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Return Update-July 8th - NSRAA chum returns last week (stat week 27) seemed to flatline. There was minimal cost recovery completed in Deep Inlet and a moderate amount in SE Cove. The Hidden Falls chum weekly return last week took a slight dip to 50,000 from the previous stat week 26 return of 62,000. So far this week there […]
Return Update-June 25th - NSRAA chinook returns have been picking up the past several weeks with a total estimated harvest in Stat Week 25 of 1,341 adults. The spring chinook fisheries in the Sitka area have harvested over 2,000 Medvejie chinook making up 47% of the Sitka Sound area commercial troll harvest. Currently the return is looking like it […]
Gulf of Alaska Chinook Salmon do not warrant listing under Endangered Species Act - NOAA has concluded its 12-month scientific review to not list Chinook salmon in the Gulf of Alaska as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Action (ESA). PRESS RELEASE NMFS ESA Ruling
NSRAA Salmon Bake & Hatchery Tour - NSRAA will be offering hatchery tours and a BBQ lunch at Medvejie Hatchery on Saturday, June 27th. Lunch will consist of barbecued King Salmon, baked potato, green salad, rolls, watermelon and non-alcoholic drinks. Tickets are $15.00 per person- CASH ONLY and can be purchased during office hours at NSRAA- 1308 Sawmill Creek Road. (8-5 Mon-Fri) […]
Support Alaska Hatcheries at Board of Fisheries - Alaska Board of Fisheries Proposals. Your voice is needed. The board of fisheries will take up three hatchery proposals at the statewide meeting. Proposals 170, 171, and 172 seek to impose broad, preemptive reductions or moratoria on Alaska’s private nonprofit (PNP) salmon hatchery program without demonstrating a causal link between hatchery production and the specific […]NSRAA 2019 Spring Board Meeting
NSRAA’s 2019 Spring Board of Directors Meeting will be held on Monday and Tuesday, March 4-5, 2019 in Sitka in the NSRAA Board Room. Meetings begin at 9 am each day. The public is invited to attend.
Topics will include reviewing the NSRAA FY20 budget, program updates, and planning for the 2019 season and beyond. The meeting agenda will be posted in early February.
NSRAA Fall 2018 Board of Directors Meeting
NSRAA’s 2018 Fall Board of Directors Meeting will be held on Wednesday & Thursday, November 14-15, 2018 in Sitka in the NSRAA Board Room. Meetings begin at 9 am each day. The public is invited to attend.
Topics will include a review of the 2018 season, program updates, a discussion of the proposed NOAA Little Port Walter Public/Private Partenership, a Pacific Salmon Treaty update, and planning for the 2019 season – including Crawfish Inlet management. Click here for the meeting agenda.
Crawfish Inlet SHA to Open Sept. 13
There will be a common property seine opening at Crawfish Inlet on Thursday September 13th. Look for the official ADF&G announcement on Tuesday September 11th. I expect there will be one or two additional openings to clean up the tail-end of the run (announcement possibly on Friday, September 14th). Cost recovery is expected to harvest <one million pounds total between today and Tuesday with no cost recovery on Wednesday.
The run to date is just over 3 million fish; 1.6 million have been harvested by the seine fleet and 220,000 by the troll fleet. Approximately 480,000 chum were caught on the past Thursday opening.
As most people are aware this run is an anomaly in several regards. Broodyear (BY) ’14 had 184,000 3s return in 2017 (1.4% marine survival) which was a very, very good survival. The 4s from that year (BY’14) also survived well with 501,000 4s so far, or 2.7 fours for each three year old. Adding the 3s and 4s from BY ’14 yields a 5.1% marine survival (that will go up with next year’s 5s). All this is very good but not an anomaly.
Broodyear ’15 chum return this year as 3’s is off the chart! 2.5 million chum have returned in 2018 as 3’s. This represents 9.1% marine survival just for 3’s. I would call that Anomaly 1. The proportion of male to female is unusual as well. We do not have the weighted average complete but it appears the male ratio will be on the order of 70%, or Anomaly 2. The high male ratio is being driven by Age 3’s, although in the past week 53% of the harvest has been female, both 3’s and 4’s.
So what happens next year? What will the forecast be? This will be difficult to predict given Anomalies 1 & 2. Even if we used 2.7:1 or the ratio of 4’s to 3’s we saw for the BY’14 return the forecast would seem improbable or 2.7 x 2.5 million 3’s = 6,750,000 4’s plus additional chum for BY’16 3’s and BY’14 5’s. It seems fairly certain there will be a lot of chum at Crawfish Inlet in 2019.
The NSRAA board will be discussing a management plan for Crawfish at its November 14 & 15, 2018 board meeting. It is unlikely NSRAA will need to conduct cost recovery at Crawfish Inlet in 2019. Trollers will continue to have a preference in Crawfish Inlet, but given the magnitude of this year’s return there will need to be a minimum of one seine opening per week in the early and late segments of the run, and two openings during the peak weeks to maintain high quality fish throughout the run.
Finally, NSRAA has two seine seats, as well as four other gear seats, expiring in November, with nominations due on November 14th at 5 pm. The election count will be conducted in February with winners being seated at the March 2019 board meeting. Please take an active roll in your organization.
Crawfish Inlet to Open Thursday Sept. 6
We will suspend cost recovery after Wednesday and have a common property seine opening Thursday September 6th. I will need to confer with ADF&G tomorrow morning for this to be official; expect ADF&G to get an announcement out Tuesday afternoon.
Sampling at Shamrock Bay and Crawfish Inlet today showed brighter fish and slightly more females at Shamrock. My observations on the two harvest boats and tender in Shamrock Bay was no very dark or nasty chum and only low numbers of gillers in the web. Fish density in Shamrock was lower than expected with only 200,000 lbs of chum taken. This seems to confirm that the chum move through West Crawfish and up into the inlets such as Shamrock, but then back out and continue on to Crawfish Inlet. Additional evidence for this is that the trollers were not happy with the harvest boats fishing in Shamrock, which suggests the trollers fish on chum moving east in West Crawfish but also west as the fish leave Shamrock and head to Cedar Pass.
Look for the ADF&G announcement and good luck.
Crawfish Inlet Update September 3
The Crawfish Inlet run continues to develop with exceptionally strong 3s at about 82% of the run or 1.5 million fish, and surprisingly low 4s (330,000 fish), although not terrible, lower than expected. The run isn’t over so I am hoping more of the remaining females are 4s rather than 3s. We are seeing a bump in female ratio with the last two CR harvests and seine samples close to 40%. Today’s CR harvest appears closer to 50%.
The sex ratio is another anomaly – 75% males so far, this is likely driven by the high number of 3s which tend to be precocious males. These unusual data make predicting where we are in the run and forecasting next year’s run difficult. Nevertheless, I expect another several hundred thousand fish before it is all done. The run total to date is about 2.1 million fish and will likely hit 2.5 million or better.
Cost recovery will continue tomorrow Sept. 4th.
The troll fishery at West Crawfish continues to be robust with 25 boats and a total harvest of 175,000 chum.
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