Alaska's salmon season has seen ups and downs, but it will be a stretch for the total catch to reach the forecasted 221 million fish.
"It just depends on how these late-returning pink salmon at Prince William Sound performs, and whether or not pinks pick up at Southeast. It's possible, but we would still have to harvest around 30 million more salmon," mused Forrest Bowers, deputy director of the state's Commercial Fisheries Division.
One of the biggest stories of the season, of course, was the surprising double run of sockeye salmon (reds) to Bristol Bay. As soon as a disappointing first run petered out and the fishery was declared a bust, a surge of late reds caught everyone by surprise and pushed the catch to nearly 36 million fish.
Alaska's sockeye salmon fishery sometimes accounts for nearly two-thirds of the value of the total salmon harvest. A statewide tally of 51.5 million sockeye by mid-August makes it unlikely the sockeye harvest will reach the projected take of 58.8 million fish.
Reds might be the big money fish but pinks are fishermen's bread and butter, and some Prince William Sound runs have been impressive. Record returns to some hatcheries and better-than-expected wild pink salmon returns have pushed the total catch above 75 million, and humpies are still coming home. Will this year top the Sound's record 93 million pinks in 2013?
"You never know," Bowers said.
Conversely, the much anticipated pink salmon boom at Southeast Alaska has yet to materialize with the catch at 23 million.
"There's still a bit of fishing time remaining and the harvest will continue to tick upward, but right now it doesn't look like we'll hit that forecast of 58 million pinks," Bowers said.
The statewide catch forecast for pink salmon is 140 million this year; by mid-August, 128 million fish had been landed.
Other salmon highlights:
• Cook Inlet's sockeye harvest of 2.7 million is just slightly higher than last year's.
• Kodiak sockeye catches (2.2 million) have been lackluster, while the pink salmon catch of 14 million is above average.
• The Alaska Peninsula has been another bright spot for reds. Fishermen have taken 5.2 million sockeyes so far, nearly 2 million more than last year. And pink salmon catches of 9 million compare to fewer than 1 million a year ago.
• Chum catches in the Kuskokwim systems are poor, but sockeye catches of 55,000 so far are "reasonable." Escapements for both sockeye and Chinook salmon are looking better.
• Slow chum fishing is afflicting the Yukon River, where a 450,000 chum catch is down 25 percent from last year. But Norton Sound is having back-to-back bumper seasons for chum, with the catch nearing 150,000 fish.
• Kotzebue fishermen also are enjoying a good plug of chums, with 245,000 taken so far. Better yet, they have a buyer.
So as Alaska's total salmon harvest nears 196 million fish, Bowers calls it a good season.
"I think perhaps the … timing at Bristol Bay and the different ways the runs have come in have skewed people's perceptions," he said. "But taking nearly 200 million fish in one year is a large harvest."
By emergency order, trawlers back fishing in Gulf of Alaska
Trawlers are back fishing for cod and flatfish in the western and central Gulf of Alaska.
The boats got a reprieve from a May 3 closure, when the dozen boats fishing in one sector exceeded their limit of 2,700 kings. At the time, only half of the annual cod and 10 percent of the flatfish quotas had been taken.
This is the first year that chinook bycatch limits have been in place for Gulf trawlers. A combined allowance of 32,500 kings is split among different fisheries and sectors. Fisheries targeting pollock and rockfish, and at-sea catcher-processors fishing for cod and flatfish are below their respective bycatch limits.
That allowed for some redistribution of the chinook bycatch – from the boats under the limit to the tied-up trawlers, said Glenn Merrill, assistant regional administrator for the Alaska region at NOAA Fisheries in Juneau. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council voted to request by emergency order that an additional 1,600 chinook bycatch be given to cod and flatfish trawlers for the rest of the year.
"We are all well below our limits in the other sectors," Merrill said.
Emergency orders are rare. Merrill said this move was based on the closure's economic impacts to Kodiak and its workforce.
"Depending on how you calculate it, that represents about $5 million in ex-vessel (dockside) value and $12 million in first wholesale value," Merrill said. "Anytime you shut a fishery, there are other economic impacts on processor workers, purchases in the community, utilities, other things like that. That is something the council considered."
The pollock, cod, perch, flounders and other groundfish caught by Kodiak's fleet of some 35 trawlers is the community's largest and most valuable fishery – roughly 412 million pounds worth more than $485 million at the docks in 2014.
"Shutting down the trawl fisheries … erodes labor hours and affects these year-round resident processors," said Julie Bonney, executive director of Alaska Groundfish Data Bank.
Merrill said the council will reconsider the Gulf of Alaska chinook bycatch caps in October.
Laine Welch is a Kodiak-based commercial fishing columnist. Contact her at msfish@alaskan.com.