Shrimp to the Gulf II, Senator Stevens, Photo info.

As I predicted, the demand for shrimp in the Gulf states is driving the prices up like the gas prices down there. If you could get your Alaska shrimp down there you'd probably do quite well.

A quote from the article: "The disruption to commercial fishing and shellfish operations in the Gulf of Mexico because of Hurricane Katrina is boosting prices for certain products, particularly oysters and shrimp, said Ed Robinson, vice president of Bar Harbor Seafood, an Orlando-based distributor."

This would be a good time for the Alaska Department of Environmental Quality to allow cooking on the decks of shrimp boats, just to get the shrimp moving south. I promise that the cooking pot will be covered in case any seagulls make a bombing run on the deck crew. Cookers use a lot more energy uncovered. The other necessity for this is that the Petersburg shrimpers don't have anyone to deliver their product to even if they didn't want to sell it to distributors themselves.

Well, my first article prompted Mark Vinsel, the Executive Director of the United Fishermen of Alaska, to call me and try assure me that they are actually doing something besides just express good intentions toward Gulf fishermen. It turns out a past AFDF Executive Director and another high energy type are doing the organizing. Mark figures that since the boats won't get out before the first of the year, they have a lot of time to organize collecting of old gear and equipment in the communities.

My daughter-in-law wanted me to send her an address of somewhere in the South to send some boxes tomorrow, bless her. She said a trucker was back-hauling to the South from the Midwest somewhere and he just announced he would be parked to take donations down. He stayed up all night and the next day loading stuff and took off with a 40 foot trailer full. The guy said government just takes too long. Well, duh.

Mark Vinsel of the UFA says the shrimpers in Petersburg would have to request their help through a local fishermen's organization for them to help. And even then he didn't know what they could do to offer the Southern markets shrimp, or help the idle Alaska shrimpers get fishing. Well, I guess if you haven't seen it done before you wouldn't know what to do. But this is where the rubber meets the road guys.

Like I've been saying, market changes move as fast as a hurricane sometimes, and any organization that professes to help fishermen needs to be structured to move just as fast.

Etcetera: The media seems to be playing politics again, as if it's the first time, not. If it's any consolation, and a bit enlightening, to Alaska's Senator Ted Stevens, the Anchorage Daily News started plotting something awhile back. My sister was a reporter for them after McClatchy bought the paper and she complained that she had to go to Saturday "philosophy sessions" that she wasn't compensated for. I don't know how McClatchy reconciles bashing Senator Stevens groundlessly and praying for our elected leaders. Unless they don't own a Bible, then they have more to worry about than a lawsuit.

The photo of the scalloper in a previous post wasn't taken by me, as all other pictures in this blog have been. I do reserve exclusive rights to all pictures of mine posted on this blog. If you have a picture that you like and want to share with others you can e-mail it to me as an attachment with a little story about it. I promise I'll use it sometime, even if I have to start another blog for all yours and my fishing pics. I'll credit you fully in the blog. My e-mail address is: careliftchairs@yahoo.com