Saving Seafood

Retail prices for 2026 Alaska salmon are still a wild card

May 1, 2026 — Given an Alaska Department of Fish and Game 2026 harvest prediction of 125.5 million salmon, down 36 percent from 197.4 million a year ago, forecasts on retail prices still remain a wild card.

The forecast for 56 million pink, 49.7 million sockeye, 17.2 million chum and 2.4 million coho compares with 2025 forecasts of 120 million pink, 52.7 million sockeye, 21.7 million chum and 2.7 million coho salmon.

While rumors are out there that salmon prices will rise because of the increased cost of fuel, nothing is settled yet, said Tito Marquez, manager at 10th & M Seafoods, a popular Anchorage seafood shop.

“We are still waiting to see how the season plays out for Alaska and Russia,” said Simon Marks, a research analyst at McKinley Research Group in Juneau, Alaska. “We usually get information on Russian pinks much later in the year.”

Current fisheries articles don’t suggest that dramatic changes are said Gunnar Knapp, professor emeritus of economics at the University of Alaska Anchorage Institute of Social and Economic Research. While hardly definitive, it is an indication that nothing is going on that is either hugely positive or negative news, he said.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

ALASKA: Higher temperatures spur Alaska’s invasive pike to eat more, a bad sign for salmon

April 30, 2026 — Invasive northern pike have wreaked havoc in Southcentral Alaska rivers and lakes. Introduced illegally in the 1950s, they have been devouring juvenile salmon and other native species.

Now a University of Alaska Fairbanks study warns that matters could get even worse.

As temperatures rise in waterways, invasive pike eat more, said the study, published in the journal Biological Invasions. And as temperatures continue to rise, that trend will continue, the study said. Based on expected temperature trends, invasive northern pike will eat 6% to 12% more by the end of the century, the study said.

“We expect there will be significant warming in the future, and the amount of fish that pike consume is going to increase with it,” Benjamin Rich, who led the study while earning a master’s degree at UAF’s College of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, said in a statement released by the university.

The UAF study found that over the past decade, northern pike of all age classes ate more as waters warmed. The increase was most dramatic in year-old pike, which upped their intake by about 63% over the period.

Read the full article at Alaska Public Media

ALASKA: Alaskan officials renew calls for better transboundary salmon protections

April 29, 2026 — Officials in the U.S. state of Alaska are again asking for better protections for salmon in the state’s transboundary rivers.

Data compiled by the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI) shows that salmon traveling from Canada into Southeast Alaska yield harvests of millions of salmon, valued at over USD 225 million (EUR 192.6 million) and making up roughly one-third of all North Pacific salmon runs.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

ALASKA: Alaska lawmakers weigh trawl ban as salmon crisis fuels debate

April 16, 2026 — A renewed push to ban bottom trawling in Alaska state waters is gaining traction in Juneau, as lawmakers grapple with declining salmon runs and mounting pressure from fishermen, tribes, and conservation groups.

According to reporting by Alaska Beacon, legislation introduced by Sen. Mike Cronk, R-Tok, and Rep. Kevin McCabe, R-Big Lake, would prohibit bottom trawling and dredging in state waters beginning in 2028. The proposal also calls for a state-led study on trawling impacts, with an estimated cost of $3.9 million.

The issue is deeply tied to the state’s identity and economy, with salmon declines– particularly on the Yukon River– intensifying scrutiny of bycatch in the Bering Sea pollock fishery. “Salmon is our identity,” Brian Ridley of the Tanana Chiefs Conference told lawmakers, emphasizing the cultural and subsistence importance of the resource.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

ALASKA: ‘The salmon people’: How Alaska’s only Native reservation saved its fishing culture

April 10, 2026 — Across Alaska’s coastline, from the Indigenous communities of Bristol Bay to the Tlingit and Haida villages of the panhandle, rural harbors that once bustled with commercial fishing boats now sit unused and empty.

Abandoned boats covered with mold and algae line the shores of one Southeast town; others have seen their fleets sold off and relocated.

In the Indigenous village of Metlakatla, though, it’s a different story.

Fishing vessels pack the downtown harbor on Annette Island, which sits just off the coast at Alaska’s southernmost tip. Huge seiners, with onboard cranes to reel in fish-laden nets, loom over the docks, with many more slips filled in by smaller gillnetters. Fathers and grandfathers still fish with sons and grandsons.

Experts and industry players disagree about the exact reasons for the decline of commercial fishing in the rest of rural, coastal Alaska — with some blaming state policies and others pointing to global market trends.

Read the full article at the Alaska Beacon

Study: Southern Alaska orca diet shifts across foraging hotspots

March 11, 2026 — Killer whales in Alaska’s Prince William Sound and Kenai Fjords have a diverse, seasonally changing diet of salmon and groundfish, consumed across regional foraging hotspots, a new study shows.

This population of about 1,000 animals, with a growth rate estimated in 2014 at 3.4 percent, shifts from Chinook, chum, and coho salmon to smaller amounts of Pacific halibut, arrowtooth flounder, and sablefish, depending on where the orcas are hunting. The study was published recently in the journal Ecosphere.

An actual estimate of the number of fish these killer whales eat was not part of this study, said Hannah Myers, an assistant professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks College of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, and lead author of the study. Researchers found that the orcas consumed mostly Chinook salmon in one foraging hotspot, mostly chum salmon in another, and mostly coho salmon in the third, Myers said. Pacific halibut, arrowtooth flounder, and sablefish also showed up in fecal samples as important prey items.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

ALASKA: Aleutians East Borough files ethics complaint after Board of Fisheries Area M decision

March 9, 2026 — The Aleutians East Borough is asking the state to investigate whether a member of the Alaska Board of Fisheries acted ethically during a vote on restrictions to the Area M salmon fishery.

Borough Mayor Alvin Osterback and representatives from several tribes in the region say they filed a complaint with the Alaska Department of Law on Feb. 23. They say a member of the Alaska Board of Fisheries had a conflict of interest when he cast a tie-breaking vote last month in favor of restricting the Area M fishery.

The complaint argues that Curtis Chamberlain of Anchorage should have recused himself because he is an attorney at the Calista Corporation, a Western Alaska Native corporation that has advocated for stricter limits on the fishery.

Read the full article at KYUK

ALASKA: Alaska Board of Fisheries votes to reduce Area M salmon fishing times

February 27, 2026 — The Alaska Board of Fisheries has approved some of the most severe restrictions on salmon fishing in the Area M fishery in decades.

On Feb. 25, the board approved a proposal to reduce June salmon fishing times in the area along the western Alaska Peninsula and Eastern Aleutians in a 4-3 vote. It pencils out to a loss of 136 hours for the drift fleet and 94 hours for the seine fleet. The reductions come during periods when vulnerable chum salmon stocks are present, but also when commercial fishermen are busy scooping up sockeye.

It’s a move welcomed by Western Alaska tribes and stakeholders who have faced years of record-low chum salmon returns on the Kuskokwim River, and complete salmon fishing closures on the Yukon River.

But they also say the reductions don’t go far enough. The original version of the approved proposal was submitted by Bethel’s tribe, and it called for a 10-day consecutive closure in the June fishery.

Read the full article at KYUK

ALASKA: Alaska salmon industry enters 2026 season heavily consolidated

January 27, 2026 — The Alaska salmon industry enters the 2026 season after a year marked by heavy industry consolidation, especially in the processing sector.

Tom Sunderland, a consultant with years of experience in the Alaskan salmon industry, said during the 2026 Global Seafood Market Conference, which took place 18 to 22 January in Hollywood, Florida, U.S.A., the state’s canning industry is now largely in the hands of Silver Bay Seafoods after it acquired a number of other Alaskan companies and facilities in recent years.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

ALASKA: Inside one of Alaska’s national parks, a fight looms over a possible gold mine

November 18, 2025 — High in a mountain valley on the far west side of this tidal inlet sits an unusual plot of land.

It’s a private parcel, with a gravel airstrip and four or five buildings that make up a small worker camp. But there are no towns in sight. Known as the Johnson Tract, the property is fully surrounded by the vast Lake Clark National Park—millions of wild acres marked by the broad white peaks of a volcano, sprawling glaciers and a muddy ocean coastline patrolled by brown bears.

Beneath the Johnson Tract lies a potential fortune. For decades, geologists have eyed gold, copper and zinc deposits thought to be worth billions of dollars. But they’ve never been tapped.

Now, amid surging gold prices and rising demand for metals like copper, the prospect is generating new excitement—and concern.

A prominent Alaska mining company is leasing the Johnson Tract from its Indigenous owners, and the property, some 125 miles southwest of Anchorage, has emerged as one of the most promising mining prospects in Southcentral Alaska.

But conservationists, commercial salmon fishermen and local lodge owners fear a mine, encircled by the federal protected area, could disrupt harvests and harm wildlife, including an endangered population of beluga whales.

Read the full article at News From The States