By Margaret Bauman
Alaska Journal of Commerce

Blustery spring weather was socking the Togiak area, 67 miles west of Dillingham in Southwest Alaska, as fishermen prepared for an anticipated 2006 harvest of nearly 26,000 tons of herring.

Tim Sands, the state's area biologist for herring and salmon for the west side of Bristol Bay, said he was projecting the fishery to open sometime between May 3 and May 6, although the last couple of years it opened about April 28. The season generally lasts around 10 days, he said.

Several processing companies that work the fishery paid between $100 a ton and $150 a ton a year ago. They likely will be paying about the same this year, as demand for herring roe as a traditional gift in Japan continues to decline, said Clyde Sterling, vice president of Alaska production for Peter Pan Seafoods.

In its heyday, herring fisheries were worth in excess of $50 million, but now their value is less than $10 million, state officials said.

"The young people in Japan are not eating herring roe," Sterling said in an interview April 26. "The attitude is, if it becomes a big loser, we will quit doing it. (Right now), it is a just a break-even situation for everybody. It gives work to tenders, fishermen and processors on the boats, but the glory days of the roe herring fishery are gone."

Sterling said even if the herring season is no longer lucrative, it does serve another purpose.

"We are providing (fishermen) another market so they will stay with us for salmon," Sterling said. "It's good business. We want these guys to fish salmon for us."

Margaret Bauman can be reached at margie.bauman@alaskajournal.com.