1148 
Pacific Northwest otter-trawlers have never been as large in production as 
those of New England although the groundfish resources available to them are 
larger than those adjacent to New England. The entire production of trawl fish 
by American and Canadian fishermen, together, from the Northeast Pacific 
ranged from 125 to 140 million pounds in the decade 1955-1964. This has increased 
somewhat in the last few years. The Alaskan trawl catch was a quarter of a 
million pounds in 1966. British Columbia catches were at a record high in 1965 
at 44 million pounds, but have gone up since. The Washington State fleet also 
had a record high to that time of 53 million pounds in 1965. The Oregon catch 
is on a smaller scale yet. and provided less than 20 million pounds per year. The 
California trawl catch amounts to something less than 40 million pounds per 
year. 
The most vociferous otter trawlers politically on the national level have been 
those of Oregon and Washington who, between them, scarcely produce 75 million 
pounds of fish per year. A large proportion of what they do produce is sold very 
cheaply for animal (principally mink) feeding. Their substantial revenues come 
from their landings of flounder for direct human consumption (much is landed 
for mink feed also). They are customarily limited by the buyers of five or six 
species of these out of the twenty-odd available to them. Even for these they are 
ordinarily put on weekly or other quotas. 
Among the most abundant other fish available to them are Pacific perch. There 
are thirty-odd species of these. They are limited by the buyers to fishing for two 
or three species of these and are ordinarily under buyer’s quota’s of a weekly 
or other nature even for these. The catch of ocean perch in Oregon and Washing- 
ton in 1965 was 28 million pounds. 
All of this contrasts with estimated resources of demersal fishes available in 
the Northeast Pacific suitable to support sustainable fisheries off California of 
600 million pounds per year, off Oregon, Washington and British Columbia, of 
800 million pounds per year, in the Gulf of Alaska of 900 million pounds per 
year, and in Eastern Bering Sea of 3 billion pounds per year. This makes a poten- 
tial sustainable yield of demersal fishes in the Northeast Pacific of 5.3 billion 
pounds per year (above the average of all landings by all U.S. flag fishing vessels 
per year in all fisheries over the last 30 years), as contrasted with the actual 
yield of less than 200 million pounds per year by all American fishermen from 
the area, and the somewhat less than 75 million pounds per year for the trawlers 
of Oregon and Washington. 
The complaints of Oregon and Washington trawlers are at several levels, and 
include these: 
1. Their large market for demersal fish is the booming fish block business of 
the mid-west and eastern seaboard. This is substantially in the hands of Canadian, 
Icelandic and Norwegian fishermen. They can seldom compete in this market 
even in the metropolitan areas of Los Angeles, San Francisco Bay area, Portland 
and Seattle-Tacoma, much less the mid-west or east coast. Historically they could 
not compete in the latter two areas against New England fishermen because of 
transportation costs, and they get frozen out of those markets before the New 
Englanders do. 
2. Their flounder and ocean perch production is pretty well limited to the 
restricted restaurant and home trade of the west coast area and that is not 
large enough to handle any considerable portion of the resources available to 
them. Also production from British Columbia trawlers (having the normal Cana- 
dian governmental supports that United States fishermen do not get from their 
government) competes directly with theirs in these western metropolitan 
markets. 
They submit to conservation regulations on two of their most important cash 
resources (English sole and Petrale), off the Washington coast arranged through 
the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission. Canada is not a member of the 
latter and while it coordinates its regulations fairly well, the Washington fisher- 
men are not exactly sure that the Canadian fishermen fishing along side them are 
submitting to the same regulations they are. 
4. The Canadian fishermen are pressing their Government to declare Hecate 
Straits, Queen Charlotte Sound, and intervening waters which provide State of 
Washington trawlers some of their best fishing, as internal waters of Canada, 
which would eliminate those grounds from their fishing area. The Canadians say 
that the Americans will be given their historic rights to fish in those waters still, 
but being given rights, and having them naturally, are two different things. 
5. They cannot land halibut, which is the most valuable ground fish (and 
flounder) in the region, because of regulations of the International Pacific Halibut 
