Taku Store Activity Central!

If you've ever wanted to get a good look at what it’s like living in Juneau, spend a spring here and you will see just about everything.  So far this month we have seen everything from snow and blowing rain, to days in the 70’s and calm seas.  Don’t like the weather?  Hang out for another hour, it’s bound to change!

The really nice thing about spring time here in Juneau is that just about everything starts in May.  There is a king salmon gill net fishery in Taku Inlet that opened late in the month.  We get halibut in just about every day.  The cruise ships started showing up on the 3^rd, and the migration of tourists and college students changes the faces on the street.  Heck, even the bears have started to make their presence known. 

With all of this activity, the Taku crew has been pretty busy getting things spruced up and inventory stocked for the new season, which doesn’t allow for much time for me to play tourist and get some pictures.  I was able to take advantage of some great weather and a light cruise day that allowed me to go out today and snap a few pictures of life on our little corner of South Franklin Street.  For those of you planning a trip to Juneau this summer, you now have no excuse for not stopping in and saying hello.  Just follow the aroma of our smoked salmon down Franklin Street and look for the big red fish.  We’ll be waiting for you.  Snacks are on us.

If you can't make it to Juneau, let us send a piece of Juneau to you.  Just visit us at www.takustore.com and you can have a taste of Juneau delivered to your doorstep! 

Halibut season opened last month, and we've already got some whoppers!  Halibut are one of those funny fish that live on the ocean floor so long that their eyes eventually end up on top of their head.  Commercial fishermen and women fish for halibut using longline gear in deep water.  These fish will weigh from 10 to 450 pounds or more...that's right FOUR HUNDRED FIFTY pounds!  On a good day, we can process about 100,000 pounds of halibut.  I've included some pictures of a recent offloading of halibut in the "Just for the Halibut" album.  Do you know where your fish comes from?

If you haven't had the chance to try some of our halibut, now is the time.  From now until May 10, if you buy 4 pounds of halibut, your order will ship at no charge.  We have some brand new halibut just off the dock that we have filleted and packed as individual servings that are ready to ship and looking for a home.  Give us a call at 1-800-582-5122 and place your order today!

Happy fishing!

I can't tell you how many times we get people calling us and asking what the weather is like here in Juneau.  This year I decided to brave the Taku winds and head out onto the dock during a particularly cold stretch we were having.  We had a run of temps hovering at or below zero for about two weeks back in the middle of March.  Sure -2 F is cold, but it's a dry cold.  Funny how that theory works for summer heat in Arizona or Texas.  So I bundled up with my heavy winter coat and knit cap and headed out to the dock. 

I went out and visited our dock crew for a little bit.  They were offloading some halibut and crab from a few different boats.  To begin with, this isn't the easiest job in the world, but add these cold temps and winds gusting to near 30 knots, and you have a real serious situation.  It was so cold in fact that many of the fish froze solid during the sorting and weighing process on the dock!  The crab that were offloaded were put in large totes while they were still in the holding tanks on the boats to prevent them from freezing in the open air.  One of the pictures you will see in the album is of our dock crew during one of these cold days.  You will also see some pictures in the fishing vessel album of some of the boats that offloaded during this cold stretch. 

If you're hankerin for a hunk-o-halibut, head on over to www.takustore.com or call me at 1-800-582-5122 and ask about this months special and we'll get some headed from our dock to your door.  It's that easy.

It's that time of year again.  Clear skies and cold temperatures greeted the fleet of crab vessels again this year.  The nice thing about this time of year in Southeast Alaska is that we generally have a nice stretch of clear blue skies.  But of course with the clear skies come bitter cold temperatures and the notorious Taku Winds.  As many of you who have visited Juneau probably noticed, this place is basically a wind tunnel, and any small gust that picks up south of town, ends up being a door slammer by the time it reaches downtown Juneau.  Needless to say, we don't fly too many kites around here.  But what we do get to enjoy when this weather comes around is the bounty of king crab that is brought to us from some very hearty fishermen.  The crab this year is absolutely beautiful.  We've even had a large number of crabs that are too big to fit in our shipping boxes!

Coming soon.......Halibut!

Welcome to the newest addition to Team Taku.  This will be your chance to get an inside look at the glamorous world of the seafood industry.  No doubt many of our visitors have seen recent television programs showing the brave men and women fishing the high seas, but what about the hard working people that process their catch into what we deliver to your door?  Here you will see things such as vessels having their catch offloaded.  You will also see fish and crab being cleaned and processed on the "slime line" before heading over to our smokehouse crew for final preparation and packaging.  From time to time we will also have profiles of various members of the Taku crew, giving you a face to go with the voice you hear when you call our store.

So, sit back and enjoy the show.  We'll try to keep our updates brief and bring you some exciting pictures of the place we call home. 

Team Taku