May 31, 2019 — On Thursday, as national delegations prepare to meet in Norway to discuss Atlantic salmon conservation, there’s a mixed bag of news for those who are passionate about salmon and salmon angling.
The headline on an Atlantic Salmon Federation press release, in fact, sounds downright cheery, as it announces that harvest of the fish in the North Atlantic is at an all-time low, and adult returns to North American rivers increased from 2017 to 2018.
That’s the attitude the ASF is taking heading into the annual meeting of the North Atlantic Salmon Conservation Organization, at least.
In an accompanying report, “State of the North American Atlantic Salmon Populations,” a more sober picture begins to emerge.
According to that report, salmon returns to U.S. rivers in 2018 met only 3 percent of the conservation limit for fish that had spent two winters at sea. And what’s a “conservation limit?” That’s defined as the number of spawning adults below which populations are unable to sustain themselves, and begin to decline.
And that pretty much defines the Atlantic salmon situation here in Maine; the fish is listed under the federal Endangered Species Act. Fishing for Atlantic salmon here is not allowed, and the population that does exist is almost entirely dependent on the annual stocking of hundreds of thousands of hatchery fish.
In 2018, according to the ASF, the Penobscot had 480 large salmon and 289 small salmon return. That run of 769 fish was lower than 2017’s 849 returning salmon.