We are also the No. 2 exporter, after Canada, selling mostly salmon and crab to Japan.

"I'm selling this gorgeous Atlantic salmon from Canada for the same price he sold domestic salmon 50 years ago," he said.

"The biggest concern came from salmon and halibut fishermen, that the pollock fisherman would try to sell salmon."

The smokehouse is on the only road through town and unmarked but for a sign out front declaring that it sells fresh salmon.

"It was a frenzy of Japanese buying," said John Peterson, who has been selling salmon in Seattle for 18 years.

Seemingly everybody, including the merchants at the central fish market who sell fresh and smoked salmon and all manner of shellfish, speaks English.

One supermarket is selling salmon which the fine print on the packaging reveals to be a completely different species of salmon, imported from China.

How many places that said they sold wild salmon actually turned out to be selling farmed once the fish were tested?

He also denied that the Taiwanese boats were selling salmon to Singapore or Thailand for processing.

Mr. Slockish was selling chinook salmon to tourists for $3 a pound.