Fishermen aren't the only ones gearing up for summer trawling. A group of 18 scientists launch their Bering Sea fish surveys from Unalaska this week.

The stock assessments provide critical information about the health of Alaska’s commercial fisheries. Fisheries regulators use these reports to determine how much of a given species fishermen can safely catch -- and thus how much fish ends up in grocery stores and restaurants across the globe. Pollock, Pacific cod, red king crab, and snow crab are all among the species being surveyed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The researchers will also pay attention to things like sponges and other invertebrates that aren't commercially valued but are important to the health of the ocean ecosystem nonetheless.

NOAA has chartered three fishing vessels to conduct the bottom-trawl surveys. The surveys are scheduled to last two months and will cover an area from Bristol Bay to the tip of the Aleutian Islands to the edge of the continental shelf, an area larger than the state of Texas.

This year, the federal government increased funding for NOAA’s annual stock assessments, allocating $67 million to the surveys. The studies had been vulnerable to budget cuts, which could have impacted the harvest limits – and in turn, the value – of the Alaska’s commercial fisheries.