By mid-June, most fishermen in Bristol Bay, home of Alaska's most valuable single salmon run, are busy getting their boats and gear ready to go in the water. The Bay's red salmon fishery is fast and furious, with fishermen wrapping the season up after only three weeks on the water, during which the Bay typically yields a catch of more than 150 million pounds of reds.  

But that's not the case for Tony Wood.  By the time most fishermen show up to work on their boats, Wood has already been fishing for a couple of weeks. And after Bay fishermen and packers call it a season in mid-July, Wood still fishes for another three weeks or so. But that's only because Wood decided early on to go it alone.

Ever since he "went over to the dark side" in 2003 and switched from a career as a sport fishing guide and pilot to fish commercially, Wood has done things differently. After 10 years of listening to his sports fishing clients ask him where they could buy some bright silver sockeyes, Woods decided that if he was going to fish he would do it only if he wasn't yoked to the big processors and could market his fish directly to consumers, food co-ops and small wholesale accounts. 

That meant building his own processing plant, not an inexpensive undertaking in Naknek , a small village on the south side of the sprawling, muddy bay, where everything has to be barged or flown in. Another reason Wood built a plant to handle his catch was he didn't want to "go on limits," an annual occurrence at the peak of most seasons in the Bay, when processors get swamped by sockeyes and, as a result, tell fishermen they can catch only a few thousand pounds of fish a day until processors can freeze and can reds as fast as fishermen can catch them. 

After adding new capacity, Wood's company, Wild Alaska Salmon & Seafood, can process 45,000 pounds of salmon a day, a drop in the bucket compared to the typical processor on the Bay, most of whom can process well over 500,000 pounds a day.  

Although it's the biggest sockeye run in the world, Bristol Bay fish have not always had the best reputation for quality. That's because most fishermen, who can land 10,000 pounds in a good set, concentrate on catching as many fish as they can, which doesn't allow them to handle each fish with kid gloves. Wood, and other Bay fishermen, though, are doing their best to improve the reputation of Bristol Bay salmon. Wood, for example, takes the time to bleed and ice each fish, opting for quality over quantity. "If you handle them right, Bristol Bay fish are among the best sockeyes. They have great oil content."

While Wild Alaska Salmon ships salmon out fresh, most of the production is frozen H&G or pinbone-in fillets (Wood doesn't want to let the fish sit for a few days until the flesh is relaxed enough to pull the pinbones). In the winter, Wood hits the road with his wife, Heather, to sell to food co-ops and farmer's markets, especially in the Midwest where consumers have minimal access to high-quality wild salmon.  Although he's still got "some big loans hanging out there," Tony and Heather Wood are seeing their hard work starting to pay off. "It's becoming a very comfortable business for us," he says.  

 

Click here to view Wild Alaska Salmon & Seafood Co.'s products and remember to tell them you found them on FishChoice when you contact them.