It´s certainly been an eventful time since the last news update! The main news was the EU´s tough stance against the Norwegian mackerel fishermen and their expulsion from EU waters at the beginning of October. There´s almost 70,000mt remaining on the Norwegian mackerel quota, but the main fishing area is close to Shetland, both on the east & west sides.

Our mackerel season started earlier than usual, on the 6^th September. Since then, we´ve received many landings from Norwegian, Danish & Swedish vessels. The main catching area has been east of Shetland, from 2 to 8 hours away from Lerwick. The quality´s been excellent, as would be expected for purse seined fish. The average size has been 400–450gms, perfect for producing a mixture of 300–500gms & 400–600gms.

Yes, our North Sea herring season started on the 13^th August with a small landing from the MV Resolute. She was closely followed by her partner, MV Forever Grateful. Both vessels have been catching around the Orkney Islands, which are around 70 miles south of Lerwick. The average size has generally been around 250gms. These 2 vessels have almost finished their quota already, but we expect 2 of our other regular suppliers, MV Ocean Quest & MV Ocean Venture to start fishing soon.

There hasn’t been any production to report since the last newsletter in May, but the sales team has been kept quite busy dealing with on-going sales of mackerel and blue whiting. We’ve also been meeting our herring customers in preparation for the North Sea season starting in August.

Well, that’s the Brussels Show by with for another year! By all accounts, exhibitor & visitor numbers were down this year, although we didn’t notice much difference on our stand. All the sales team were kept busy for the whole Show and we managed to sell our last remaining mackerel stocks. Hopefully an empty mackerel market now bodes well for next season. We’d like to thank all the visitors to our stand and we look forward to meeting you again soon.

It�s been a busy time since our last news page with the ending of the mackerel fishery in mid-February and the start of the blue whiting season in mid-March.

Shetland Fish Products, the company owning and operating the fishmeal and fish oil plant at Heogan on Bressay, Shetland, is now wholly owned by Shetland shareholders.

Simon Leiper & I were privileged to be invited to the wedding of Gaurav Samtani with Minal Chotirmall. Their wedding took place over 3 days in Goa, India, earlier this month.

What a rollercoaster ride it’s been in October with one financial crisis after another! Hopefully things are now back on an even keel and normal business can resume in November. Throughout it all, Shetland Catch has been relatively unaffected. Our bank, DnB, weren’t exposed to the sub-prime market so our facility remained intact. Currency fluctuations affected sales, just like everyone else, but the worst seems to have passed now.

The 2nd October dawned in Lerwick with the maiden landing by the MV Christina S, a fine new addition to the Scottish pelagic fleet for father & son, Ernie and Alan Simpson. They were regular suppliers to Shetland Catch with their previous vessel and we wish them all the very best of luck and good fishing with their new boat.

Yes, blink and you’ve missed it! The herring season finished on the 31st August when the Antares landed her last shot, less than 3 weeks after we began. This is our shortest herring season ever, which is due to the lack of quota.

The “Glorious Twelfth” is the name given to the start of the grouse shooting season in Scotland, always the 12th of August. The 12th of August was also glorious for Shetland Catch because we had the first herring landing of the season from the Fraserburgh registered Ocean Venture. She had a fine catch averaging almost 300gms, unusually large for herring from this area. There are other boats from the S&S group at sea so we hope for more landings from them later this week.

Well after a busy and successful blue whiting season, the factory staff is taking a well deserved break before the start of the herring season in August.
However there is no rest for the sales team at this time of year. John Angus & Alan Leask will be busy travelling to meet with some of our herring customers and hope to negotiate sales for the summer herring. Please contact us at sales@shetlandcatch.com if you have any interest in North Sea herring this year.

Well 4 days to be exact! Yes, the wanderers have returned from yet another successful show in Brussels. We thoroughly enjoy our time in Brussels, as it gives us a chance to meet with potential customers as well as allowing us to spend time with our current ones. We had some very useful feedback from our customers regarding their results from the mackerel season and also enjoyed discussed the forthcoming herring season with them.

We have now come to the end of very successful herring and mackerel season, with raw material supplies more than exceeding our expectations. Demand has been much higher than in previous years, so our sales team have been kept busy with negotiating sales and arranging delivery of goods.