Another unique course is called Seafood Buyers Tour, targeted toward people interested in sourcing products from Alaska. It will cover the diversity of the commercial fishing industry, species available, supply chains, management, product safety, merchandising, promotional ideas and shipping methods.

"Students will tour fishing ports and learn directly from the people catching and processing seafood. They will learn about the best ways to market that product to their customers back home," Myers said.

Both classes will be taught by well-known industry professional Steve Grabacki, and include participation by a wide range of experts. They run five weeks, with one week spent on the Anchorage campus.

A third class, back by popular demand, focuses on getting products to customers in top condition. Emerging Trends in Seafood Logistics will be taught again by Oliver Hedgepeth, director of UAA's logistics department. He said Alaska has a pretty good handle on transportation methods, but new trends in packaging and electronic tracking technology bring exciting new possibilities.

"Most people don't realize that 30 percent of all perishable products are damaged in transit or arrive no good at all. If we can use new ways to cut that down by just a few percentage points, it adds up to a lot of money for Alaska fishermen. Those are the key things we're looking at," Hedgepeth said, adding that he will also customize shorter courses as needed.

UAA is also launching a new "business incubator" next spring for entrepreneurs in seafood and other ventures.

"For any folks out there with good ideas, we have a space for them to do a start up business project and we'll help them get it going," Myers said.

Questions? Contact tmyers@cbpp.uaa.alaska.edu or afwoh@cbpp.uaa.alaska.edu.

Copper River might be best known for its famous salmon, but studies on other species provide important clues to the region's overall ecology.

"One of the things we're finding is that delta estuarine waters are very important nurseries for a variety of bottomfish species and Dungeness crab," said Mary Anne Bishop, a research ecologist at the Prince William Sound Science Center.

To learn more about the Copper River delta's bottomfish community, scientists over the past three years have tagged about 800 starry flounders, halibut and stag horn sculpin. It's part of a much larger biological observation project looking at the overall ecology of the delta's estuarine waters. Only four of the bright yellow or red tags have been returned so far, and researchers hope to get more by the time the study winds down next year.

"The tagging study will give us information on how fast the fish are growing, their movements and the nutrients that feed them," Bishop said, adding that flounders make up the largest flatfish stock on the delta, followed by sculpin.

Until now, no research has been done on the region's many bottomfish species. "Anything we do out there is new," she said.

Bishop said the observation project will also provide important information in case of an oil spill. "We want to be able to predict what would happen to this environment if there was a pollution event, or predict what's going to happen with climate changes from global warming, glacier melting, those kinds of answers," she said.

The research project is sponsored by the PWS Oil Spill Recovery Institute and the Exxon Valdez Restoration Project.

Alaskans had a rare chance on Aug. 25 to give direct input to a top official on the U.S. Farm Bill, which authorizes programs under the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Since fishermen are now officially classified as agricultural producers, they can push for the inclusion of seafood in more USDA programs, such as school lunches or baby foods.

USDA deputy secretary Chuck Connor held a "listening session" at the Palmer train depot to get input on the Farm Bill, which is revised every five years. The new Farm Bill is set to be implemented in 2007.

With a fiscal year 2006 budget of $94.6 billion, the USDA is the government's premier food agency.

Get more information at 907-761-7738 or at www.usda.gov/farmbill.