Vol. 27, No. 11
November 2007
Gary Freitag has been hired as UAF Ketchikan MAP extension agent and associate professor of fisheries. Freitag is currently research and evaluation manager for the Southern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association, and he owns Oceanographic Services of Southeast Alaska, a firm that conducts environmental oceanographic, fishery, and marine mammal surveys. He is on the Pacific Salmon Commission and the NMFS Marine Mammal Stranding Network. He is also president of the OceansAlaska board. Freitag will start the MAP job in January.
Three Alaska Sea Grant–funded students recently defended their theses. Olav Ormseth's Ph.D. dissertation title is Reproductive Potential of Pacific Cod in Alaska. Ormseth's results suggest that female Pacific cod maximize fitness through increased egg production, not egg quality, and that their reproductive success is under strong environmental control. Maternal length and weight are excellent predictors of fecundity, but variability in egg size is not related to the age or size of females. Brenda Norcross is Ormseth's faculty advisor.
Renee Raudonis' master's thesis is Bacteria Associated with Paralytic Shellfish Toxin (PST)–Producing Strains of Anabaena circinalis. Raudonis looked at bacteria associated with six Australian freshwater cyanobacterial strains of Anabaena circinalis, three toxic and three nontoxic. The identity of bacteria associated with toxic cyanobacteria, and the role they play in paralytic shellfish toxin production, are unknown worldwide. Raudonis found that the bacterial communities were dominated by Proteobacteria. Gerry Plumley is Raudonis' major professor.
Sarah Manes' master's thesis title is Identifying Seasonal Changes in Photosynthetic Activity of Arctic Phytoplankton and Sea Ice Algae under Environmental Stress Using Pulse Amplitude Modulated (PAM) Fluorometry. Manes assessed photosynthetic activity of phytoplankton and sea ice algae from land-fast sea ice off Point Barrow. Her work strengthens the validity that the photosynthetic potential of arctic sea ice algae is mainly regulated by light limitations and salinity in winter and nutrient availability during the spring bloom. Rolf Gradinger is Manes' advisor.
MAP seafood specialist Don Kramer trained Russian fish processors and marketers in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky last month. Kramer's visit was part of an effort of the World Wildlife Fund and the UAA American Russian Center (ARC) to help Russians raise the level of quality of their seafood products for marketing within Russia, and to conserve fish stocks.
One of five U.S. presenters, Kramer focused on quality control systems in salmon processing. He used a Russian translation of Alaska Sea Grant's Care and Handling of Salmon as a handout, as well as translations of Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute publications. Thirty-six students participated.
At a local food market, Kramer saw a predominance of roe and cold-smoked seafood. He toured a processing plant that was producing a high-quality product, but says the Russian Far East seafood industry overall has work to do, to make good commercial use of their fish and control quality. While fish poaching is common there, a marketing survey shows that fish conservation is important to Russian consumers nationwide.
Thirty attendees at the North Aleutian Basin Energy/Fisheries Steering Committee meeting on October 19 expressed varied opinions on oil development in the North Aleutian Basin. The group began to plan a March 2008 public workshop for stakeholders to discuss whether oil and gas development can coexist with the valuable fisheries. Brian Allee, Alaska Sea Grant director, and Jan Sørnes, Bodø University professor, Norway, facilitated the October meeting.
Dan Sharp, fisheries biologist at Minerals Management Service, urged everyone to study and learn the procedures that could lead to development. The permitting process for exploration can be carried out between now and a 2011 lease sale, and under a hypothetical timeline, gas production could start in 2026, according to Sharp.
Gregg Nady, of the Shell Exploration and Production Company, believes the fishery can be protected by using advanced technology. Several community leaders from the area are cautiously optimistic, viewing the possibility of oil and gas development as an opportunity to hold onto their young productive citizens. In this camp are Stanley Mack, mayor of the Aleutians East Borough; Justine Gundersen of Nelson Lagoon; and Shirley Marquardt, mayor of Unalaska.
Offering another perspective, World Wildlife Fund's Bubba Cook said his organization is opposed to offshore exploration and development in the region. Bill Popp, who experienced oil and gas development firsthand on the Kenai Peninsula, warned that promises made about new jobs should be scrutinized carefully. Joe Childers of United Fishermen of Alaska said that fishing was definitely restricted in Cook Inlet after oil and gas development in the 1950s, and additional restrictions are created every few years.
At the end of the meeting, a subcommittee volunteered to plan the March public workshop. For more information see the Energy/Fisheries Web site.
The Alaska Seas and Rivers project unveiled the new curriculum Web site (http://www.alaskaseagrant.org/teachers) at the Alaska Math and Science Conference for teachers in Anchorage. Marla Brownlee, project leader, and several teachers presented two conference sessions and showed the curriculum on laptops at the Alaska Sea Grant booth. Four curricula are being piloted in classrooms now: At Home in the Water, grade 2; Rivers to the Sea and Back Again, grade 3; Case of the Missing Sea Otter, grade 4; and Humans and the Ocean, grade 5. An educator team is writing materials for grades K–1 and recruiting teachers for the June 2008 workshop at the Kasitsna Bay Lab to develop curricula for grades 6–8.
MAP agents Sunny Rice and Glenn Haight have initiated a twice-yearly newsletter, The Fish Entrepreneur, to strengthen communication with small catcher processors who do their own marketing. The first issue features an interview with the owners of Lofoten Fish in Southeast, who enjoy providing a high-quality salmon product. Also in the issue are articles on onboard inspection and using the ASMI brand.
The free newsletter was mailed to 800 registered Alaska business owners and posted on the MAP Web site. The Fish Entrepreneur is part of the Alaska Fisheries Business Assistance Project, Fi$hbiz, a seafood business training and educational program offered by MAP.
Glenn Haight, MAP fisheries business specialist, organized a session with Kevin Klair from the University of Minnesota Center for Farm Financial Management to train MAP agents on business management extension education. At the daylong seminar, seven MAP agents learned how to use financial management tools. With this added training the agents are better able to assist seafood business people in their communities with financial management and using Alaska Sea Grant's product Financial Statements and Business Calculations for Commercial Fishermen.
Kate Wynne was an invited attendee at the NMFS marine mammal Serious Injury Technical Workshop in September. The workshop focused on developing standards to determine when human-caused injuries to marine mammals should be considered lethal. NMFS uses the criteria to categorize all U.S. fisheries on their annual List of Fisheries. The Marine Mammal Protection Act mandates that each fishery be classified as having a frequent, occasional, or remote likelihood of incidental mortality or serious injury to marine mammals. Wynne presented a summary of the difficulties and subjectivity in assessing the outcome of large whale entanglements in fishing nets.
A scholarship will be created in remembrance of Alaska Sea Grant Advisory Committee member Frank Hill, to assist Native village students. Hill died in October after a lifetime of service in education to Native and rural Alaskans. He helped Alaska Sea Grant by offering support and advice, for four years. Donations can be made in Frank Hill's name, to the Education Foundation of the Bristol Bay Native Corporation, 111 W. 16th Ave., Suite 400, Anchorage, AK 99501.