Page 310 - Vacation Country Travel Guide

The Life and Logistics of an Alaskan Fish Tender Boat and Crew

Have you ever wondered just how your each season, which for them generally covers boats using gill or set nets. The fish are then
wild caught Alaska salmon and other seafood a full 90 days through June to September and constantly spit out the back of the unit for
is so very fresh and tasty? This story and occasionally into October if the late season hose transport up onto a long table for some
accompanying Travel Guide video, shot runs are strong. very fast sorting into red, silver and dog
onboard a fishing tender vessel waiting in salmon bins. The different species are each
Petersburg port to offload to the cannery, help automatically weighed once the bins are full
answer that question. One of the secrets lies and introduced into their holding tanks. Fish
in advanced technology, which allows tender “tickets” are issued to the working boats and
vessels to be directed by the cannery to exactly the catch is also re-weighed at the cannery.
where they need to be in order to seamlessly If the actual total is more than 1% over the
transfer the catch from fishing nets directly recorded weight, the tender vessel must buy
into their boat. Another factor in freshness those excess fish. The hold water is constantly
is the impressive system used to pump the monitored and graphed by automated high
fish onboard, sort them by species, dispose of tech “hobos” to insure the temperature never
bycatch, debris and excess water, weigh and See Video rises above the acceptable 29 degrees in
transport them alive and undamaged to the order to maintain excellent product quality.
hold, where clean seawater is recirculated by a While some “catcher” boats opt to
50-ton freon based refrigeration unit and kept transport their fish to the cannery themselves,
at exactly 29 degrees for the duration of the where they are offloaded before the tenders
trip back to the cannery. and paid “run money,” it can be a long haul
Tom Branshaw is the owner and operator of of commonly 14 to 20 hours, and fuel costs
the FV Northern Mariana tender vessel, which are high. Capable of carrying 20,000 gallons
he runs every season with his son-in-law Cole of fuel, the Northern Mariana burns 55 gallons
“Coldwater” Wasson. A fisherman for nearly The FV Northern Mariana is a mid-sized an hour while at sea to carry its payload of
his entire life, Tom has been transporting tender designed to service seine net fishing up to 290,000 pounds of salmon. At season’s
salmon to the canneries for 50 years. Cole boats, sucking the fish directly from the nets end, it’s off to the Seward shipyard for
splits his year between running the tender into a large diameter hose powered by a annual maintenance and repairs, often in the
with Tom, long line fishing with him for halibut vacuum system wet pump that fills the waiting $100,000 and up range. Watch our Travel
and black cod, and crabbing in the unforgiving canister with an astonishing 2000 pounds of Guide video to see for yourself just how much
Bering Sea. Together they bring in an average fish every 20 seconds. A completely different Tom and Cole value this exceptional life on the
of 7 million pounds of salmon to the cannery pumpless system is employed for fishing open waters of the Gulf of Alaska.

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