Pacific herring

The pacific herring fishery has always been a major fishery on Canada’s Pacific coast. After the collapse of the sardine fishery in the late 1940s, Pacific herring were actively fished for reduction to fish meal and fish oil.

Pacific herring have fewer vertebrae the keel scales between the pectoral and ventral fins are poorly developed or absent and teeth on the vomer bone are weak or absent. Eggs are shed on seaweed, usually in shore waters at a depth to 10-15 m at temperatures of 0 -10.7 ° C (rarely 15 ° C).

Clupea pallasii pallasii inhabits the coasts of the northern Pacific Ocean from the Bering Strait to Korea and in the Arctic Sea to the mouth of the Lena Rover. On the North America coast, it distribution extends from California to Nome, Alaska.

 Fish reach sexual maturity at 2-3 years and reach 50 cm in length. The fish are most abundant off Alaska and British Colombia and are commercially important, particularly for herring roe.
Pacific herring