Icicle Seafoods Proceeding With Plan to Relocate Farmed Salmon Pens East of Port Angeles Icicle Seafoods, which was recently acquired by Canada’s Cooke Seafood still plans to relocate some of its Atlantic salmon pens to a 9.7 acre stretch of water in the Puget Sound, just east of Port Angeles, Washington. The company’s plan for putting pens out in the Juan de Fuca Strait has been driven by U.S. Navy plans to expand its base on Ediz Hook. Under Icicle’s planned development, 14 circular pens, each 126 feet in diameter, would be kept in place by a network of two-to- four-ton steel anchors. The new pens would produce 20 percent more salmon than the old. They would be the first anchored this far offshore in Washington waters. The Lobster Council of Canada is urging Canada's lobster exporters to speak with their overseas customers about opposing Sweden's proposal to ban live North American lobsters from its market. “We’re asking our exporters to ask their importers to lobby their own governments,” said Geoff Irvine, executive director of the Council. The European Union’s Scientific Forum on Invasive Alien Species is expected to express an opinion about the proposed ban on Aug. 31. In other news, Copper River's coho season opened on Monday, August 15 with an estimated landing of 19,000 silvers, which puts the run on track with the preseason estimate of 201,000 fish. “If the run comes in as forecast, harvest could be over 45% higher than last year when 137,000 Copper River coho were caught,” said ADF&G biologist Steve Moffitt. The Bering River District, an important coho river system, will open this Monday morning on August 22 for a 24-hour commercial fishing period. Meanwhile, the Alaskan Jack Corp., the US-based company related to Yihe in China, announced a line extension to its Alaskan Jack's salmon products with three salmon dumplings. The new dumpling products are all Alaskan wild-caught pink salmon, made in the USA and have all-natural and GMO-free ingredients. Yihi said that some customers demanded a made in America product, and opened Alaskan Jack's Corporation in the US, with Steven Chen, president of Yihe, also president of Alaskan Jack's. Finally, a push to create a commercial market for Florida's invasive lionfish appears to be working. Retailers including Whole Foods and Wegmans are featuring the fish in their seafood cases and now restaurants up and the down the East Coast are reporting good sales of the fish. "Almost every customer that's approaching our seafood teams [is] chatting about it," said David Ventura, Whole Foods' seafood coordinator in Florida. "Demand is very strong, and given the dedication of the divers, I'm confident the supply will be there."