There's something fishy about the Alaska Department of Fish and Game's sport fishing regulations summary booklet for Southcentral Alaska.
According to the department, several errors slipped into this year's 96-page booklets, of which 230,000 were distributed across the region.
Among the errors:
-- Incorrect fishery dates for the Russian River sockeye and coho fisheries;
-- An incorrect time for the Eklutna Tailrace youth-only fisheries;
-- The omission of a statement clarifying inclusive waters for a special early season king salmon special harvest area and conservation zone on the Kenai Peninsula;
-- A misleading size restriction for Copper River Highway coho salmon.
-- The omission of the two-page "Southcentral Alaska Guiding Regulations" summary.
The regulation most likely to trip up anglers this time of year is a misstated date for the start of the popular Russian River sockeye fishery, which begins June 11. In a pair of graphic boxes on pages 66 and 67, the opening date for sockeye is stated as June 1. The regulation is correct in several other places on the two pages. Also on page 67, an information box says coho fishing on the Russian is open through the end of October, but it actually closes on October 1.
The department issued a press release detailing the errors on May 26. According to ADFG regional management biologist Matt Miller, the errors were made during a reformatting process designed to make the notoriously confusing summary booklets easier to read.
"The last couple of years we did a big project in-house where we tried to make changes in an effort to have continuity between all regions," Miller said.
Previously, Miller said, each of the four regions (Northern, Southwest, Southcentral and Southeast) was responsible for its own booklets, which meant there was little continuity between them.
"Each region was doing its own regulation summary booklet without discussion with anyone else," he said.
Some of the changes made during the reformatting process included things like adding larger fonts and making sure regulation booklets for each region included similar graphics and colors denoting open and closed areas.
"We're trying to make it more intuitive," he said.
Fish and Game publications specialist Tony Wagner said the Southcentral booklets cost about $75,000 to print and ship.
Miller said all of the errors involved regulations that were unchanged from last year, meaning anglers who simply follow the old rules will be fine. He also noted that the official regulations are available online and that ignorance of the law isn't an excuse -- despite the errors in the booklets.
"The regulations are what's in the codified regulation book, that's what's the law," he said. "We do the regulation summary to get the information out to people."
On page 3 of the booklet, the department includes a disclaimer stating that the summary booklets are provided as a service to anglers, but is "not intended to be a complete digest of all fishing regulations," and directs anglers to the Alaska Administrative Code website.
Miller said the department became aware of the mistakes after alert anglers brought them to Fish and Game's attention.
"There are more eyes in the public than there are in-house," he said.
He noted that anglers can check the department's website at adfg.alaska.gov for regulations and emergency orders, which the department frequently uses to modify regulations during the season.
Here's the complete text of the department's press release correcting the booklet errors:
2015 SOUTHCENTRAL ALASKA SPORT FISHING REGULATION
Southcentral anglers are advised that errors are present in the 2015 Southcentral Alaska Sport fishing Regulations Summary Booklet. ADF&G has identified inadvertent errors in the printed copy of the 2015 regulation booklet. The following errors have been corrected in the online version and the Department apologizes for any inconvenience caused by the errors in the printed copy.
BOOKLET ERRORS AND CLARIFICATION
Southcentral Alaska Guiding Regulations
Guided sport fishing regulations can be found on our website at: http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/static/regulations/fishregulations/PDFs/southcentral/2015SCguide_supplement.pdf
Lower Cook Inlet, Homer
Cook Inlet Salt Waters Special Regulations for the early run king salmon area on page 20. The inclusive water statement was omitted, but should have been included. Inclusive waters for the Special Harvest Areas and Conservation Zone are all marine waters south of the latitude of the mouth of the Ninilchik River (60o 03.99' N) to the latitude of Bluff Point (59o 40' N) and within 1 mile of shore (see map).
Northern Cook Inlet, Palmer
Page 44: Eklutna Tailrace Youth-Only King and Coho Fisheries are from 6:00a.m. – 6:00p.m.
Northern Kenai Peninsula, Soldotna
• Page 66 and 67 under Russian River: The first box for section A on page 66 and the first box for section C on page 67 incorrectly states the season date for sockeye salmon 16 inches or longer is June 1 - June 30. For both sections A and C the correct season dates for sockeye salmon 16 inches or longer is June 11 - June 30.
• Russian River on page 67, section C incorrectly states coho salmon season is August 21 through October 31. The coho salmon season in Section C is open through September 30 and closed October 1 through June 30.
Anchorage/Resurrection Bay/ PWS, Anchorage
Page 82 under Freshwater Special Regulations: In Copper River Highway streams, the sentence after the first bullet point under "Coho salmon" should read: "August 15-September 15: After harvesting a bag limit of coho salmon, a person may not sport fish with bait for the rest of that day in these waters". The "16 inches greater in length" does not apply to this fishery.
To review the corrected online versions of the 2015 Southcentral Alaska Sport Fishing Regulation Summary Booklet visit our website at: http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=fishregulations.sc_sportfish
Reach Matt Tunseth at mtunseth@alaskadispatch.com or 257-4335.