Get in touch and share some perspective — give us a call at 907-842-5281 or send an email to fish@kdlg.org. If you’d like to get a message out to the fleet on this show, send your messages to the fleet to fish@kdlg.org.
Messages to the Fleet
To the Fishing Vessel Linda K,
Happy Happy Birthday Towner! Keep on Rockin Crew.
All my love
Miss Denver
PS: missing you cap. HAY!
The Numbers
The baywide catch on Wednesday was 247,733 fish, bringing the total season catch to 743,192.
Cumulative escapement is at 845,105 so far.
The total run as of Wednesday June 26 was 1,588,297 sockeye.
Nushagak
With the first opening in the Nushagak District under way, fleets hauled in just under 247,676 fish on Wednesday, with an average drift delivery of 693 sockeye.
The drift fleet has caught about 85.2% of that total harvest, while Nushagak set netters have harvested 5.6%, and set netters in the Igushik have harvested about 9.1%.
Nushagak River
Nushagak River sonar counts picked up significantly yesterday after a quiet last few days. This surpassed the Nushagak King Action Plan’s requirement of 210,000 sockeye projected past the sonar station to open the district to commercial fishing. . Over 292,241 sockeye passed on Wednesday, for a total of almost 392,765 fish up the Nushagak so far.
1,457 Chinook passed the Nushagak River sonar, for a total of just under 12,454 so far this season.
About 45,440 chum salmon passed the sonar yesterday, for a total of around 95,383 so far.
The Nushagak River is estimated to see a 3.5 million sockeye run this season, with an escapement goal range of 370,000 to 1.4 million.
For chinook salmon, the escapement goal range in the Nushagak River is 55,000 to 120,000.
Wood River
At the Wood River counting tower on Wednesday, sockeye counts also skyrocketed. About 244,422 sockeye passed, bringing the total escapement to over 435,024, with another 70,314 fish passing the tower as of 6 a.m. this morning.
The escapement goal range for the Wood River this year is 700,000 to 3 million fish, and the forecast is for around 7.8 million sockeye.
Igushik
The Igushik tower crew counted just 138 fish yesterday, for a total of 480 thus far, with an additional 48 fish counted as of 6 a.m. this morning.
Togiak
Fishing crews in Togiak caught just 57 fish on Wednesday, for a total catch of roughly 3,138 so far.
Togiak’s escapement counts are scheduled to begin on July 5th.
The total inshore run for Togiak River sockeye is forecasted to be around 680,000 fish, with an escapement goal range of 120,000 to 270,000.
On the east-side…
Naknek-Kvichak
Naknek and Kvichak fishing fleets caught no fish yesterday. The season total stands at around 28,409 fish. So far, drifters in the Naknek and Kvichak Rivers have caught 89.5% of the season’s total catch. Setnetters on the Kvichak have caught 6.1% of the season’s catch and setnetters on the Naknek have caught 4.4%.
The Naknek tower crew counted only 66 spawners yesterday, bringing their total to an estimated 3,840 fish.
And the Kvichak tower crew counted just 144 fish yesterday for a total of 906.
Alagnak escapement numbers will likely start coming in on June 29th.
An inshore run of approximately 15 million sockeye is expected across the Naknek/Kvichak district this season.
The Naknek River escapement goal range is 800,000 to 2 million sockeye. In the Kvichak River, the escapement goal range is 2 million to 10 million, and the Alagnak River has a minimum escapement goal of 210,000.
Egegik
Egegik fleets brought in no fish yesterday, keeping the cumulative catch at 327,172. So far, Egegik drifters have caught 82.8% of the season’s total catch, and setnetters have caught 17.2%.
246 spawners made it past the counting towers in Egegik yesterday, bringing the season’s total escapement to almost 12,090 fish. The total season run so far for Egegik is just over 339,262.
The Egegik district’s inshore run this season is forecasted to be about 5.5 million sockeye salmon and the river’s escapement goal is 800,000 to 2 million fish.
Ugashik
Ugashik crews also brought in no fish yesterday, and their season’s catch stays at 112,813. So far, Ugashik drifters have caught 90.8% of the season’s total catch, and setnetters have caught 9.2%.
The district’s inshore run this season is forecasted to be about 4.6 million sockeye salmon and the river’s escapement goal is 500,000 to 1.4 million fish.
Ugashik escapement counts are scheduled to begin any day now.
Vessel Registrations
As of 9 a.m. this morning, in Egegik, there are 235 permits on 175 boats. That will drop slightly to 235 permits on 174 boats. D boats will go from 60 to 61
The Ugashik District has 169 permits on 114 boats, which will increase to 181 permits on 122 boats by Saturday. DBoats will move up from 55 to 59.
In the Naknek-Kvichak District, there are now 248 permits on 195 boats. That will bump up to 286 permits on 224 boats by Saturday. DBoats will increase from 53 to 62.
In the Nushagak, there are 691 permits on 502 boats. By Saturday, that will increase to 707 permits on 515 boats. DBoats will increase from 189 to 192.
The Togiak District will remain the same at 14 permits on 14 boats.
In total bay-wide, there are 1,357 active permits on 1,000 boats and 357 DBoats.
Chignik River weir
At the Chignik River weir, about 10,093 sockeye swam through the weir on Wednesday, for a season total of just under 138,585 so far.
Roughly 9,411 fish were part of the early run, and 682 fish were part of the late run.
Area M
Over in Area M, fleets harvested around 54,382 sockeye on Wednesday for a season total of over 1,101,301.
95 chinook were caught in Area M yesterday, bringing the total season harvest to just under 1,395 so far.
About 60,287 chum were caught yesterday. Their season harvest is over 374,241.
No coho were caught on Wednesday. Their season total is still 138.
12,705 pinks were caught, bringing the pink’s season total to over 257,193.
The majority of commercial harvests this season have been caught on the South Peninsula by South Unimak and Shumagin Islands fleets, with sockeye harvests also coming in from Port Moller to Outer Point Heiden and Nelson Lagoon.
Port Moller Test Fishery
Weather was quite rough on Wednesday, and crews were unable to collect samples from all stations except for station 6.
A catch index of 219 is all that was reported from that station.
Today they should be back up and running, and we should have the latest stock composition on tomorrow’s show.
Get in touch at fish@kdlg.org or 907-842-2200.
