Captain Dan Veerhusen and Jan, his wife, run the Taurus, one of the few remaining boats that still fish herring in the Bering Sea. Last summer, in Sand Point, the couple were preparing the 58-foot seiner for what would be Veerhusen’s 30th-or-so season.
He’s been fishing herring since 1988, when Unalaska’s Port of Dutch Harbor was at the center of a multimillion dollar crab boom.
“I love herring fishing. It's real fishing.” he said. “It was a regular, competitive fishery back then. But these days, there’s ourselves, another boat, maybe three boats out there.”
The herring fishery in the Bering Sea boomed in the early 20th century but struggled after World War II as Americans lost their appetite for the fish. Demand increased again in the 1970s when the Bering Sea crab industry took off, creating a demand for herring as baitfish. But as crab fisheries has collapsed — king crab shut down in 2021, followed by snow crab in 2022 — so has the herring market.
“Crab fishing was our main customer,” Veerhusen said. “With the crab going to heck, there goes your market.”
Finding new markets
The snow crab fishery opened in October for the first time since its closure two years ago, but it’s the smallest allowable catch in the fishery’s history — not enough to drive a major herring revival.
Some parts of the state have weathered the herring market downturn, like around Sitka, where there’s still a market for sac roe — herring eggs sold mainly to Asia. But the sac roe market faces its own challenges. Younger generations in countries like Japan don’t have the same appetite for sac roe as previous generations. The large herring fishery in Togiak, which exported to Asian markets, was also hit by a decreased interest in roe, and that fishery hasn’t opened since 2022.
Like others in Alaska’s herring sector, Veerhusen wants to promote herring to Americans as more than just bait, but it remains a niche market in the U.S.
"The U.S. just hasn't developed a taste for it," Veerhusen said.
Demand is stronger in Europe, which is the world’s largest consumer of herring, most of which is fished in the North Atlantic. But those herring stocks have declined in recent years, while Alaska stocks remain strong.
Bruce Schactler is the marketing chairman for United Fishermen of Alaska, which promotes the state’s commercial fishing industry. He sees potential for Alaska to fill that gap.
“We're all sort of thinking there could be some opportunity for Alaska herring,” he said.
Schactler said buyers from Japan, Iceland and Europe have expressed interest, but getting Alaska herring into those markets remains a challenge, especially for small-boat fishermen like Veerhusen.
“The shipping cost is so much to get it to Europe,” Veerhusen said. “By the time you get it there, there's no value in it, hardly.”
‘We're going home’
After leaving Sand Point in the eastern Aleutians in June, the couple and their two crew members drove the Taurus 200 miles west to Unalaska, and the fishing was good along the way.
“Darned if there was some good herring fishing before we even got to Dutch Harbor, where our market is and our processor, so we came in with a load of fish,” Veerhusen said.
Remnants of the town’s last herring plant stood across the bay from where they moored the Taurus.
“Those red buildings over there by the bridge there, that was a herring saltery,” Veerhusen said.
Manson's Herring Saltery thrived in the early 1900s. Today, its rotten wooden planks and rusted metal roofs lay in disrepair. It survived the attacks during the 1942 Battle of Dutch Harbor, but it didn’t survive World War II.
“The military filled in all the grasslands where they used to lay their eggs," Veerhusen said. “They kind of ruined the breeding grounds.”
Veerhusen said the population is slowly recovering, which is good news. But he’s not sure if he’ll come out to fish again this year if nobody is buying his catch. He only catches what he thinks he can sell, which made for a short season.
“The weather was good and herring were there, and so we got them caught quick, what we could sell,” he said. “Now we can't sell anymore, so we're going home.”
The Alaska Department of Fish And Game said it’s too early to know how many boats will enter the fishery this year. The season is expected to open in the spring.
