We have 300 pounds of Small Scales Seafood's Scrumptious Halibut ready to sell and ship to you! 

This is super top quality halibut caught by Kyle on a blustery day this fall. They were caught in the shallow waters of Kachemak Bay, AK on hook and long-line gear and hauled in by hand in an open skiff.  Due to the small-scale nature of our operation each line of gear sat for less than 3 hours before being hauled in and delivered to our processor.  All halibut were well bled upon landing and properly iced down.  The fishing yielded beautiful medium sized fish that are portioned into 8oz pieces.  (As fishermen we don't target the largest halibut because they are the main female reproducers.  A smaller fish is also more tender and tasty for you!)

This is as good as halibut gets, from the fisherman directly to you! 

Pricing:  We are selling this halibut in 10 pound shares.  Each share is made up of about twenty approximately 8 oz. portions individually vacuum packed.  *Price includes all packaging, overnight shipping, insurance.

• 1 share, (10 pounds) costs $290, or $29/lb
• 2 shares (20 pounds) costs $520, or $26/lb (the savings is in the shipping)
• (if you want more than 2 shares, please inquire about the cost per pound)

Shipping:  We will have our processor, Coal Point, ship the halibut overnight Fed Ex from Homer, AK.  We can ship up until 12/18 or anytime after 1/5, Monday through Thursday. To Order: Please send an email to emily@smallscalesseafoods with the following info.  We will confirm your order via email, have you mail a check, and set up the shipment!

1. Name
2. Physical Shipping Address
3. Phone Number (for shipping purposes)
4. Number of Shares
5. Preferred Shipping Date/s

  Halibut is a high value, sought after fish.  It's mild flavor and white flesh take well to marinades, grilling and rich dishes like our favorite, Halibut Olympia.  Halibut is allotted to fishermen on an Individual Fishing Quota, or IFQ, meaning that a fishermen owns a certain number of 'pounds.'  (This is unlike salmon where a permit allows you to catch as much as you can in one fishing period.)  Based on the health of the resource in each particular fishing area of Alaska a fishermen is then allowed to fish a percentage of his owned stock.  Currently we are allowed to fish only about 30% of our owned IFQ.  The fishery is restricted because a large portion of the population is growing very slowly.  This is the long explanation to why halibut currently costs a lot per pound!

We've been busy the last month with our new greatest project: Benjamin Harding Lints, born 10/10/14 in Brewster, WA.  Benjamin weighed 8 lbs. 10 oz and measured 21 inches at birth.  He is healthy and content and already proving to be a gentle soul.

We are so grateful!!!

We are spending the fall-spring back in the Methow Valley of WA.  We joke that the Methow is our calving ground and Alaska is our feeding ground.  Last week we bought boxes of winter storage onions and squash from a local farmer in Twisp.  The beauty and succulent taste of the onions is so incredible and so much better than what we buy at the grocery store.  Granted, we had to coordinate back and forth to arrange a pickup time and may have paid more than the non-organic, non-local store counterpart. It reminds us that buying directly from the producer is so much more rewarding in knowing who we are supporting and in the quality of the food.  We hope you feel the same about buying fish from us! We are doing our best to get back to customers but may be on a newborn sporadic schedule for a little while.  It's amazing how a little one can shake things up!  We have about 500 pounds of sockeye to sell before the end of the year and 300 pounds of halibut and will be in touch soon.  Thank you to all of you have already bought your Scrumptious Sockeye Salmon Shares this year.  We hope you are enjoying the scrumptiousness!

If you have any questions or changes to your order, please let me know.  We really appreciate your business and all of your word of mouth references that keep our little business running. We still have some Shares of portions available and a fair amount of Shares of fillets available.  Kyle is getting ready to fish halibut this week and we hope to offer some Halibut Shares in 2015 for the first time!  We'll keep you posted. On a side note:  There is a large scale mine proposed at the headwaters of Bristol Bay, where we now fish.  If you care about wild Alaskan Salmon and the many people who depend on it, please submit a comment to the EPA during the final comment period. Help protect a fishery that should last forever from a short sighted mine!  It takes 30 seconds. http://www.bristolbayunited.com/savebristolbay

Brock and JP with your Scrumptious Sockeye Salmon!

 

A few pieces of good news:

• Your fish is moving one step closer to your home as it makes its journey by freezer barge from Bristol Bay, Alaska to Seattle, WA.

Fillets are already in transit and beginning to arrive in Seattle.  Portions will begin the journey south soon.  Prices are being set as we speak.  Shipping options are being researched for our new business model this year.  Now that we have an idea of when fish will begin to be available in Seattle we can tell you that shipments will happen in September.  We will contact you in the beginning part of August with all pricing and shipping details.  Thanks for your patience as we do our best to learn a new game plan in Bristol Bay and do our best to get you top notch fish.

 

Kyle with a rare King Salmon

JP showing off his war paint (a.k.a. blood from all of the fish that he so diligently bled to get you top quality sockeye!)         

• Kyle, JP and Brock are all home safe and sound!

Kyle and JP returned to Homer, AK a week and a half ago.  Brock returned to Twisp, WA a little earlier after straining his arm.  There were still some fish to catch, but being short on crew and exhausted meant that safety was compromised.  Also, Kyle already had a great rookie season in a new fishery and was eager to get home to little Maggie and his pregnant wife. Proof of the many beautiful salmon caught- rubber boots covered in scales.

• We have some Scrumptious Sockeye Salmon Shares left in portions and a lot of availability left in fillets.

Thanks for sending people our way!  We will accept new orders through approximately the end of August.

Thanks to so many people for getting orders in!  We do still have shares left, so just let us know if you'd like some Scrumptious Sockeye Salmon this year. It's been a busy couple weeks for Kyle, JP and Brock aboard the Northland.  After waiting for the fish the arrive, the fish came on strong.  What was predicted to be a mediocre run turned out to be about 30% better than expected and Kyle's choice to drop his permit card in Naknek proved to be a wise one.  Alaska Department of Fish and Game regulates the fishery and decides when and where fishing is allowed.  With a lot of fish returning to the river boats were given two fishing periods a day and Kyle reported only having 2 one hour naps a day for a period of time and not knowing if it was day or night when awaking.  (It's still mostly all light up here in Alaska!)  For his first year in a new place Kyle is pleased with the fish he caught, whether battling it out on the boundary line of the district with all the big, fancy boats, or exploring for fish on his own up north in the sand bars.  Brock and JP asked Emily to ship out special knee pads so they could bleed each and every fish that came on board.  That's a lot of work to make sure we can offer you the best quality salmon! Sadly Brock re-injured an old rotator cuff tear and flew back to Washington this evening.  Thanks for all your hard work Brock!  We hope it heals up soon.  Kyle and JP are still fishing, waiting to see if more fish are on their way or if the run is over.  Some years the run is condensed and ends suddenly, while other years there's a long, steady decline. There are so many variables with fishing- from the weather, to the amount of fish that return, to how well your boat runs, to what's happening in the global market.  You never know until it's all over and then the speculation over the next year begins (yes, this is gambling at its finest ;).

An old Bristol Bay boat. Did we mention that the Bay was fished by sailboats in times of past!?

 

Kyle and crew left Homer three weeks ago and have been in Bristol Bay for almost 2.5 weeks.  Last minute preparations were made and early season fishing has been underway.  Last season the fish came early and many boats missed out on a large percentage of their season's catch.  So of course everyone showed up early just in case this year.  Turns out the fish didn't get the 'early fish' memo, so lots of boats have been lined up scratch fishing, only catching a little bit of fish in each opener. In the last few days the numbers of fish has slowly increased, so things should be starting to happen soon.  In Bristol Bay the first weeks of fishing are declared 'Free Week' and a boat can fish any district.  However pretty soon every boat has to drop their permit card in a specified district (Naknek, Egegik, Nushagak, Ugashik, etc.).  In order to switch districts you forfeit 48 hours of fishing, which can be critical in the peak days of the fishery.  It's a big decision to be made, especially for a first time Bristol Bay fisherman like Kyle. A lot of research and 100 times more speculation is put into what will happen in a fishery, and yet you never really know how it will all shake down until the season is over!  

(PS- Keep those orders coming!)

We know that some of you follow this blog to hear about us in general, so here's a quick photo update: We had a great winter in Washington, where the snow conditions were not at their best but surely better than coastal Alaska's!  (yes, we tried to stop being seasonal but haven't quite figured out how to kick the habit yet . . .)  Grandma Kathy "Rah Rah" enjoyed her time with Maggie. We had a nice Mexico get away.  The highlight for Maggie was for sure all the little dogs! Here's Maggie on one of her first fishing adventures, fishing for little Bonita by kayak.  (She still signs the story of how Mama had the fishing line tied to her toe, screamed, tried to pull the fish in and lost it!).  Did we mention we're expecting another baby this fall!! We recently escaped from boat work for a little biking adventure in Denali National Park.  It was complete with snow most days, bears and sheep. Maggie (now 18 months) learned how to use her very own sleeping bag! On a more serious note, in the midst of little girls growing up and babies growing in the belly, Emily's stepdad, Dave, died this April.  It's still a shock and we miss his presence.  He was a kind, giving man who lived a full life and even helped drive your fish around last summer.  We love you Dave.

• Payment will still be by check at the end of the season once prices are set.
  • (The Salmon market is changing a lot lately, so we can't speculate about prices yet. Last year prices were $15.20/lb for a 25 pound Salmon Share and $13.90/lb for a 50 pound share.  Fillets will be slightly cheaper.)

Please contact us if you have any questions about our Small Scales Seafoods Scrumptious Sockeye Salmon Shares for 2014 and get your order in soon!

The Northland fishing Upper Cook Inlet 2013.

 

Kyle has flown north to Homer, AK to start boat work for the 2014 season.  With summer right around the corner we wanted to give everyone some updates:

• This winter we sold our Upper Cook Inlet Drift permit and bought a Bristol Bay Drift permit!  (We've long considered switching to the Bay and decided to make the plunge with permit values approaching each other and the political scene in Cook Inlet getting more and more volatile . . .)
• We will still be offering some great Small Scales Scrumptious Sockeye Shares, but our distribution and exact product will be a little different this year.  (More details to follow shortly.)
• On the personal, non-fishy note, our little girl Maggie is almost 1.5 years old and we're expecting another munchkin due end of September.  Rita is happily living with a new non-kid family, Dakota passed away last summer and Sassy is going strong.

As always, thank you to all of our great customers.  We love hearing from all of you about how much you're loving your salmon!!

Maggie and her King Salmon cousin

 

Almost all of our customers have already received their Small Scales Scrumptious Sockeye Salmon Shares.  We hope you're really enjoying the fresh fish!

We have about ten shares left to sell, send your friends our way.

One customer made a particularly scrumptious sounding meal: salmon fillets marinated in olive oil and fresh rosemary, lightly grilled and then topped with a peach bourbon sauce.  Mmmmmm!   We are officially done fishing.  Kyle and JP fished one final day this last Monday in search of a strong Silver Salmon run.  The fishing report was 'too calm and too clear' (often rough water makes it harder for the fish to see the net).  After catching only 15 fish for a long day of fishing they decided that the fuel and time expenditure didn't quite sketch out. Kyle's birthday load!

 

Here is a photo of Kyle a couple weeks ago on a particularly good day of fishing.  The load was mostly Silver Salmon (Coho).  It was a pleasant surprise for late season fishing, especially since it was Kyle's birthday.  All these fish were caught in one set, over a pretty short period of time.  Fun and exciting! Overall it's been a pretty good season.  Last year was so good that it's hard to compare, but the price increase at the dock helped to offset the difference in our catch.

We really appreciate your business and hope you appreciate your fish!