July 13th Return Update-Hidden Falls produces
The big news this week is today’s Hidden Falls chum opener which, when it is all over today, will be the largest single day harvest in at least the past decade. Early estimates indicate total harvest may top 300k adult chum. This is fabulous news and puts us on a potential path to top a 1 millionchum return this year to Hidden Falls which hasn’t happened since 2013 (1.38m in 2013). Keep in mind we currently release approximately 50% fewer chum fry from Hidden Falls than we did in the brood years that made up the 2013 return. Today Hidden Falls is beginning their chum spawn and we...
Read MoreFriday June 30 Return Update
After a slow first 10 days of fishing at Hidden Falls things have begun to pick up. Yesterday (6/29) in the Thursday seine opening approximately 60k chum were harvested compared to a cumulative total of 25k for the previous 10 days. The 6/29 sample had a 6.5lb size avg, 67% male and the age structure of the return so far is relatively “normal” with the majority being age 4. . While this harvest increase gives us confidence that the return is tracking our forecast of 800k total return, the lines have been modified for Sundays (7/2) opener to provide more protection for brood...
Read MoreNew Seafood Donation Inquiry Form via ALFA / ASFT
The Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association (ALFA) and Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust (ASFT) are inviting community and tribal leaders, organizations, fishermen, and others to share via a new Seafood Donation Network Inquiry online form, whether they are struggling with access to local seafood or have seafood that they would be willing to contribute to families in need. Their invitation is part of ALFA and ASFT’s Seafood Donation Network, which was created in March 2020 as a program of ALFA but has since evolved into a statewide network of communities, organizations, businesses, and...
Read MoreDeep Inlet/Bear Cove Closure
The Deep Inlet terminal harvest area will close to common property fishing at end of day Saturday (9/10) for chum and coho brood stock concerns at Medvejie Hatchery, and a likely shortfall of chum cost recovery from Crawfish Inlet. We are just over 50% complete on the fall chum egg take goal of 92 million at Medvejie and estimate that we may need an additional 5-10k fish for brood, depending upon additional recruitment, and final sex ratio. Additionally, the coho return to Bear Cove and Deep Inlet continue to perform below forecast. Bear Cove will close to retention of coho salmon at...
Read MoreAug 29th-Return Update
Cost recovery continues at Crawfish Inlet and we have approximately 42% left to harvest. We made good progress over Friday and Saturday at CI and harvested nearly 20% of the goal. The male sex ratio is holding high in the cost recovery samples and last sample taken from Saturdays harvest was 65% male. We have been seeing a high 3-year old percentage at CI and that is maintaining at 35% of the harvest in recent samples. We will continue cost recovery fishing at CI Monday (8/29) through Wednesday (8/31). It is very unlikely that there will be a Thursday seine opening for CI as the...
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