Tag Archives: wild caught salmon
Kenai River sockeye over-escape by 1M, Kotzebue’s 2021 chum season to wrap up, Big PWS Humpy Harvest
Those numbers concern fishermen like Joe Dragseth, a drift-netter in Kenai. He said he worries about the health of the river. And, he said, it’s unfair commercial fishermen have been restricted while so many fish have made it up the river. “Basically, they’re taking the living away from us,” he said. >click to read< – Kotzebue’s 2021 chum salmon season to wrap up with another low catch – “It hasn’t been very good,” said Karen Gillis, manager of the Copper River Seafoods processing plant in Kotzebue. It’s one of two commercial chum salmon buyers in town this year. >click to read< – Prince 
William Sound Humpy harvest is 3rd largest of decade – “The highlight of this season has been the wild stocks returning stronger than anticipated, given the uncertainty about spawning success from the 2019 parent year that was assumed to be negatively impacted by drought conditions,” said Heather Scannell, area management seine biologist in Cordova for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. >click to read< 14:35
Humpy surge boosts Prince William Sound harvest to 54.3M
For Prince William Sound alone the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s preliminary harvest report as of Wednesday, Aug. 18, stood at 50.4 million humpies, up from 31.9 million humpies just a week earlier, when the overall PWS commercial harvest totaled 39.8 million fish. Deliveries to PWS processors also reached a cumulative total of 2.6 million chums, 1.3 million sockeyes, 39,000 cohos and 7,000 Chinook salmon.,, In the PWS seine fisheries the egg take underway at the Valdez Fisheries Development Association was 38% complete as of Aug. 17. The Prince William Sound Aquaculture Corp. reported good run entry at Wally Noerenberg Hatchery and minimal run entry at the Armin F. Koernig and Cannery Creek hatcheries. Future fishing opportunities targeting PWSAC enhanced pink salmon would be contingent on run entry and broodstock acquisition, biologists said. >click to read< 11:22
“We’ve been sitting on the beach for 16 days” – Copper River salmon fishery reopens
“We are back to getting into the goal range,” said Jeremy Botz, finfish area management biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game in Cordova. “I think we are seeing a late compressed run. I still feel it is a relatively small run, but higher than in 2018 and 2020.”,, While eager to be fishing again, veteran Cordova harvesters felt they should have been allowed out on the grounds earlier to get a better handle on what the run, albeit late and maybe compressed, was really stacking up to be.,, Cordova harvester John Renner said the fleet should have been used earlier to collect data, to see if the run was weak or strong, rather than just waiting for the sonar count. “We’ve been sitting on the beach for 16 days,” >click to read< 14:15
