the weather did turn to shit.  East 35.  Rain. .  “A hair parter” according to my buddy Philbert.  The forecast isn’t any nicer for this next one, either.  E 45 seas 13 feet. I ran into my other buddy Lyle and said, “Yeah, did you hear the forecast?  45.”  “45 degrees?”  Asked Lyle.   Valid question being that is been hovering around the mid- 40s for the past few days. “Both.”  I said,  “It is 45 out right now but its supposed to blow 45”.  That’s not going to be much fun.  Its never a good time when the temperature is the same as the wind speed.  A good diet plan though.  It will be too sloppy to cook, might be too sloppy to eat and what you do eat might re-visit ya anyhow.  That South Beach diets got nothing on the Copper River Flats diet.  Between that and the cold weather, the pounds should fall right off.  I know I’ve been freezing my butt off lately, though more figuratively than literally.  45 degrees is colder than I experienced all winter!  I’m not acclimatized being that I spent my winter sailing in Florida.  As a matter of fact it’s colder in this house than it was all winter in Florida.   My emergency Patagonia order arrived just in time.  I had to order a warm vest, ski socks and fleece hoody, then I trotted down to Copper River Fleece (http://www.copperriverfleece.com/hoodiefemale.html) and picked up another spare fleece hoody just in case to go with my long johns, hat, multiple jackets and liners for my gloves.  I think I’ll get some of those hand warmers, too.   Yes, it is that cold out there.  Between the wind and the rain and the cold fish and the cold ocean. Brrr.  I know it’s been hot around the country and has been in the 90s in Ohio so it probably hard to imagine that we still have snow and did I mention cold? There’s nothing too much worse than picking cold fish with ice-cold hands.  Kind of makes the process a bit more unpleasant.  Honestly.

What do fish prices and anvils have in common?

With three openers under our belts the fishing season here is starting off with a bang.  The first opener, which was 12 hours, the fleet caught 155,000 sockeye salmon verses an anticipated
32, 000 according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) www.adfg.alaska.gov and the price was pretty high at $4.00 a pound!  Not as many kings as anticipated were caught, 1,100 verses an anticipated of 2,100, but at $6.50 a pound, we’ll take it!  The sonar is clicking away steady, counting fish up stream that are returning home.   The cumulative count, as of May 23^rd is more-less on track at 17,184 with an anticipated count of 18,418 fish. 

Tender and gillnetters out on the fishing grounds

Monday’s opener turned out to be a good one, too, except for the fact that the price dropped like an anvil in a Road Runner Cartoon.  But the weather was nice and there were a few fish around.  The fleet caught 219,000 reds.  That is huge!  The anticipated catch was 94,000 reds.  1,300 kings were caught verses an anticipated of 3,455. The price is still shaking out and there are a few discrepancies between canneries, like one offering $3.10 a pound for sockeye and the other offering $1.75.  That’s a big price difference.  We’re still waiting to see if the low ballers are going to come up on price or how on that. 

Tender out on the fishing grounds

I just got in from another 12-hour opener, our third of the season.  It started out pretty sloppy out there, not much wind but tide running against the current, seemingly both against the wind.  Just made it lumpy.  My guts took a beating when we ran.  Nothing too bad, but you certainly couldn’t make Eggs Benedict.   That’s how I gauge how bad the weather is out there.  Is it a peanut butter and jelly day or can I make an actual sandwich?  Can I fry an egg or will it end up paper thin and the complete diameter of the pan?  Crepes are probably a good thing to cook out there on a snotty day, the thinner the better, right?  I was working on a tender one summer and tried to bake a cake.  For some reason or another, we had a port list.  And the cake, you guessed it.  Lemon list cake.  One side was about a half in high and the other was 3.  Anyway, I digress. Like I said, I'm writing this after the fishing opener.  I'm still rocking.

The price dropped again for reds (sockeye) to $1.30 a pound! I think that's lower than it went last year and this is only the 3rd period!  Wouch!  That is what I heard anyhow maybe it will come up.  But I’m curious.  What are you guys paying a pound at the store?  And where?  Do tell!

Rain-gear blowout.  I thought I felt a draft....

I drove through the Yukon and all I got was this lousy metal shard in my tire

Metal shard in my tire

 Lucky for me, I stopped and got it fixed before I had a flat tire in the middle of the Yukon in the middle of the near blizzard I was driving in.  But, I'm getting ahead of myself.

The Yukon, near the AK border, May 7, 2012

Fishing season is upon us!  It starts next week actually, we got a 12 hour opener May 17th for the Copper River.  Fish on!  The fish buzz is in the air as we all gear up for yet another season.

It was time to make my way back up to Alaska after visiting family in Ohio.  I packed up the car and headed north.  Well, west first, around Chicago then north. 

I entered Canada from North Dakota, drove across the plains with their lovely old wooden grain elevators and their old farm equipment turned into statues and endless fields.  And, of course, their larger than life statues of Paul Bunyan and a disturbingly large beaver statue about 25 feet tall.

Once I hit Edmonton, the road goes more north again and skirts the mountains.  The landscape become more rustic along with the buildings.

Camp ground in Fort Nelson where it costs $37.00 to pitch a tent.  Showers are extra.

Who knew they even allowed guns in Canada

Rustic justice. 

 I also saw a picture of a revolver that said "we don't call 911". 

 Soon, if you are not shot first, you are passing more wildlife of the roads than cars.

Stone Sheep in BC & Yukon

Caribou, aka Boo

Stone sheep 

Ewe

Wild bison littered along the highway

Boo

Moo

Little black bear in the Yukon

More boo outside my window

In between dodging wild animals on the road, snow storms and metal shards, I did get to enjoy some local R&R at Liard Hot Springs in BC and local sign post forests like this one outside of Whitehorse.

Sign Post Forest of the Yukon

Liard Hot Springs

Some of the drive was just breath-taking, like this lake the just disappears into the mountains and the road, that goes right through it.

BC

After 4000 miles and about 8 straight days of driving, I made it to Alaska.  Ah, it was good to be home where there are glaciers along the side of the road.  And planes parked at rest stops, also along side of the road.  How did it get there?

plane parked on turn-out along the Glenn Highway

Matanuska glacier

Tune in next week to hear all about the Copper River's first opener of the season.

Until then, eat fish, live longer.