Escapement in the Egegik District has reached its midpoint goal, so the 48-hour waiting period for transfers into the Egegik District is now waived.
The run in Bristol Bay is over 30 million fish, 30.8 million to be exact. Total harvest baywide was 2.1 million yesterday, bringing the season’s harvest in Bristol Bay to 20.9 million fish. Total escapement so far this season across the bay is 8.8 million.
Fish per drift delivery saw a bit of a swing yesterday. Ugashik fishers averaged over 2,500 fish per delivery, the Naknek-Kvichak saw an average of over 1,000 fish per drift delivery, but other districts were between 180 and 700 fish per delivery.
Nushagak District
The Nushagak District had a daily harvest of 440,000 fish yesterday. Because the drift fleet is behind on allocation, the Wood River Special harvest area is still open to the drift fleet, with its next opener starting at 7 p.m tonight.
Escapement across the Nushagak district was 311,000 fish yesterday, for a total district escapement so far of 2.5 million fish. Breaking that down by river in the Nushagak district:
Nushagak River
The Nushagak River sonar counted 98,500 sockeye pass upriver yesterday, making total sockeye escapement in the Nushagak River 959,000 fish.
The sonar also saw 70 kings for a season king escapement of 38,000 in the Nushagak River, and 2,400 chums for a season chum escapement of 100,000 fish so far.
Wood River
The Wood River counting tower crew had counted 37,800 fish past the tower before 6 a.m. this morning. This makes escapement in the Wood River 1.4 million fish.
Igushik River
In the Igushik River, the counting tower crew counted 4,900 sockeye past the tower this morning, bringing total escapement in the Igushik River to 78,000.
Altogether, the total run in the Nushagak District is 8.6 million fish--the third largest run in the bay so far.
Togiak
12,000 fish were caught in the Togiak District yesterday, bringing the season total harvest in Togiak to 63,000.
The counting tower crew in Togiak saw 700 fish pass before 6am this morning, making cumulative escapement in the Togiak District 10,000 fish. Togiak’s total run is now 73,000.
Naknek-Kvichak
A daily harvest of 877,000 fish in the Naknek-Kvichak District brings total season harvest in the district to 7.2 million--the largest total harvest in the bay so far. That total catch is attributed 7% to Kvichak set-netters, 14% to Naknek set-netters, and 79% to the drift fleet.
Escapement across the Naknek-Kvichak District was 847,000 fish yesterday, bringing total escapement across the district to 4.7 million fish. Let’s look at that escapement by river:
Alagnak River
In the Alagnak River, 315,000 fish escaped yesterday, bringing Alagnak total escapement to 817,000 fish.
Kvichak River
The Kvichak River had 429,000 sockeye escape yesterday. This makes the total escapement in the Kvichak River 1.2 million fish. The Kvichak River also has a 700,000 fish in-river estimate.
Naknek River
And the Naknek River had a daily escapement of 103,000 fish yesterday, pushing the total Naknek River escapement to 2.6 million.
Across the Naknek-Kvichak District, the total run is 12.6 million--the largest run in the bay at this point in the season.
Egegik
In Egegik, harvest yesterday was 610,000 fish yesterday. Total harvest in Egegik is the second largest total district harvest in the bay at 7 million fish, caught 86% by the drift fleet, and 14% by the set-netters..
Escapement in Egegik reached its midpoint goal, 1.5 million fish, after 329,000 fish escaped in Egegik yesterday. The 48-hour transfer period into the Egegik district is now waived. Boats transferring to other districts from Egegik still have to wait 48 hours.
Along with the 200,000 fish in-river estimate in the Egegik River, the total run in the Egegik District is 8.7 million--the second largest total run in the bay.
Ugashik
Fishers in the Ugashik District hauled in 166,000 sockeye yesterday. Total harvest so far is 451,000 fish in Ugashik, caught 36% by the set-netters and 64% by the drift fleet.
Daily escapement in Ugashik was 75,000 fish yesterday, bringing cumulative escapement in that district to 157,000 fish. Along with the 180,000-fish in-river estimate, the total Ugashik run so far this year is 788,000 fish.
Permit registration on July 11 9:00 a.m. to July 13 at 9:00 a.m.
Today in vessel registrations: There are 1,558 permits fishing on 1,223 vessels in the bay right now. That’s 888 single permit boats and 335 D boats. In 48 hours, that will be 1,315 total vessels fishing the bay, 379 of which will be D boats. Now, by district:
The Naknek-Kvichak District has the most registrations in the bay right now, and will blow the competition out of the water in 48 hours. Right now, it’s being fished by 457 vessels, 142 of which are D boats. That’s 37% of the baywide fleet. That will jump to 532 vessels in 48 hours, 174 of which will be D boats.
Egegik is second in vessel registrations, 32% of the fleet. 390 boats are fishing there, and 122 D boats. Based on the numbers we got this morning, that will jump on Monday morning by 2 boats to 392 boats, with the same 122 D boats, although those numbers may change with the elimination of the 48 hour waiting period to enter the Egegik District.
The Nushagak District is being fished by 24% of the fleet or 289 boats, 60 of which are D boats. In 48 hours, those numbers will both drop: there will be 279 boats fishing in the Nushagak, 59 of which will be D boats.
The Ugashik District is being fished by 46 boats, 11 of which are D boats. That’s 4% of the fleet. Ugashik will see the biggest jump in the bay in comparison to its current registrations on Monday morning: 71 vessels will be fishing in Ugashik, 24 of which will be D boats.
There are 41 boats fishing in Togiak, and that 3% of the fleet won’t change in the next two days.
Chignik
6,348 sockeye passed the Chignik weir yesterday, and 924 sockeye passed the weir as of 9am this morning. That brings the total sockeye run in the Chigniks to 133,642: 113,883 in the early run and 19,759 in the late run.
Also yesterday, 36 king salmon passed the weir. Added to the 6 that passed the weir this morning, the Chignik king run is 332. 24 pinks passed the weir yesterday, and another 6 passed this morning, making the pink run in the Chigniks 312 fish.
Area M
Harvest on the South Peninsula of Area M is confidential yesterday because fewer than three processors are buying, but we still have the public harvest numbers.
Fleet in Area M caught 165,000 sockeye yesterday, bringing total harvest of sockeye in Area M to just over 1 million. Fleet also caught 50 kings, 350 chums, and 16 pinks yesterday.
Port Moller
Turning now to the Port Moller test fishery, we’ve got a new batch of indices from yesterday, but no other news from Port Moller. We’ll hopefully have the next stock composition estimate for you tomorrow afternoon.
Here are yesterday’s catch indices from Port Moller:
Station Index
Station 4 had an index of 0 -- no fish were caught at Station 4.
Station 6 had an index of 23 -- 3 in the 4 ½ and 4 in the 5 ⅛.
Station 8 had an index of 27 -- 3 in the 4 ½ and 5 in the 5 ⅛.
Station 10 had an index of 117 -- 22 in the 4 ½ and 15 in the 5 ⅛.
Station 12 had an index of 14 -- 4 in the 4 ½ inch mesh.
Station 14 had an index of 21 -- 6 in the 5 ⅛ inch mesh.
Messages to the fleet:
Happy birthday from Coco to her dad Mike on the F/V Miss Gina out in Egegik.
And another happy birthday to Mike on the F/V Miss Gina, from his wife, Gina.
To Captain Doug Morgan fishing vessel Miss Emma
Doug, I know it FEELS like everyone in the bay is catching fish and you're not. Statistically that's true. But just remember....well ah....um... l forgot what I was going to say...
Oracle
To: Capt. Brent Cathey on the F/V Independence
Hope all is well. Things are good here. I finished the closets and kept everything color coded just like you prefer. I had no idea chartreuse was a real color. You teach me new things every day. I’m starting on your shop next. You don’t really need all these tools right? And who has this many vises?
Miss you like crazy,
Montana Chick
Correction: The percent allocations of harvest by gear type are calculated from the cumulative harvest, not the daily catch as initially reported.