The Bristol Bay sockeye run continues to exceed expectations.
Prior to the season, the Alaska Department Fish and Game forecast was for a sockeye run of 26.6 million fish. A run of that size would have allowed a commercial harvest of 17.9 million fish, leaving about 8.7 million fish for escapement. All of those numbers have already been surpassed.
Through July 7, ADFG counted a total salmon run of 30.88 million in the region. The commercial harvest through that day was 21.14 million fish.
The run has also well surpassed the 2013 run of 23 million fish. The 20-year average run is approximately 36 million sockeyes for Bristol Bay.
Strong red returns in the Wood River drainage pushed ADFG to increase the sport fish limit from five to 10 reds per day on July 4. The Wood River run was more than 1.9 million through July 2, far greater than the upper escapement goal of 1.5 million fish.
An early and now waning king salmon run on the Nushagak River forced the department to halve the daily bag limit — from two to one — for sport caught kings in the large Bristol Bay watershed July 7. As of that day, 59,539 kings had passed the Portage Creek sonar on the Nushagak, well off last year’s total of 86,054 kings for the same day. The total Nushagak king run in 2013 was 113,743 fish.
According to a July 3 ADFG release, the run is expected to fall within the escapement goal range of 70,000 to 90,000 kings.
Southcentral
Upper Cook Inlet sockeye returns continue to outpace historical averages as well. Through July 8, 42,273 early-run sockeyes had passed the Russian River weir, exceeding the runs upper-end escapement goal of 42,000 fish with six days of counts to come. The traditionally larger late run officially begins July 15.
Those late-run reds are on their way up the Kenai River, too. Nearly 127,000 fish had passed the sonar at Mile 19 of the Kenai by July 8. By comparison, 50,100 late-run reds had passed the counter in the same period last year.
The Kenai River personal use dipnet fishery begins July 10. King salmon caught in the fishery must be released.
Sport king fishing opened July 1 on the Kenai below a regulatory marker near Skilok Creek, downstream of Soldotna. The first week of the run is ahead of the previous two years with 1,524 fish counted through July 7. Single-hook and no-bait restrictions are in place for the fishery.
With more than a month to go in the Kasilof River red run and already surpassing its minimum escapement goal of 160,000 fish, ADFG increased the daily bag limit from three to six sockeyes on the Kasilof July 4. Through July 8 the Sterling Highway sonar on the river had counted 201,469 sockeyes.
Additionally, ADFG expanded the personal use red fishery on the Kasilof through Aug. 7, opening the river to dipnets up to the Sterling Highway bridge.
Upper Inlet commercial fishers have harvested 520,000 salmon, ADFG reported July 9. Of those, 452,210 were Upper Cook Inlet Central District sockeyes. The department also reported 2,481 kings had been taken commercially in the Upper Inlet.
To the south, the Lower Inlet commercial fleet had harvested 122,683 salmon, a catch dominated by 117,848 sockeyes as of July 9.
Elsewhere in Southcentral, more than 17.8 million salmon have been harvested commercially in Prince William Sound fisheries, according to ADFG numbers available July 9. The eastern purse seine fishery pinks accounted for more than 10 million of those fish, with another 2.8 million pinks harvested in the Montague District.
Copper River gillnet fishers had taken 1.8 million sockeyes and 9,541 kings, according to the Sound report. Through July 8, nearly 960,000 sockeyes had passed the Miles Lake counter on the Copper.
The upper escapement goal for the fishery, which is counted through July 27, is 750,000 sockeyes. As a result of the high sockeye returns, ADFG is opening the Chitina dipnet fishery July 14 to July 20 with a supplemental harvest of 10 fish per household allowed above the annual limit. The yearly limit is 15 for household of one and 30 salmon for households of two or more.
Commercial harvest of Kodiak sockeyes neared 789,000 fish as of July 7, with the total salmon catch eclipsing 1 million fish. A majority of the sockeyes came from the Karluk River area with 423,521 fish harvested there. More than half — 41,870 — of the 91,664 pinks harvested in Kodiak fisheries came from Karluk as well.
Chum harvest around the island totaled 106,094 fish through the first week of July, with the Karluk, northeast and Duck bay areas dominating the catch.
Southeast
The summer king troll fishery opened July 1 in Southeast. ADFG’s total king harvest target, with Alaska hatchery fish, is 171,300 fish.
Harvest statistics will not be available until later in the month, according to the department.
In the spring troll fishery about 43,000 kings were taken. That was the highest number since 2007.
Only 7,000 chums were harvested by 43 Icy Strait spring troll fishers, down from a harvest of 280,000 chums by 185 permit holders in the same area in 2013, ADFG reported.
The region’s purse seine fishery opened in traditional areas June 15. ADFG is projecting a harvest of 22 million pinks, well below the 10-year average of 34.5 million of the small salmon. Total chum returns, which are primarily hatchery fish, are expected to be 9.9 million salmon.
Elwood Brehmer can be reached at elwood.brehmer@alaskajournal.com.
