PORTLAND (AP) — Maine’s baby eel fishery is in its final week with fishermen hoping for a season that rivals previous years.
The elver fishing season ends this Sunday. Maine fishermen are by far the largest U.S. supplier of elvers, which are sold overseas as seed stock for Asian aquaculture companies. The companies raise them to maturity and sell them as food.
Price has fluctuated in recent years, with elvers valued at more than $1,800 per pound in 2012 and 2013 and about $875 per pound in 2014. Fishermen were reporting in April that prices this year were back up to more than $1,800 per pound.
Maine fishermen face a maximum catch of 9,688 pounds of elvers this year. That is about how much they caught in 2014.
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