With the final stretch of the season upon us, we’ve got the numbers from the last daily run summary of 2019. And in those numbers, Egegik just pulled past the Nushagak to claim the highest cumulative harvest total in the bay.
With the final stretch of the season upon us, we’ve got the numbers from the last daily run summary of 2019. Egegik just pulled past the Nushagak to claim the highest cumulative harvest total in the bay.
The Nushagak harvest was the smallest in the bay yesterday, with a catch of only 9,000 fish. The cumulative in the district is up to 14.75 million. Escapement in the Nushagak district was 25,500 yesterday, but keep in mind that’s only counting two rivers since the Wood River Tower is all wrapped up for the season. Cumulative escapement is just a hair short of 3 million, currently at 2.99 million.
Also on the west side, Togiak pulled in 17,000 fish yesterday as part of a run that typically comes later than most other districts. The cumulative harvest in Togiak is now up to 690,000. Escapement in the district was 30,000 yesterday and 200,500 so far this season.
Moving over to the East side now, Egegik posted the bay’s biggest harvest for the second day in a row with a catch of 54,000. That pushes Egegik’s cumulative harvest up to 14.76 million, which pulls ahead to become the biggest cumulative harvest in the bay -- just about 14,000 ahead of the Nushagak. With no new escapement numbers coming from Egegik, the cumulative there will stay at 2.3 million.
Ugashik is coming in with the second biggest catch on the east side. Yesterday’s harvest was 32,000 fish, bringing the cumulative up to 989,500. Yesterday’s escapement in the district was 61,500, making the cumulative 1.5 million.
And finally, the Naknek-Kvichak posted a catch of 21,000 yesterday, which brings the cumulative to 11.4 million. Escapement in the district yesterday was 11,000, but that number is just coming from the Kvichak, with no data from the other two rivers. Cumulative escapement in the Naknek-Kvichak is just about to crack 3 million, with the total up to 2.99 million.
Down the Peninsula in Area M, the south side is up to 1.1 million sockeye so far, as well at 1.7 million pinks. On the North Pen, they’ve caught 1.9 million sockeye.
At the Chignik Weir, after a bit of a spike last week, the run is slowing down again. Yesterday, they counted just about 6,000 sockeye, which puts the total up to 522,000. That’s more than last year’s total at this point, which was around 308,000, but still lower than the five years beforehand.
We have an update on how this season’s bonuses are shaking out. For drifters fishing for Icicle: there is an 8 cent bonus for bled sockeye in RSW only, 15 cents for sockeye chilled in ice or RSW, and a 5 cent premium for floated fish. For set netters, there is also a .15 cent bonus for chilling.
Statistics on sexual harassment in the fishing industry aren’t readily available. But in recent years, there has been a push for awareness around the issue. Izzy Ross talked to Renee Gross, a reporter at KBBI in Homer, about her coverage on the hurdles of talking about this issue and sparking change.
Finally on this evening’s program, we have a musing from Melanie Brown, a Naknek set netter who has fished on her great grandfather’s site since 1979, and began writing for the fisher poets.
We’re in the final stretch of this summer’s fish report now, but we’re still taking suggestions and requests. If there’s anything we missed or anything you wanna hear about, send it our way. You can email the show at fish@kdlg.org or call 842-5281. That’s the same place to go with song requests and messages to the fleet.
And just a heads up, we’re not going to have any shows this weekend. Today’s Daily Run Summary will be the last scheduled set of numbers we get for the time being, so we won’t have a show for you on Saturday and Sunday. And next week, we’ll only have shows on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.