RobLL":3ejg3wyt said:
Incidentally, Copper River Salmon is a marketing device, and a marketing device at its best. They copyrighted(?) the name, developed regulations that go from catching the fish, immediate icing/processing, transporting it, and likely selling it.
You can count on the freshest fish possible when you buy. It is the way good ocean caught fish should be sold.
Not really. There is a Copper River Marketing Association, and they do set standards for the fishery, how fish are handled on the grounds and at the processor. The fishermen pay into this association to help market their fish and assure buyers of some standard of quality in handling. I know of some direct-market fishermen who do much more than those who sell to canneries.
And the treatment of the fish does make a big difference. For example, this particular resource is probably the best of the best, (
http://www.gulkanaseafoods.com) fish are actively bled by pumping saline through the fish's vascular system. It purges the blood from the fish instantly, and it is put immediately onto slush. The handling is a big part of the product, but the product itself is unique as well.
But Copper River Salmon are a fairly unique run for a couple reasons. First and foremost is the fact that the spawning tribs for the Copper River are WAY upstream, and the river puts out really high flow rates. So the fish travel a long way over the ground, and and about 10-100x times that distance through the water. The only other system that comes close is the Yukon, which is a longer migration over the ground, but not nearly so through the water as the yukon is a lazy river, and the Copper is not at all.
In order to make their spawning migration they pack on fat. MORE fat than chinook from other systems. I promise you that if we went gillnetting and got us a bona fide Copper River king and also got us one from another system that was passing through, ten minutes on the grill and you would be able to tell the difference easily. i have done this "pepsi challenge" numerous times, and am happy to do so again if
I'm not saying other chinook isn't great. But there is a reason beyond marketing, why the fish is priced higher than any other.
Halibut prices are, however, nuts. Fishermen are not super happy because the quota has been dropping for years and management has gotten very conservative due to issues with the population structure, and an over-abuindance of chickens coupled with a depletion of barn doors, which are the most productive spawning females. Things are beginning to turn around in southeast and around kodiak and the bering sea, but the north gulf of AK had its quota slightly reduced this year. With fewer fish allocated in the fishery, the laws of supply and demand take over and the price goes way up. I think things are starting to work though, and that the IPHC has done really well in figuring out solutions to some challenging issues regarding resource allocation and tension between sport, charter, commercial and subsistence users. In the end, some groups have shouldered more of the burden, especially in southeast, but we are seeing that stock rebound, and that population structure come back into something more ideal.
In the north gulf of AK I think arrowtooth flounder have expanded into the ecological niche of halibut and are getting more common as bycatch. This is likely the biggest issue at present for halibut stocks there, as arrowtooth flounder is not marketable without some chemical manipulation at sea to keep the meat from going to mush. So they are discarded. They make good bait though!
OK, that's about enough for now.
