Avrella joins the local fishing fleet

SHETLAND’s latest addition to its growing whitefish fleet has been landing her first catch of 139 boxes at Scalloway.

The 24- metre Avrella LK174, formerly known as the Maimai FR437, arrived from Fraserburgh over the weekend.

New owners Trevor Cumming, from Trondra, and his two sons Duncan and Owen, hope to capitalise on the somewhat better news of growing fish stocks and relatively stable quotas.

The Avrella also brings new quota entitlements to the Shetland Fish Producers’ Organisation.

Cumming said the investment had become possible after he left the Aalskere K373 fishing partnership and moved his quota share to the new vessel.

Speaking about his plans he said: “We got my quota out of the Aalskere, and we also got quota with the Avrella. That is quite a bit of quota to play with.

“The plan is to go out and do as well as we can for four to five years and, hopefully, assuming the fishing is still good despite all the rules, to go onwards and upwards with a newer vessel.”

The 47 year old fisherman with more than 30 year of working in the industry has been based at Peterhead for the last 15 years. The Avrella will be fishing out of Scalloway and Lerwick.

Cumming added: “Fishing is what we do and the only thing we know. It has been good to me all my career, and hopefully the new rules won’t destroy the industry – that’s my main concern.”

Last week, fishing minister Richard Lochhead was told by local industry leaders not to tamper with the way the islands’ fishing sector is being managed.

A Scottish government consultation emerged with much praise for Shetland’s unique system of sharing quota between vessels in the local PO.