HB Grandi’s pelagic vessels have caught a high amount of this season’s mackerel this week and have seen an increase in the amount of herring in catches.
The vessels reported that around 11,400 tonnes of mackerel had been caught, leaving 4,500 tonnes left from this season’s mackerel quota.
Gudlaugur Jónsson, skipper of Ingunn AK, said: “Fishing has been pretty good this summer. There was a bit of a dead patch yesterday, which is nothing unusual, but after we reached the fishing grounds at midnight, the catches were excellent.”
He added: “There was some herring with the mackerel in the first haul but this morning we had a clean 200 tonne mackerel haul and hopefully, the third tow will be enough to give us the usual 400 to 500 tonnes that we like to have for the factory.”
Vessels fishing herring north of the main mackerel regions have been careful to leave enough of the mackerel quota due to an increase of 10% to 20% in the proportion of herring in catches.
HB Grandi’s vessels supply its Vopnafjördur factory with the high fat, quality fish, landing at roughly three day landings with 400 to 500 tonnes each time.
