Vol. XXIV, No. 5
May 2004

New MAP Agents
Sunny Rice has been hired as the new research assistant professor/MAP agent in Petersburg. Rice has a master's degree in public administration from UAS, has served as MAP program assistant in Petersburg since 1997, worked as a port sampler and in the Alaska processing industry, and is skilled in distance delivery. Rice volunteers for KFSK radio, and is president of WAVE, a domestic violence hotline.

As MAP agent, Rice will focus on commercial fishing and coastal community issues. She helped coordinate the 2003 Community Cold Storage conference in Anchorage and the 2003 Freight Consolidation Facility Project. She is the southeast coordinator for Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) workshops, and wrote part of the Fishermen's Direct Marketing Manual, published by MAP. She was co-coordinator of a project funded by USFWS working with small-boat longliners, testing seabird deterrents, and she provides outreach for this project. She is the primary point of contact for the many people who visit her downtown Petersburg MAP office.

Torie Baker starts May 6 as the new research assistant professor/MAP agent in Cordova. She holds a master's degree in adult education from UAA. Baker has been a commercial gillnetter since 1988, seafood marketing director for Eyak Packing Company for seven years, and secretary of the Boards of Fish and Game since 1999. She was co-coordinator of a project funded by USFWS to test seabird deterrents on longliners. Baker also has served in the following organizations: Cordova District Fishermen United, United Fishermen of Alaska, AMSEA, Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Public Advisory Committee, Women's Coalition for Pacific Fisheries, Copper River Watershed Project, and American Society for Training and Development.

In her new job, Baker will complete her work as coordinator of TAA technical assistance for Alaska salmon fishermen; promote water safety; train fish processors to meet food safety regulations; and help seafood direct marketers with business plans, marketing, and shipping logistics. The office she works from was donated to UAF by the Prince William Sound Aquaculture Corporation.

Thanks to Brian Paust
Brian Paust, former MAP agent in Petersburg, retired as full professor in 2002. He was named Professor Emeritus, and continued to work for MAP part time. Paust looks forward to serving MAP as a volunteer in the future.

Paust began his Alaska Sea Grant career in 1978 as a research assistant in Fairbanks, and joined MAP in Petersburg a year later. He is well known in Southeast Alaska and has assisted thousands of local residents and written on topics including seafood transportation and infrastructure; seafood processing such as smoking and live harvest; undeveloped fisheries including octopus, salmon sharks, and sea urchins; seafood marketing; and mariculture.

During his 25 years with MAP, Paust's excitement and curiosity about how to develop and improve commercial fisheries in Alaska has never waned. He was instrumental in developing several fisheries in Southeast Alaska, and his work with clam fishermen and oyster aquaculturists has led to sustainable and profitable businesses. He has worked with many researchers on their projects throughout Southeast.

While on MAP duty, Paust authored more than 20 publications, including

• Marketing and Shipping Live Aquatic Products
• Quality Handling of Hook-Caught Rockfish
• Guidelines for Shellfish Farming in Alaska
• Care of Halibut Aboard the Fishing Vessel
• Recoveries and Yields from Pacific Fish and Shellfish
• Fishing for Octopus
• Guide to Northeast Pacific Flatfishes
• Air Shipment of Fresh Fish
• Salmon Shark Manual

Paust was a teacher and school administrator in Nome, Kivalina, and White Mountain before joining MAP.

Sea Grant Research
Alaska Sea Grant has funded two pilot feasibility studies based on panel and peer reviews of earlier submitted proposals: (1) Early Life History of Eulachon (Thaleichthys pacificus): Age Validation and Growth in Berners Bay, Alaska, Nicola Hillgruber, SFOS; and (2) Larval Ecology and Settlement Dynamics of Dungeness Crab in an Alaskan Marine Reserve, Ginny Eckert, SFOS and Department of Natural Sciences at UAS.

Ocean Report
In response to the release of the Preliminary Report of the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy (http://www.oceancommission.gov/), Sea Grant directors are contacting their governors to tell them how Sea Grant programs successfully address issues mentioned in the report. Governors and other stakeholders have until May 21 to comment on the Ocean Commission Report.

In 2001, the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy began a review of national ocean policy, to provide recommendations for a comprehensive policy to the President and Congress. It is the first full review on national ocean policy in over 30 years. The first ocean commission led to the creation of NOAA in 1970.

A preliminary National Sea Grant response to the report agrees that the oceans are in trouble, a new approach for ocean management is needed, it must involve coastal and ecosystem management, all entities must work together to manage the oceans, increased ocean research is necessary, and marine education and ocean literacy must be enhanced. Sea Grant nationwide was mentioned throughout the report:

• Sea Grant has the infrastructure necessary to fund research and conduct educational activities that will expand understanding of ocean ecosystems.

• Sea Grant funds studies of legal, political, economic, and anthropological dimensions of ocean affairs, a neglected area of research.

• Most federal research on marine aquaculture has been carried out by Sea Grant.

• Sea Grant should be primary in delivering information products of regional ocean information programs.

• Sea Grant directors should be on regional boards to administer ocean information programs.

• Sea Grant has made notable efforts in transforming research data into exciting and accessible materials.

• Sea Grant should get more funding to promote lifelong ocean education.

• Sea Grant, NSF's Center for Ocean Science Education Excellence (COSEE), National Marine Educators Association, and National Science Teachers Association could find ocean-based examples to meet education standards.

• Sea Grant and COSEE could coordinate scientist-teacher programs, to teach the teachers.

• Sea Grant is critical in providing graduate education opportunities, a role that could be enhanced.

• NOAA should establish "Distinguished Professorships in Marine Studies" at Sea Grant colleges.

• Congress should double the federal ocean and coastal research budget in five years, from $650 million to $1.3 billion per year, which would help to expand the National Sea Grant College Program.

Publication Awards
Alaska Sea Grant's Ocean Treasure: Commercial Fishing in Alaska, by Terry Johnson, won the 2004 silver award from the Association for Communication Excellence in the four-color popular publication category.

The new cover on Guide to Northeast Pacific Rockfishes, by Don Kramer and Victoria O'Connell, won the 2004 gold award in graphic design from the Association for Communication Excellence. Tatiana Piatanova designed the cover. Both books are available at the Sea Grant office, 474-6707.

Workshop in Bristol Bay
Dillingham MAP agent Liz Brown co-coordinated a three-day workshop, "Nuts and Bolts of Processing," for Bristol Bay residents interested in fish processing. Sixty people from seven communities participated in the workshop, which was cosponsored by MAP and the Bristol Bay Economic Development Corporation. Speakers included Quentin Fong of FITC, local and statewide processors, and others from the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute and the Alaska Department of Community and Economic Development.

Electronic Newsletter
Would you like to change from a paper subscription of Fishlines to electronic only? Please contact Sue Keller at fnsk@uaf.edu. Each month we will send you an email linked to the electronic copy on the Sea Grant Web site.

Fishlines is a monthly in-house newsletter reporting Alaska Sea Grant activities to staff, students, and principal investigators of Alaska Sea Grant and the Marine Advisory Program, and staff of the School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences. For more information contact Sue Keller, (907) 474-6703, fnsk@uaf.edu.