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Latest Alaska Department of Fish and Game

Sockeye salmon are pictured in this file photo. (File)

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Fish and Game optimistic about 2019 sockeye run

After a poor sockeye return last summer, Alaska’s Department of Fish and Game is slightly more optimistic about…

A fisherman’s stringer of Kasilof River sockeye salmon caught in the personal-use dipnet fishery lies on the beach on Tuesday, July 31, 2018 in Kasilof, Alaska. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

News

Fish and Game increases Kasilof sockeye bag limit

With the Kasilof River sockeye run safely within the optimum escapement goal, the Alaska Department of Fish and…

A sockeye salmon caught in a dipnet from the Kasilof River lies on the beach on Tuesday, July 31, 2018 in Kasilof, Alaska. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

Life

Kasilof dipnet fishery hot on high tide, silvers reach Kenai

Tuesday night brought a ray of sunshine, a high tide and a fresh bloom of fish into the…

A guide motors a boat full of anglers up the Kenai River near Soldotna Creek Park on Wednesday, Aug. 1, 2018 in Soldotna, Alaska. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

News

Kenai River sockeye fishing to close Saturday

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is closing the Kenai River entirely to sockeye salmon fishing for…

A herd of Dall’s sheep graze on the side of one of the peaks in the Mystery Hills above the Skyline Trail in September 2017 near Cooper Landing, Alaska. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion, file)

News

Fish and Game expands monitoring for harmful sheep, goat bacteria

The state is asking hunters to bring in the heads of the animals they’ve harvested this season so…

Melody Miller (left) disentangles a salmon she just netted on Kenai’s north beach with the help of her daughter Manuia Tufi on Thursday, July 26, 2018 in Kenai, Alaska. The two had recently after arrived from Anchorage and had caught the day’s first fish. Miller said this is her seventh year of dipnetting in Kenai. On Thursday afternoon, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced the fishery will close two days early, at 12:01 a.m on Monday. (Ben Boettger/Peninsula Clarion)

News

Dipnetting to close early, sockeye bag limit reduced

Personal-use dipnetting on the Kenai River will end two days early this year, and sportfishermen will be limited…

Personal-use dipnet fishermen pull up to the bank of the Kenai River beneath the Warren Ames Bridge on Saturday, July 21, 2018 in Kenai, Alaska. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

Life

78-pound king caught on Kenai; sockeye fishing up and down

Despite its nickname as the Land of the Midnight Sun, there are in fact hours of darkness on…

A brailer bag full of commercially-caught salmon is hoisted up to the Snug Harbor Seafoods dock for processing on Thursday, July 12, 2018 in Kenai, Alaska. On Tuesday the Alaska Department of Fish and Game downgraded its estimated Kenai River sockeye run from 2.5 million fish to less than 2.3 million, changing some of the management procedures for commercial fishing in Upper Cook Inlet. (Photo by Ben Boettger/Peninsula Clarion)

News

Fish and Game lowers Kenai River sockeye estimate

The sockeye salmon run to the Kenai River is weaker than the Alaska Department of Fish and Game…

An angler casts her line into the Kenai River near Soldotna Creek Park on Wednesday, July 18, 2018 in Soldotna, Alaska. The water in the Kenai River is a little higher than usual — about 9.71 feet, according to U.S. Geological Survey’s gauge at Soldotna — but has fallen since last week and is significantly below the flood stage of 12 feet. Anglers were hitting the banks on Wednesday morning for sockeye salmon, which normally peak in returning numbers to the Kenai River in mid-July. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

Life

Sockeye fishing remains slow on Kenai, counts pick up on Kasilof

Anglers are hitting the banks of the Kenai River in more serious numbers now, though the sockeye have…

News

More restrictions for Kenai, Kasilof king salmon

Anglers won’t be able to keep a king salmon on the Kenai and Kasilof rivers after Wednesday.

News

Kodiak hatchery experiments with salt water exposure to mark its pink salmon

Editor’s note: This is the third part of a three-story series about the operations of Alaska’s salmon hatcheries…

Sockeye salmon smolt being raised by Cook Inlet Aquaculture Association at the Trail Lakes Hatchery, ultimately destined for Shell Lake in the Matanuska-Susitna Valley, swim in their tank on Friday, April 20, 2018, near Moose Pass. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

News

Hatchery-marked salmon important for management, international relations

Editor’s note: This story is the second in a three-part series about the operations of Alaska’s salmon hatcheries…

Sockeye salmon smolt being raised by Cook Inlet Aquaculture Association at the Trail Lakes Hatchery, ultimately destined for Shell Lake in the Matanuska-Susitna Valley, swim in their tank on Friday, April 20, 2018 near Moose Pass, Alaska. Pacific salmon raised in hatcheries are usually exposed to predetermined sets of hot and cold water cycles before they hatch, leading to dark and light rings on their inner ear bone, called an otolith, that biologists can later read to track where the salmon came from when it returns as an adult. Staff at Trail Lakes Hatchery raise all the association’s sockeye salmon, which are hatched, imprinted and distributed to the organization’s various operations across Cook Inlet, from China Poot Lake in Lower Cook Inlet to Shell Lake. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

News

A look into how salmon hatcheries mark their fish

Editor’s note: This is the first part of a three-story series about the operations of Alaska’s salmon hatcheries…

An Anchor River king salmon Saturday, May 19, 2018 in Anchor Point, Alaska. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion, file)

News

King fishing to open in lower peninsula streams with gear restrictions

The Ninilchik and Deep Creek will finally be open to king salmon fishing, but with limited gear and…

In this July 2016 photo, a drift gillnet fishing vessel floats in Cook Inlet just off the coast of the Kenai Peninsula near Kenai, Alaska. A thin season for sockeye and kings has led to restrictions in all fisheries, though drifters are seeing more chum salmon than usual in Upper Cook Inlet. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion, file)

News

Commercial fishing slow for sockeye, good for chum

Commercial fishermen around the Gulf of Alaska are seeing weaker sockeye salmon runs, but Cook Inlet salmon fishermen…

Sean Carlson shows off the 50-inch king salmon he caught on the Kenai River. (Photo courtesy Scott Miller)

Life

Kenai dipnet opens slow

The fishermen on the beach for the opening day of the Kenai River personal-use dipnet Tuesday got the…

Sean Carlson shows off the 50-inch king salmon he caught on the Kenai River. (Photo courtesy Scott Miller)

Life

Kenai dipnet opens slow

The fishermen on the beach for the opening day of the Kenai River personal-use dipnet Tuesday got the…

In this Aug. 10, 2008 file photo, hikers watch a brown bear fish on the Russian River near the falls near Cooper Landing, Alaska. Human-bear interactions are a fact of life in Alaska. (Clarion file photo)

News

People and bears intersect on the Kenai—not always badly

People and bears share space in Alaska — it’s a fact of life. Sometimes, that includes driveways and…

In this Aug. 10, 2008 file photo, hikers watch a brown bear fish on the Russian River near the falls near Cooper Landing, Alaska. Human-bear interactions are a fact of life in Alaska. (Clarion file photo)

News

People and bears intersect on the Kenai—not always badly

People and bears share space in Alaska — it’s a fact of life. Sometimes, that includes driveways and…

News

Lynx trapping remains closed

Lynx trapping will stay closed this year on the Kenai Peninsula as the wild cats and the prey…