Saving Seafood

ALASKA: Record-breaking pink run surges into Sitka

August 26, 2026 — Sitka purse seiners broke the area’s single-day pink salmon harvest record twice this month, as a strong late run and increased fishing effort turned around what had initially looked like a difficult season.

According to an Aug. 20 report from Raven Radio, seiners in District 13 harvested 1.23 million pink salmon on Aug. 6, surpassing the previous single-day record of roughly 950,000 fish set in 2017.

Four days later, the fleet broke the record again, harvesting 1.28 million pink salmon on Aug. 10.

“We’ve just been seeing really strong harvests of pink salmon and really strong escapements, which was kind of unusual for an even year, and fairly unusual, given what’s been going on with pink salmon in the rest of the Gulf of Alaska,” Alaska Department of Fish and Game Sitka area management biologist Aaron Dupuis told KCAW. “So it’s pretty special to have a good pink run in the Sitka area this year.”

Read the full article at National Fisherman

ALASKA: Deep sea mining in the Gulf of Alaska

August 13, 2026 — With China reportedly producing around 90 percent of the world’s supply of rare earth elements, and far ahead in processing technology, the U.S. and other countries are searching for new ways to meet demand, and deep sea mining on seamounts in the Gulf of Alaska is on the list of proposals. The Japanese press reported in July that experimental deep sea mining had successfully extracted rare earth elements such as neodymium, dysprosium, and terbium—all vital for fighter jet and missile guidance systems—from 6,000 feet below the surface.

In April of 2025, President Trump issued Executive Order 14285 “Unleashing America’s Offshore Critical Minerals and Resources,” and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is evaluating whether to advance a competitive lease sale for minerals on the Alaska Outer Continental Shelf. “We don’t know what impact deep sea mining could have on fisheries, but there is cause for concern,” says retired University of Alaska marine professor Rick Steiner, who now runs a consulting company called Oasis Earth.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

Sullivan reintroduces sweeping bill targeting bycatch, seafloor impacts

July 8, 2026 — U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) has reintroduced the Bycatch Reduction Act, legislation that would expand federal efforts to reduce bycatch, limit seafloor impacts from trawl gear, improve fisheries monitoring and increase transparency in fishery management.

According to Sullivan’s office, the bill builds on recommendations from the Alaska Salmon Task Force, which was created through legislation he authored and signed into law in 2022.

The proposal would establish new standards and monitoring requirements designed to keep both midwater and bottom trawl nets off the seafloor, require proven salmon excluder devices on pollock vessels, invest in salmon tagging and genetic sampling, expand ecosystem research, and create a new flume tank testing facility to evaluate fishing gear under simulated ocean conditions. The bill also would reauthorize NOAA’s Bycatch Reduction Engineering Program and encourage fishermen to test new gear and technologies aimed at reducing bycatch and habitat impacts.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

North Pacific council to study new options to reduce bottom trawling

June 17, 2026 — Federal fisheries managers plan to consider new options in 2027 to reduce bottom contact of pelagic trawl gear on red king crab populations in the Bering Sea and Gulf of Alaska.

Members of the North Pacific Fishery Management Council assigned council staff during their June meeting in Vancouver, Wash., to develop a discussion paper on potential regulatory measures to reduce bottom contact of pelagic trawl gear in areas currently closed to non-pelagic trawl gear.

The goal is to reduce the uncertainty associated with unobserved crab mortality and to improve existing fishing practices, in light of depressed red king crab populations and changing ecosystems, council staff said.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Loss of ocean monitoring could create fisheries blind spot

June 8, 2026 — The Alaska Marine Community Coalition is raising concerns over plans to dismantle much of the federal Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI), arguing that the loss of long-term ocean monitoring could reduce critical information used to understand changing conditions in Alaska’s fisheries.

In a recent statement, the coalition said the National Science Foundation plans to remove in-water equipment from four of the five OOI sites over the next 15 months, including Ocean Station Papa in the Gulf of Alaska, located roughly 620 miles offshore. The network has collected continuous oceanographic data since 2016, while Station Papa itself has served as one of the North Pacific’s longest-running ocean monitoring locations.

The coalition said the station provides information on deep-water temperatures, ocean chemistry, currents and biological conditions that help scientists track changes affecting species including salmon, halibut, crab and pollock.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Federal fisheries agency decides against listing Alaska king salmon as endangered

May 21, 2026 — Federal fisheries managers have determined that Gulf of Alaska king salmon are at low risk of extinction and don’t need to be listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act.

The decision, announced May 13, results from a more than two-year study of Alaska chinook — including Southeast stocks — by a team of National Marine Fisheries Service scientists, with input from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game as well as leaders of Alaska tribal governments and the public.

NMFS launched the review after the Wild Fish Conservancy, a Washington-based nonprofit, in January 2024 filed an Endangered Species Act petition, asking the fisheries service to list all Gulf of Alaska chinook stocks as endangered.

The conservation group pointed to long-term declines in king salmon numbers in Alaska.

A U.S. District Court judge in Washington, D.C., approved a settlement which ordered federal fisheries managers to issue a decision on the endangered petition by May 13.

Read the full article at Wrangell Sentinell

NOAA declines ESA listing for Gulf of Alaska Chinook

May 19, 2026 — Federal regulators have determined that Gulf of Alaska Chinook salmon will not be listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), concluding a status review initiated by a 2024 petition.

According to NOAA Fisheries, the agency’s 12-month review found that listing the species is “not warranted” at this time, based on the best available scientific and commercial information.

The decision stems from a petition submitted in Jan. 2024 requesting ESA protections for Gulf of Alaska Chinook salmon. NOAA previously issues a positive 90-day finding, determining that the petition presented substantial information indicating that listing “may be warranted,” prompting a full scientific review.

Read the full article at National Fisheries

Gulf of Alaska king salmon are not endangered species, federal government concludes

May 14, 2026 — The federal government has rejected a request to list three populations of Gulf of Alaska king salmon as endangered, according to a public notice scheduled for publication on Thursday.

The listing was requested in 2024 by a Washington state conservation group amid long-term declines in king salmon numbers in Alaska.

If the listing had been approved, it could have resulted in new limits on development in Alaska as well as major restrictions on commercial, sport and personal-use fishing in the state.

State officials opposed the listing, and in a written statement Wednesday morning, Alaska Department of Fish and Game Commissioner Doug Vincent-Lang said the decision means Alaska is managing its fish stocks well.

“This decision by NMFS Assistant Administrator Eugenio Piñeiro Soler indicates strong support for Alaska’s management of natural resources,” he said. “Alaska became a state, in large part, to hold authority over our own natural resources such as fisheries. Since then, the sound science and fisheries management by our department has been recognized globally.”

The Wild Fish Conservancy, a conservation group based in Washington state, had requested the listing in January 2024, citing climate change and competition from hatchery-raised fish.

Read the full article at Alaska Beacon

NOAA Fisheries Finds Listing Gulf of Alaska Chinook Salmon Under the Endangered Species Act “Not Warranted”

May 13, 2026 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

NOAA Fisheries has completed a status review and 12-month finding for Gulf of Alaska Chinook salmon in response to a January 2024 petition. The Wild Fish Conservancy petitioned to delineate and list one or more evolutionarily significant units (ESUs) of Gulf of Alaska Chinook salmon as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. 

We have determined that listing any of the three ESUs of Gulf of Alaska Chinook salmon under the Endangered Species Act is not warranted. This determination is based on the best available scientific and commercial information and the findings of the status review.

 

NOAA researchers use genetic tools to improve understanding of Alaska’s Pacific cod stocks

May 1, 2026 — NOAA researchers from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Alaska BioMap have been working on identifying genetic stocks of Pacific cod in Alaska to build a cost-effective genetic database full of assessments.

Breaking the population into four stocks – Bering Sea, Gulf of Alaska, Aleutian Islands, and Pacific Coast – the assessment found that none of the four have been or are subject to overfishing threats, as measured by estimating the spawning biomass, or the number of females able to reproduce, according to a release by NOAA.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource