By Laine Welch
For the Journal

British Columbia policy makers at a summit last week urged Canada to approve fish farms along the province's coast. Liberal party members called on the federal government to speed up the approval process, which now takes three years and, according to the Canadian Press, "discourages investment." The group also voted down a resolution that would ban fish farms from areas traveled by migrating wild salmon.

Party member William Belsey said aquaculture companies need the freedom to rotate farm sites every two years, and that allowing them to do so will actually protect the environment.

"The practice is a must for land farmers if they want to avoid blight. We see parasites, we see disease, we see a buildup on the bottom of these pens," Belsey said.

Aquaculture outfits are having a hard time getting more sites approved, said Mike Hunter of Nanaimo. "Fish farming is controversial. There's a lot of debate out there and a lot of facts aren't understood. But irrespective of all that, I think in this country, when it takes the federal government three years to approve a site, that's unacceptable. This is an economic opportunity we haven't fully exploited."

The move comes at a time when close to 48 salmon farms are being converted for sablefish, or black cod, farms. Sablefish is one of the most lucrative wild stocks for both British Columbia ($30 million) and Alaska fishermen ($107 million).

The auditor general of British Columbia along with Gov. Frank Murkowski recently urged Canada to delay the start of sablefish farming until proper precautionary measures are in place. Murkowski points to risks of disease, sea lice, inbreeding and predation on wild stocks that migrate between the two countries.

"Last year, (Canadian) Premier (Gordon) Campbell promised that issues associated with fish health, escapes and wastes are being addressed in advance of the development of sablefish culture industry" said Eric Wickham, director of the Canadian Sablefish Association. However, approximately 40,000 farmed sablefish from Sablefin Hatcheries were transferred to at least two farm sites on Saltspring Island in August - ahead of any regulations for sablefish farming.

Growers project it will take two to three years to raise each crop of market-ready sablefish at a farmed cost of $1.67 per pound. Within five years, they expect to produce about 14.5 million pounds for market.

Meanwhile, a report by the University of Washington claims that adding just 1 million pounds more to the world sablefish market would drop the price to fishermen by 60 percent. For Alaska, that would mean going from about $3.40 to $1.15 a pound.

"Sablefish is one of the best managed and successful fisheries in the world. It's insane to be risking it," Wickham of the Canadian Sablefish Association said.

An end to killer whales' free lunch?

Killer whales rob huge numbers of fish from longline gear in the Bering Sea. Working in packs, they seem to converge on certain boats, then simply pluck the pricey black cod and turbot off the hooks, leaving only the lips. Fishermen refer to it as getting "whaled."

For years researchers and fishermen have speculated that it is the signature sounds of boat engines that attract the whales. Now, a team from a small firm in Anchorage believes the culprit could be the sounds and vibrations from the lines themselves.

"When the vessel is pulling up the line, it causes low frequency vibrations and the line acts as a transmitter of this frequency," said Alex Kulinchenko of Scientific Fishery Systems, or SciFish. For the past year, armed with a $50,000 grant from the Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation, SciFish has been doing acoustic studies aboard the F/V Prowler in the Bering Sea. Listening underwater, the scientists have learned that longlines being spooled back on deck sound like the plucking of a very large guitar string; and boat engines with a low signature frequency of 230 hertz seem to draw the whales.

The fact that only certain longline vessels seem to attract killer whales is what prompted the acoustic research. Once a whale scout would locate a boat, the researchers would hear lots of vocalizations, and more whales would appear. Up to three dozen might work together to gobble up the catch before it is pulled on board. One full grown killer whale can eat 550 pounds of fish a day.

"The problem is we are conditioning a generation of whales to subsist off of longline fisheries," SciFish director Patrick Simpson told the Journal in an earlier interview.

"We have not found the acoustic sounds - the dinner bell - that we can correlate with the whale activity. It is a work in progress. If we can locate the sounds, the next step would be to eliminate that attraction," Simpson added.

Kulinchenko believes keeping boats quieter could be the key to remaining whale-free.

"We've gotten reports from fishermen over the past 20 years who quieted their boats by using sound-absorbing or motion-control connections around the engine couplings, and did get to such low levels that the whales left them alone," he said.

Simply changing the way the boat engine is connected to the reel that is spooling the lines is one way to change the frequency. Kulinchenko said a control system that monitors the power of the engine and can automatically change speed is another way to change a boat's sound. Modifying the materials and style of the longlines would also reduce sounds and vibrations.

"If we can quiet all the boats so the whales can't hear them, they won't come," Kulinchenko said.

In the next phase, SciFish wants to try beating the whales at their own game by scaring them away. "We want to play the sounds of mammal-eating killer whales during a fishing operation, and hopefully, it would keep the fish-eating whales away from the lines," Kulinchenko said. He added that the toughest challenge is to reproduce the sounds so that they are perfectly natural.

"Killer whales are very, very smart and any attempts so far to try and trick them have failed," he said.

SciFish also wants to compare the sounds of boats that do not have trouble with killer whales with those that do. "We would like to discuss the possibility of working with them during our research," Kulinchenko said. For more information, contact SciFish at (888) 347-4764 or alex@scifish.com.

Aquaculture, Alaska style

Crops of oysters, mussels, giant rock scallops and clams are being grown in shellfish farms in Alaska. It's an industry that is showing steady growth and untapped potential.

To address that interest, a two-day conference is set for next month in Anchorage. The event will provide a detailed look at business opportunities and policy considerations for shellfish farming and enhancement.

Notably, the potential for crab aquaculture is on the agenda. "Essentially, it's looking at crab in a hatchery setting, reared to a certain level and then released and made available to crabbers. Work has been done around the world but it is not perfected. The point is to see if it's something that is feasible and valuable enough to put research dollars into," said Glenn Haight, fisheries specialist with the Alaska Department of Commerce, Community and Economic Development.

The state of Alaska this year provided nearly $1 million to boost aquaculture projects. It also launched a program to lease long-term sites to interested shellfish growers. Currently, there are 58 shellfish farms in Alaska - 26 are in Southeast, 17 at Cook Inlet, 14 in Prince William Sound and one on Kodiak. Of that, 29 are actually marketing their products, with sales (mostly oysters) topping $600,000 last year.

"There's a lot of room for growth, and the state is looking at what it can do to foster that growth," Haight said. He added that along with interested shellfish farmers, state and federal policy makers should also attend the conference.

Along with the state commerce department, the shellfish conference is sponsored by the governor's office, the University of Alaska Fairbanks Marine Advisory Program and the departments of natural resources and fish and game. Dates are Dec. 3-4 at the Anchorage Hilton. Register by Nov. 30 for $15. Contact Glenn Haight at (907) 465-5464 or glenn_haight@commerce.state.ak.us. More information is available at www.commerce.state.ak.us/oed/seafood/conference.htm.

Kodiak-based freelance writer Laine Welch can be reached via e-mail at msfish@alaska.com.