HB Grandi’s pelagic vessel Lundey NS was due to dock at Vopnafjördur today with 730 tonnes of herring, caught mostly in the Jan Mayen zone according to the skipper this trip, Stefán Geir Jónsson, who added that one haul was taken in international waters.
‘We took four hauls this trip of good quality herring averaging 360 grammes. The weather has been good to us on the way back and hopefully we’ll be in time for at least a third of the catch to be processed for human consumption while the rest will go for meal production at Vopnafjördur.’
Lundey’s fishing grounds this trip are more than 300 mile steam from Vopnafjördur and according to Stefán Geir Jónsson, there were seven Icelandic vessels fishing there when Lundey set course for home. All three of the HB Grandi ships were fishing there, as well as pair teams Júpiter ÞH with Thorsteinn ÞH, and Margrét EA fishing opposite Börkur NK. He says that fishing has been patchy north of Iceland.
‘We were two days beating north to the Jan Mayen zone and we couldn’t start fishing until the 5th of October. We had spells of good fishing weather, but the problem is that the herring isn’t easy to handle and there don’t appear to be large amounts there. The fish are down at 180 to 200 fathoms during daylight hours, in small shoals that aren’t easy to locate. But when it starts to get dark, the fish come all the way up to 15 to 20 fathoms, which is our signal that we have an opportunity to start fishing. Normally by midnight it’s all over and the fish are gone,’ Stefán Geir Jónsson says.
