EXCELLENT BLUE WHITING FISHING FOR NORWEGIAN FLEET

Excellent blue whiting fishing for Norwegian fleet

By Kenneth Garvik

Norwegian pelagic sales group, Norges Sildesalgslag, reports that there has been fantastic blue whiting fishing in the west, and mixed herring fishing in the north.

From 22 different boats, 43,800 tons of blue whiting have been fished. All catches are taken in International waters west of Ireland. Fishing here has been particularly good, with the boats reporting dense “spots” of blue whiting. Most of the boats have loaded up after a few trawl tails and in a record short time. What is unusual this week is that there has also been good weather there in the west of the “blue marsh”, where there is normally low pressure in line at this time.

This year’s blue whiting quota is 305,000 tonnes, and 73,000 t has now been fished. All this is taken in International waters. In the coming week, even more boats will participate in this fishing, and we can hope for good availability in a couple or three more weeks there west.

For NVG (spring spawning herring there was a mixed fishery in the north. A total of 15,400 tonnes have been caught. The best day was last Wednesday with 8,300 t. Otherwise, there were days without registrations due to bad weather on the herring field.

Of this week’s quantity, ring nets have contributed 7,100 t, trawl 2,600 t, coast 1,700 t, and from four foreign boats we have 4,000 t.

The herring are staying far north this winter. The fishing last week has taken place from the west of Vesterålen and further south on the west side of Lofoten and down to Trænadjupet this weekend. Last year in the same week, the southernmost catches were outside Sklinna, and we got the first catch at Møre on 28 February.

In relation to sizes, we fish for herring that have come from the north (2016 year class) and on larger herring that have come in from the Norwegian Sea, or mix of these. The average sizes range from 273 grams as the lowest to 358 grams as the highest average. The weighted average for the entire quantity is 318 grams.

From the buyers who buy herring, there is excitement about the roe share in the herring. Fishermen report up to 20% of roe. The catches landed during the week have so far not contained fully mature roe for the best herring roe markets.

In the coming week, there will be a number of boats in activity on the herring. And hopefully the herring will be pulled southeast to the area southwest of Træna. In the latter part of the week, storms have been reported that will hamper herring fishing.

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