Outlook for fisheries in the Russian Far East in June 2008
Just like in the previous years, in June 2008 in the Bering Sea and in the East Kamchatka zone the fishermen will continue trawl fishery of Alaska pollock based on small local spawning concentration and the stock migrating from eastern part of the sea as the water gets warmer, fishery sources in Vladivostok told http://www.fishnet-russia.com/ (https://www.fishnet.ru/).
As the water has been warming more slowly than usual, the APO migration from the East Bering Sea shelf is expected to grow slowly. Active feeding of large Alaska pollock is forecasted in the inshore zone of the fishing area where small and middle Danish seine fleet can conduct efficient fishery of Alaska pollock. Catches are expected to contain up to 50% of cod.
In June the activity of Danish seine fishery in the Anadyr Navarin area is traditionally high. On the bottomfish grounds catches are forecasted to be dominated by flounder.
Commercial salmon fishery will begin with sockeye runs to the spawning grounds. In the recent years in the West Bering Sea zone sockeye has approached the spawning grounds earlier and the harvest of the species by the end of June 2008 is expected to account for one half of the total abundance of the stock running for spawning during the season. In the Petropavlovsk Komandor subarea the expected catches of sockeye may account for 70% of the allowable harvest. In the basin of the Kamchatka River of the above subarea the fishermen are forecasted to harvest 80% of the annual chinook limit by the end of June 2008.
In the Sea of Okhotsk already on 8-10 June 2008 the fleet ceased roe herring fishery. The fishermen will be switching to cod, halibut, flounder, sculpins, grenadier, crabs, shrimps and whelks.
The first runs of sockeye in the south of the West Kamchatka are expected on 10-15 June 2008, though they are forecasted to be weak. In the course of the month the fishermen are forecasted to harvest no more than 1% of the TAC. Pink salmon and chum salmon are expected to approach to the north coast of the Sea of Okhotsk in the closing days of the month, the fishery usually starting no earlier than on 5-10 June.
In the basin of the Bolshoy River in Kamchatka poachers already started harvesting chinook.
In the Amur the pink salmon season is to start on 20s of June 2008. The runs of pink salmon to the inshore waters of the southwest fishing area of Sakhalin are forecasted to be irregular.
As per early June 2008, the fishermen were concerned by a potential collapse of the salmon season 2008. In Kamchatka the final decisions on allocation of the fishing sites and quotas in two areas were made as late as in the end of the first week of the month.
In the meantime, the concentrations of squid which were formed in the waters of the North Kuriles in May enabled the fishermen to continue successful operations in June. More specifically, the catch rates per tow are forecasted at 4-6 tonnes and 12-18 tonnes per ship daily.
As for other fishing areas the fisheries of particular species are not expected to differ from the situation in the previous month, probably only in number of the vessels operating on the grounds and the fishing gear used.