Course of Norwegian fisheries in week 6

Record week for herring outside Møre, good capelin fishery in the Barents Sea and the first blue whiting for the season caught west of Ireland, reports www.megafishnet.com with reference to Norges Sildesalgslag.

Norwegian Spring herring
Good weather and large quantity of herring in the ocean yielded a record week with a total of 61 900 tonnes. This is almost 13 000 tonnes more than the previous record for a week this winter, Wednesday was the big day with over 17 400 tonnes reported in.
Purse seiners have contributed with 26 300 tonnes, the coastal vessels with 18 600 and 6 200 from the trawlers. Foreign vessels have been very active outside the 12 nautical miles border and caught 10 900 tonnes. This is a historical high for foregin vessels in this herring fishery.

Beside the fishing outside the Møre coastline we have also seen a few catches outside Sogn. This could indicate that the herring is heading for Ryfylkefjordene this year also. The catches outside Træna totaled just over 8 000 tonnes.

The size of the Norwegian spring herring is still variable. We have seen a 100 grams difference of the 220 grams herring caught by Træna compared to the 325 gram fish the vessel "Sheanne" got at Buagrunnen. The average size for the week landed at 283 grams.
Prices are still strong for mid-feruary. Highest action prices was NOK 5,27, lowest 3,85. Average for the week was NOK 4,66.

We are expecting a lower quantity this coming week due to the fact that many vessels have reached their quotas and many of the larger purse seiners are heading for the Barent Sea and the capelin fisheries there.

Capelin:
"Svanaug Elise" was the first to catch capelin in the russian sector last week and more vessels have been active in the areas last week, In total we are seeing 23 catches totaling 32 800 tonnes. All catches are from the area of E 40° in the russian zone. The capelin is heading southwest towards the Norwegian coastline.

The world market for fishmeal and fishoil indicate that demand is strong, hence all but three catches have been delivered directly to Norwegian and Danish fishmeal factories. The price for the meal/oil actions have been from NOK 2,20 to 2,60. The final prices will be determined after the carious catches have been analyzed for fat percentage and fishmeal yield.

From the buyers of capeling for human consumption we are seing less interest so far this season compared to last year's. As mentioned only 3 of the 23 catches have been bougth for this purpose, at prices from NOK 2,30 to 2,40. Too much feed inside the capelin have caused problems with the quality and we have seen rejections of catches due to this matter. It is a known problem with the capelin caught this far east in the Barent Sea.

For the coming week we are expecting more vessels in this fishery. More purse seiners are heading towards the fishing ground as of now.

Blue whiting:
"Kings Cross" had the honour of the year's first catch with 400 tonnes. The catch was made north of "Porcupine Bank" outside the western area of Ireland.
The blue whiting quotas are at a historical low after this fishery got under way in the 1970s. this year the Norwegian fleet are only allowed 22 033 tonnes.

The low quotas combined with reports of a low degree of blue whiting in storage we are expecting high demands for blur whiting for human consumption purposes. A buyer in Killybegs bought the catch from "Kings Cross" for NOK3,00 per kilo.

Horse mackerel
Two irish vessels reported in 670 tonnes horse mackerel caught nortwest of the Hebrides. The sizes are from 230 to 370 grams. The prices fro, NOK 5,77 to 7,87.

There has been no mackerel landings in Norway last week. Just a few boats are in this fishery, in the area far southwest of Ireland. Unconfimred reports say 470-490 gram mackerel has been landed in Scotland at a very good price level.

North Sea herring:

1 600 tonnes of North Sea herring landed this week. 1400 tonnes was from a Norwegian trawler, the rest from two Scottish vessels. The price range was NOK 4,10 to 4,35.
In addition about 200 tonens were caught near the coast outside Sogn.