fishery

Friday Faves — notes from the new gastroconomy, No. 20

a weekly round-up of our favorite finds from the front lines of food

  • Behold, the geekiest baking project ever (right) — Apple Pi
  • National Marine Fisheries Service's seafood inspection program intends to ramp up enforcement on fish fraud, busting the open secrets of the industry, like soaked scallops and over glazed fillet. "This sounds like something that is so simple, and so sort of pedestrian in the world of fraud, you would think ... people wouldn't get away with it....But it is absolutely a challenge."
  • The huge, unsexy and hard to address issue of food waste got coverage from Reuters. "Cleaning your plate may not help feed starving children today, but the time-worn advice of mothers everywhere may help reduce food waste from the farm to the fork, help the environment and make it easier to feed the world's growing population."
  • Pinterest is full of gorgeous food pictures. The online bulletin board for photo sharing is the latest social networking darling. Read some tips on promoting films, with plenty for food producers to apply.

Friday Faves — notes from the new gastroconomy, No. 17

a weekly round-up of our favorite finds from the front lines of food


  • Catching invasive species is making town and country strides at being hip. Fishing for snakehead is featured in the current issue of Food & Wine and Trout Unlimited is singing the praises of fly fishing for carp.

Friday Faves — notes from the new gastroconomy, No. 16

a weekly round-up of our favorite finds from the front lines of food

  • It's not just the sugar that will kill you... Cereal killers (left, and more) has some fun with the pop culture form.
  • Is seafood charcuterie taking menus by storm in 2012? Reports from Boston and LA think so.
  • The USDA is giving more grants to farmers for developing value-added products. “The local food movement really took off with most folks selling direct through farmers markets and CSAs, and that’s great, and yet 97 percent of the food consumed in America goes through the wholesale markets. So if we’re really going to create new markets for family farmers and cut food miles, we have to figure out how to get into these markets.”
  • Maine looks for new ways to keeping fishing and fishing culture alive. "I've got all kinds of fisheries policy people, I've got all kinds of fisheries scientists. But we don't have anybody that creates that link back to shore-side business side of commercial fishing, and you can't have one without the other. We need the healthy fisheries, but we have to make sure we have a link back to the shore-side business that supports the sale and development of fish or lobsters or clams or anything else it might be."

Friday Faves — notes from the new gastroconomy, No. 15

 a weekly round-up of our favorite finds from the front lines of food

  • "Survival in the epicurean jungle was a matter of brawn and culinary skill, in which mastery of the Switchblade Spork was king. Gangs of sous-chefs and line cooks ruled the streets and no food was safe from the steely glint of their sporks."
  • In tsunami-hit Japan, microfinancing is helping food business get up and running even when banks don't want to lend. "So I wondered if maybe what we do really is important. Many people are waiting for the very original products that we select and sell. They are small goods, but they fill voids in our hearts.”
  • UN asserts that famine is predictable: "drought and famine are not extreme events but “merely the sharp end of a global food system that is built on inequality, imbalances and – ultimately – fragility.”'
  • States, like Massachusetts, are increasingly looking to create brands of provenence to market fisheries. “If we took a look at fish being landed in Massachusetts and put a mark on them ... it allows a story and to tie in what’s happening in New Bedford or Gloucester. It means something to [diners]."

Reflections on the Condit Dam

On Wednesday, October 26, 2011, engineers blew a hole in the base of the Condit Dam releasing the White Salmon River. 

The White Salmon River, located in south-central Washington, originates on the southwestern slope of Mount Adams, then runs through Klickitat and Skamania Counties, finally draining into the great Columbia River.  In 1913, the Condit Dam was completed, providing hydroelectric power to local industry, but at the same time, creating a significant obstacle to spawning grounds for both native salmon and steelhead.  

The Condit Dam had a good run and served its purpose by providing the area with energy for many years. But, having become no longer cost-effective or useful, a relic of sorts, it was time for the dam to go.  This dam removal, coming weeks after the beginning of the Elwha Dam project, is the latest in a series of major removals taking place across the Pacific Northwest.   

I have family members who live very close to the White Salmon River, and I know it well. I’m certainly not a river guide, but I have fished the now drained Northwestern Lake, rafted the white water above the dam and have even walked the pipe downstream.  I am looking forward to watching how the basin changes in the coming days, months and years.

Quick Facts: 

  • Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife estimates that the dame removal could open 33 miles of habitat for steelhead, 14 miles of salmon habitat and could eventually allow reestablishment of 700 steelhead, 4, 000 spring Chinook, 1,100 fall Chinook and 2,000 Coho salmon.
  • The more than 12-story Condit Dam on the White Salmon River is the second-tallest dam to be demolished in U.S. history.
  • Its two turbines produce about 14 megawatts of power, enough for 7,000 homes, but its owner, Portland-based utility PacifiCorp, elected to remove the dam rather than install cost-prohibitive fish passage structures that would have been required for relicensing.

Watch a great timelapse video via National Geographic.

And White Salmon Restored: A Timelapse Project